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All the material on this website is copyrighted to J-P Metsavainio, if not otherwise stated. Any content on this website may not be reproduced without the author’s permission.

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Monday, January 26, 2015

New exhibition in Oulu, Finland



Astronomical nature photographing, an exhibition
Monday, Wednesday and Thursday from 12-18.00 every week until the end of the February.
Kajaaninkatu 13, Oulu, welcome!

An exhibition poster, my photo of NGC 281 at background

A MAP



Some photos from the exhibition, many new photos as a high quality aluminium prints

An aluminium print of constellation Cygnus at right, 90 x 144cm


A photographic print of Veil nebula at light of ionized Oxygen only, 30x40cm


NGC 1499, the California Nebula, an aluminium print, 55x70cm


At to, an aluminium print of the Tulip nebula, 58x70cm. At bottom, Sharpless 132, as an aluminium print, 50x70cm.

The Pelican Nebula at bottom left, an aluminum print at size of 62x110cm and many others.


A collection of real museum quality photographic prints at many sizes




Sunday, January 11, 2015

Veil Nebula in light of ionized oxygen only



This must be the worst winter season ever! Last time we have had clear skies, up here 65N, was at end of the October, almost two and half months ago! Now it's cloudy, -13celsius (~8 fahrenheit) with a storming wind to a top of that. Next ten days will be no better by weather forecast. Few words comes to in my mind but I say only one, frustrated.



Veil Nebula in O-III light only
Click for the large image

This photo of the Veil Nebula supernova remnant in Cygnus shows only an emission from the ionized oxygen (O-III). All the stars are suppressed to show the actual shapes of the ionization front better.
The ionized oxygen, O-III, glows at wavelength of 500,7 nanometer. To a human eye it shows as a turquoise color. 

Info

Veil Nebula is a cloud of ionized gas and dust, leftovers from an exploded star. The star exploded some 5000-8000 years ago at distance of about 1470 light years. This, relatively faint target, is difficult to image due the large angular diameter, about three degrees, and a dense star field.


Some closeup photos in emission of ionized oxygen only


IC 1340 in ionized Oxygen light, O-III

More info about this photo of mine can be see HERE



Pickering's Triangle in ionized Oxygen light, O-III

More info about this photo of mine can be see HERE



Eastern Veil in ionized Oxygen light, O-III

More info about this photo of mine can be see HERE



Witch Broom Nebula in ionized Oxygen light, O-III

More info about this photo of mine can be see HERE



The Veil Nebula in colors

This photo of the Veil nebula shows it in full colors. Colors are combined from the emission of ionized elements, hydrogen, sulfur and oxygen.(H-alpha, S-II and O-III) More info about this photo of mine can be see HERE




Thursday, January 8, 2015

Astro Anarchy gets published




CNET article by Michelle Starr about my "It looks like..." photo pairs


You can read the story from HERE


A sample image, the Twirling Dancer

Melotte 15 cluster in IC 1805, info about this photo can be seen HERE

All my "It looks like...image pairs can be found from THIS blog post.



Wednesday, January 7, 2015

Cygnus Wall in visual colors


This photo is originally published at 31.10. last year. At the time I made only a mapped color version of it.
Now I'm publishing the same image in visual spectrum. It's combined from three component exposures of an emission from the ionized elements, hydrogen , oxygen and sulfur. (H-alpha, O-III and S-II) Channels are combined by following method, Red = 75%H-alpha + 25%S-II Green = O-III and Blue = 80%O-III+20%H-alpha (to compensate otherwise missing H-beta emission.)

The Cygnus Wall, a part of the much larger North america Nebula, NGC 7000. This is a relatively bright formation, three hours of H-alpha light and half an hour of O-III was captured for this photo. S-II channel is borrowed from an older wide field image, since the clouds rolled in before I was able to shoot it.

Cygnus Wall
Click for a large image

Image is in visual spectrum from an emission of  the ionized elements. 
The Red glow is mainly from ionized hydrogen, bluish hues are from ionized oxygen.

Detail from the image above



INFO
Source: NASA APOD

The North America nebula on the sky can do what the North America continent on Earth cannot -- form stars. Specifically, in analogy to the Earth-confined continent, the bright part that appears as Central America and Mexico is actually a hot bed of gas, dust, and newly formed stars known as the Cygnus Wall. The above image shows the star forming wall lit and eroded by bright young stars, and partly hidden by the dark dust they have created. The part of the North America nebula (NGC 7000) shown spans about 15 light years and lies about 1,500 light years away toward the constellation of the Swan (Cygnus).

Technical details

Processing work flow
Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 33 iterations, added at 50% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.

