Science Daily: Uranus
- New images reveal what Neptune and Uranus really look like January 5, 2024
- Ringing in the holidays with ringed planet Uranus December 19, 2023
Science Daily: Pluto
- How Pluto got its heart April 15, 2024
- Evidence of geothermal activity within icy dwarf planets February 15, 2024
Science Daily: Kuiper Belt
- How Pluto got its heart April 15, 2024
- Evidence of geothermal activity within icy dwarf planets February 15, 2024
Author: Roland Roberts
Eclipse Prominences
I had a vague idea of trying to merge this with an HDR version of the corona to show the prominences and the corona all at once. Of course, it doesn’t look like that to the naked eye, but hey! However, the process of aligning the image sets immediately revealed that won’t work. The moon …
“First” 2024 Totality Image
It’s really about the 3rd or 4th attempt to merge multiple exposures to get an HDR image. Object: Sun, solar eclipse Location: Outskirts of Jackson, MO Observer: Roland Roberts Time: 8 April 2024, 13:59:10 – 13:59:33 Camera: Canon T6i, Lens: AstroTech 66ED, 400 mm @ f/6 Exposure: 2 each at 1/4000, 1/1000, 1/250, 1/60, 1/15, …
3D Constellation Models
Last week I as at NEAF and as usual, the 3D constellation models were a hit. I’ve been reusing some very old model templates created ages ago but they have some problems…with the math that created them. This past year, I wrote up a spreadsheet with the calculations an a write-up on how to use …
Eclipse 2024 Preparation
Final setup and tests for Monday’s totality from Jackson, MO. I’m fortunate enough to have family living pretty much on the centerline for this one. Depending on which eclipse map web site I visit, the centerline either goes by about 50 meters west or 50 meters east of my location. This is a 1200×1200 crop …
Eclipse is Coming
I’ve been silent for the past year because…well, I’ve done pretty much nothing astronomy-wise. Life has kept me busy. But I’m fortunate enough to have relatives that live pretty much on the centerline of this eclipse (within a couple hundred meters or less, depending in which online map I consult). So, I’ve got 4 minutes …
Lost Drivers from the Days of Windows 7
So I haven’t used my Orion ST120 in a while which means I’ve gone through two OS upgrades from Windows 7 to Windows 10 and recently to Window 11. Which means I don’t have a driver for my archaic James Lacy LazyFocus controller that goes with my very nice first generation Moonlite focuser. Fortunately, I’m …
StarXTerminator 2.x: I’m sold
I’ve had mixed luck with StarXTerminator. When I first came across it, I found it worked better than StarNet for the images I was processing. Those were with the RedCat 51 at 250mm F/L. It was wonderful, so I bought a license and considered worth every penny. Then I started doing some wider field images …
Star Haven M31
As usual, between equipment issues and weather issues, I got much less than I expected. But it was a good time with friends from the club and I did get some images. Object M 31, in the constellation Andromeda Camera dual Canon T6i, modified Lens/Scope Rokinon 85mm f/1.4 @ f/4 Exposure 55 x 3 minutes …
PixInsight Background/Gradient Removal
Sometimes, you just have to keep asking the same question over and over again until you get a good answer. PixInsight has some really good background/gradient removal tools and if you use PixInsight, you’re immediately thinking of the Dynamic Background Extraction (DBE) or Automatic Background Extraction (ABE). Truth is, that’s what I always think of, …
Analyzing Images
So, this is a post, but I might convert it to a page for reference at some point. I’m exploring how to analyze my imaging train for aberrations and what I can do about it. ASTAP has a couple of built-in tools that make this easy. The question is what constitutes an aberration that is …