Tuesday, November 29, 2011
Cygnus Mosaic is getting large, 18 panels now
22 x14 degrees of sky from the constellation Cygnus
The "Chinese Dragon Nebula"
The "Chinese Dragon Nebula"
H-alpha emission, 18 panels, mosaic image of Nebulae in Cygnus
Download link for the 2600x3950 pixels image HERE. (Note, about 7,3 meg)
The noise in a background, is not a noise but countless number of stars!
The noise in a background, is not a noise but countless number of stars!
I was busy last night
I started to image about Four a clock! Up here, it's dark enough for astronomical imaging at that time.
My previous project, an eight panel mosaic of Cygnus Nebulae, is starting to grow! I was not planning to shoot so large mosaic but since the first one turned to be so good and funny to do, lots of work though, I decided to go on. The Canon EF 200mm f1.8 lens is very fast optically, so the needed exposure time per panel is reasonable. I shot all 12 new panels between Four and Two a clock , Ten hours straight, no pauses.
I will shoot other channels, S-II & O-III, little by little. If weather cooperate, I might have this ready before Christmas. This is the largest mosaic, I have done so far.
The "Chinese Dragon Nebula"
Do you see a Chinese Dragon in upper image?
Some technical information about the image
- Original size for the 18 panels mosaic 14.000 x 9000 pixels
- Resolution 5,5 arch seconds / pixel
- Image center, RA 20h 27s, Dec 43d 30m 45s
- Area of this image is about 22 x14 degrees of sky.Full Moon has an angular diameter of 0,5 degrees, it fits to the area of this image about 1230 times!Start of the Cygnus project
I started the Cygnus mosaic project by shooting a three panel mosaic from the "Cirrus area"Blog post can be seen here: http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2011/11/cirrus-of-cygnus-project-finalized.html
Image in mapped colors, H-a = Green, S-II = Red and O-III = BlueThe second phase was an eight panel mosaic. The blog post can be seen from here:
Eight panel mosaic. This image gives an idea, how the large mosaic will look in colors.
Relative sizes of mosaics.
Technical details for the 18 panel mosaic
I have used a very fast camera optics, Canon EF 200mm f1.8, full open to collect all the data in this mosaic. Due that, total exposure time is relatively short, ~12h, there are some very dim formations clearly visible.
Processing work flow:
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Levels, curves and mosaic combine in PS CS3.
Optics, Canon EF 200mm camera lens at f1.8
Camera, QHY9
Image Scale, ~5,5 arcseconds/pixel
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Filter, Baader 7nm H-alpha
Panel 1
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 2
H-a, 5x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 3
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 4
H-a, 4x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 5
H-a, 5x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 6
H-a, 8x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 7
H-a, 6x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 8
H-a, 4x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 9
H-a, 4x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 10
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 11
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 12
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 13
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 14
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 15
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 16
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 17
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Panel 18
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
Total exposure time for all panels ~12h
Top of light exposures, there are calibration files shot.
21 Flat frames
99 Bias frames
19 Dark frames
NOTE.
No star or noise reduction, nor sharpening, are used.
NOTE.
No star or noise reduction, nor sharpening, are used.
Sunday, November 27, 2011
A collection of "Sub mosaics" of Cygnus mosaic
A series of panoramic mosaics.
Mosaics are done from the material used in my large, eight panel, mosaic of Cygnus Nebulae.
Couple of panoramas in natural color palette from narrowband channels
I made mosaic panoramas above, since I now have several over lapping images from constellation Cygnus.
The massive resolution, eight panel, mosaic of Nebulae in Cygnus can be seen in this blog post:
http://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2011/11/cygnus-project-grande-finale.html
Eight panel mosaic of Cygnus, used for the panoramas
All panoramic images above are made from this material.
A very large, 7,5 meg and 3000x2000 pixel, version can be seen HERE.
Saturday, November 26, 2011
North America & Pelican Nebulae as a stereo pair 3D
Other 3D-formats:
Original 2D:
NOTE! This is a personal vision about forms and shapes, based on some known facts and an artistic impression.