Imaging optics
Celestron Edge HD 1100 @ f7 with 0,7 focal reducer for Edge HD 1100 telescope

Cameras and filters
Imaging camera Apogee Alta U16 and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x2
Astrodon filter, 5nm H-aplha
Astrodon filter, 3nm O-III

Exposure times
H-alpha 6 x 1200s = 3h
O-III 3 x 600s = 30min. 
S-II is borrowed from my older wide field image

Orientation

The area of interest is marked as a white rectangle, Photo is in mapped colors.


A single un cropped, calibrated and stretched 20 min. H-alpha frame





Sunday, January 4, 2015

The year of Astro Anarchy as a movie



All my photos and some highlights of the year 2014 as a movie, 2min 30s. 



Click to start and stop the movie



Thursday, January 1, 2015

Happy New Year!




Image shows the Tulip Nebula, Sh2-101, in Cygnus. More info about this photo HERE



test










Wednesday, December 31, 2014

The year 2014 of Astro Anarchy Observatory, happy new year 2015 to all!


The Great Wall of Cygnus 2014

Astro Anarchy Observatory, the year 2014

At the Spring season of 2014 my old Meade LX200 12" telescope gave up and died. I spent a whole summer season trying to find a way to finance a new setup.

I had lots of troubles, especially with the Meade company. First they contacted me and offered a brand new 14" LX850 for free. Then, after a couple of months, they cancelled everything without a reason. Meade really pissed me off big time, somebody might call it to a fraud! The false promises from Meade side cost me a lots of money, time and energy.

After all the troubles everything went well. I got great supporters from high end manufacturers and retailers. The new setup was up and running at mid October 2014.


All of my photos from the Autumn season 2014
Click for a much large image

All my photos from the Autumn season 2014 are taken with my new imaging setup. Celestron Edge HD 1100 with 0.7 reducer at 10-micron mount. Apogee Alta U16 camera with Astrodon filters and an active optics unit, SXV AO LF, from Starlight Xpress.
Photos from upper left to lower right, Soul Nebula, Tulip nebula, Cygnus Wall, Cederblad 214, Sharpless 132, NGC 281, Propeller Nebula, Sharpless 115 and the Pelican Nebula.

All of my photos from the Spring season 2014
Click for a large image

All images are taken with the Canon EF 200mm f1.8 lens, QHY9 astrocam and Baader narrowband filters by using a Meade LX200 GPS 12" as an imaging platform. After the last image of the Spring season, the ten panel mosaic of Cepheus at middle, the old Meade fried permanently.
Photos from upper left to bottom, Sharpless 221, G65.3+5.7 SNR, Cepheus mosaic and a mosaic image of Sharpless 221 SNR and 216 PL.


Some highlights of the year 2014 


  • Supporters, my humble thanks to the supporters, they made my work possible once again!

    All companies are offering the first class products and service!

This setup was possible due to great support!
The new imaging system. Some image quality analysis can be seen HERE


Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2014, Royal Observatory of Greenwich, third place.
Over 2500 images from 51 countries participated.


  • I also got one NASA APOD published (Astronomy Picture Of the Day) at November 15, the Tulip nebula.

NASA publication, Sh2-101, the Tulip Nebula





  • Suomen Kuvalehti wrote a large article at the last issue of the year 2014 about my photographing, eleven pages total. (SK 51-52 19.12.2014, pages 1 and 42-51)




California Nebula as an experimental 3D-model
In constellation Perseus


This is a looped video, click to start and stop. This is an experimental test with a 3D-conversion of my astronomical images. Only real elements from my original image are used, there is nothing added but the volumetric information!


  • I was invited as one of the speakers at the NEAIC conferenceNew York, Spring 2014. 


  • Two large public artworks from my photos get revealed at 2014. A very large, over 10 x 3m, photographic print on aluminium "Cirrus of Cygnus" and the "Path of Swans", 4 x 2m, on aluminium. Beside public works, many of my photos ended up to a private homes.
Path of Swans, 4x2m

Cirrus of Cygnus 10x3m, the large mosaic image is a very sharp even in this scale.


  • I participated to two art exhibitions with my astronomical photos, one in Helsinki and an other here in Oulu. 
3D-exhibition in Helsinki, large anaglyph photos, paintings and a movie.

Sale exhibition in Oulu


  • One of the most interesting tasks at 2014 was a cooperation with the vocal ensemble Cappella pro Vocale. This cross art production was a mixture of an old vocal music and the astronomical images. The production  took place at the church of  St Thomas. My photos get  projected with three powerful projectors on walls and sealing and everything was matched with the music carefully.  
Projected images in church of St Thomas, image copyright Tuula Jurvelin

Image copyright Antti Nevalainen

Image copyright Jaakko Nurro

Image copyright Jaakko Nurro