North America & Pelican Nebulae as an anaglyph Red/Cyan 3D
3D-NOTE!
You'll need Red/Cyan Eyeglasses to be able to see images as 3D.If you have a Red and Blue filters, you can use them! Red goes to Left eye.
Click for the large image
Other 3D-formats:
Original 2D:
R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen. Note, the "noise" in background is not a noise but countless stars!
NOTE! This is a personal vision about forms and shapes, based on some known facts and an artistic impression.
Friday, November 25, 2011
Cygnus mosaic as a stereo pair 3D
Cross vision 3D
Other 3D-formats:
Original 2D:
NOTE! This is a personal vision about forms and shapes, based on some known facts and an artistic impression.
Thursday, November 24, 2011
Grande mosaic of Cygnus as an anaglyph Red/Cyan 3D
3D-NOTE!
You'll need Red/Cyan Eyeglasses to be able to see images as 3D.If you have a Red and Blue filters, you can use them! Red goes to Left eye.
Note how dark nebulae are shadowing emission ones.
Vertical composition
Other 3D-formats:
http://astroanarchy.zenfolio.com/f359296072Original 2D:
http://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2011/11/cygnus-project-grande-finale.html
NOTE, this is a largish file, 1400x1950 pixels and 2,8 meg.
Ps.
An anaglyph 3D-image from the "Cirrus area", of this mosaic, can be seen here:
Stereo pairs from "Cirrus of Cygnus", Parallel & Cross vision:
NOTE! This is a personal vision about forms and shapes, based on some known facts and an artistic impression.
Wednesday, November 23, 2011
A two frame panorama from Cygnus
A panoramic image from the Butterfly to the Crescent Nebula
In constellation Cygnus
Click for the large image
Image is in mapped colors from an emission of ionized elements,
Red=Sulfur, Green=Hydrogfen & Blue=Oxygen
I have published some images composed from the material, I collected for the large panorama of Cygnus Nebulae. Original size for this high resolution image is ~7000x3000 pixels. Technical details can be found from an older post, Cygnus project, the grande finale.
A narrow stripe, a detail from the Cygnus mosaic
This image is a narrow cut from my previous post, Cygnus project, the grande finale.
Image is reduced a lot, original, full size, mosaic is 14.000x10.000 pixels.
Image stripe in this post is shown at resolution 640x2700, it might take few moments to load, sorry.
The idea is to show, what kind of resolution a well collimated and focused, 200mm f1.8, high end camera lens can deliver.
Image stripe in this post is shown at resolution 640x2700, it might take few moments to load, sorry.
The idea is to show, what kind of resolution a well collimated and focused, 200mm f1.8, high end camera lens can deliver.
A cropped and reduced stripe from the Cygnus mosaic in mapped colors.
Image is combined from emissions of ionized elements, Red=Sulfur, Green=Hydrogen & Blue=Oxygen.
Large area and technical details can be seen in my previous post, Cygnus project, the grande finale.
Tuesday, November 22, 2011
Cygnus project, the grande finale
Mosaic of dancing Nebulae
in constellation Cygnus
An Eight panel mosaic of Nebulae in Cygnus in mapped colors.
NOTE, this is a largish file, 1400x1950 pixels and 2,8 meg.
Direct link to a 2000x3000 pixel version HERE. (7,5 meg)
(Original one is ~14.000x10.000 pixels)
Direct link to a 2000x3000 pixel version HERE. (7,5 meg)
(Original one is ~14.000x10.000 pixels)
It took couple of Months to shoot all the needed frames for this mosaic and I did use every possible clear moment. This mosaic image has eight full size (3500x2500 pixels) panels and the final image has a massive size of 7.000 x 10.000 pixels. For every panel, I shot three different images of emission of ionized elements, Hydrogen, Sulfur and Oxygen. (H-a, S-II and O-III). This image is a mapped color composition showing Hydrogen as Green, Sulfur as Red and Oxygen as Blue.
Image spans about 10 degrees horizontally and 14 degrees vertically. (Apparent size of the full Moon is ~30 arc minutes = 0,5 degrees. Full moon fits to this are at about 480 times!)
Generally this mosaic took a lots of work to finalize and it was kind of difficult to process since the star field is so very dense at galactic plane. Overall I'm happy with this result!
Northern constellation Cygnus (aka "Norther Cross") locates at the plane of our Milky Way and it's a treasure box of beautiful nebulae. Bright supergigant star Gamma Cygni can be seen at center Right, next to the Butterfly Nebula, IC 1318. The bright Blueish spot at upper Right is the Crescent Nebula, NGC 6888.At top Left, a beautiful open cluster, NGC 6819 , can be faintly seen. (It's well resolved in full res. image)
Two bright objects at bottom middle are Sh2-112 and a bluish Sh2-115. At bottom Right are parts of the North America and Pelicän nebulae visible. The propeller Nebula can be seen at center left. There are many other objects in this large field.
Overlay with a star map.
Closeups from the large panorama
Click for a large image!
Open cluster, NGC 6819, at middle, from upper Left corner of the mosaic.
I have finally teamed this f1.8 lens and now all of the stars are pinpoints to edge to edge!
Closeup from lower Right corner shows part of the North America & Pelican Nebulae.
The Crescent Nebula from upper Right.
Gamma Cygni from center Right and a part of the Butterfly Nebula.
A closeup of the "Cirrus" area from lower Left of the large mosaic.
New pictures from the panorama material
Since I now have a load of processed panels for the panorama, I have composed some new individual high resolution images out of them.
Click for a large image!
Mountains and dust of Pelican Nebula
I started this project by shooting a Three panel mosaic of "Cirrus of Cygnus"
"Cirrus of Cygnus", this area can be seen at Left in an image at top.
A "Natural" Color composition from the emission line channels
R=80%Hydrogen+20%Sulfur, G=100%Oxygen and B=85%Oxygen+15%Hydrogen to compensate otherwise missing H-beta emission. This composition is very close to a visual spectrum.
Click for a large image!
Large Eight panel mosaic in natural color composition from the NB channels
A two panel mosaic from the same material.
An animation, nebula with and without stars
This animation will show more details in the nebula, since human brains gets easily fooled to see shapes in a cloud of dots, like stars are. Please, let the animated GIF load for few seconds to see it animated. ( 1,2 meg)
Click for a large image!
I think, that dim Blueish arch like formations, seen at top Left, are some reflections.
8,5nm O-III filter is too wide. to block all of the light pollution. and reflections can happened.
Technical details
I have used a very fast camera optics, Canon EF 200mm f1.8, full open to collect all the data in this mosaic. Due that, total exposure time is relatively short, ~15h, there are some very dim formations clearly visible.
Processing work flow:
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Levels, curves and color combine in PS CS3.
Optics, Canon EF 200mm camera lens at f1.8
Camera, QHY9
Image Scale, ~5 arcseconds/pixel
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Filter, Baader 7nm H-alpha and Baader O-III 8,5nm
Exposures for Eight panels,
Panel 1 (Top Left),
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 2x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 2x300s Binned 3x3
Panel 2 (Top Right),
H-a, 5x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 6x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 6x300s Binned 3x3
Panel 3 (Upper Left),
H-a, 3x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 3x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 2x300s Binned 3x3
Panel 4 (Upper Right),
H-a, 4x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 6x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 6x300 Binned 3x3
Panel 5 (Lower Left),
H-a, 5x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 3x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 2x300s Binned 3x3
Panel 6 (Lower Right),
H-a, 8x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 6x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 6x300 Binned 3x3
Panel 7 (Bottom Left),
H-a, 6x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 3x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 2x300 Binned 3x3
Panel 8 (Bottom Right),
H-a, 4x900s Binned 1x1
O-III, 2x300s Binned 3x3
S-II, 2x300s Binned 3x3
Total exposure time for all channels ~15h
Total exposure time for all channels ~15h
Top of light exposures, there are calibration files shot.
H-a, 21 Flat frames
O-III, 21 Flat frames
S-III, 21 Flat frames
All filters:
99 Bias frames
19 Dark frames
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