Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Ones again, it's over
I feel sad to say good bye for my addiction for nearly a six months.
Astronomical darkness will end at 08.04. officially but at the moment we have only couple of hours darkness so there is not much point to do any long exposure imaging any more. Here, at 65N, we'll have next dark night at 06.09. 2012 and just for about two hours.
All my images from the Autumn/Spring seasons 2011-2012 as a poster
Click for a large image, NOTE 3300x1800 pixels and 6,75MB
A slideshow
A slideshow
Note. Usually two palettes are shown, HST and Visual spectrum (more or less Red)
All the images, with technical details, can be found in my portfolio:
http://astroanarchy.zenfolio.com/p456394140
Autumn season 2011
Original blog post, with technical details, can be seen here:
I have no a large photographic print on my wall, image here:
http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/01/large-print-out-of-cygnus-nebulae.html
A study about the scale in a sky: http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/01/cygnus-zoom-in-series.html
A study about the scale in a sky: http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/01/cygnus-zoom-in-series.html
Spring season 2012
The main work for the Spring season 2012 was a mosaic image too, a 12-panel mosaic of constellation Auriga. Original blog post can be seen here:
http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/03/auriga-panorama-gets-bigger-12-panels.html
A study about the scale in a sky: http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/02/siemis-147-scale-in-sky.html
A study about the scale in a sky: http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/02/siemis-147-scale-in-sky.html
Tools used
I shot everything in this imaging period with my camera lenses. At first with the Tokina AT-X 300 f2.8 and most of the images with Canon EF 200mm f1.8, after I managed to fix the orthogonality issue between the CCD and the lens. All images was taken with QHY9, a cooled astro camera, and Baader narrowband filter set. (H-a, O-III and S-II)
Summer time
I will update my blog regulatory during the Summer season though. I have considered about renting a remote operating scope now and then, if I'll find funds for it. An naturally I will publish my experiments too and fine tune equipment's and work flow.
Some of the publications from the season 2011-12
At end of the Spring season I had my first exhibition about astronomical imaging in Oulu Museum of Art.
There was about twenty or so large framed prints to see and one lecture for interested. I have hardly any images of the event, here are some bad ones with mobile phone... Unlike seen in images, there was actually lots of visitors.
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and
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![[nasa-large.jpg]](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhnPTKmnidt6gHuVkChO_MPYTqp2lSu-Tr0If3ey1qfJxF9BJpDhG8wIWnxo86hb3vT5OYKiznVUminjBaRRat99o70A1ODvDjHEDHpKGWYCsnjn-WFYunaGVPsfXiizriH0upX9hbpNWs/s1600/nasa-large.jpg)
and
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My most published image, in past season, was the "Cosmic curiosity", or "?", as I named it originally.
It get printed in several Finnish news papers and online news and it was one of the "Space Picture of the week" by National Geography magazine.
Link to an original blog post:
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Veil Nebula, reprocessed with some new data
I found some forgotten data, from my hard, disk for the Veil Nebula. Image of this supernova remnant was originally published at 30. October 2011. I reprocessed the whole image with new data, here is the result.
Supernova remnant in constellation Cygnus
R=Hydrogen + Sulfur, G=Oxygen and B=Oxygen + Hydrogen.
Note. The "noise" in the background is not a noise but countless stars!
Note. The "noise" in the background is not a noise but countless stars!
Veil Nebula is a cloud of ionized gas and dust, leftovers from an exploded star. The star went off some 5000-8000 years ago at distance of about 1470 light years. This, relatively faint target, is difficult to image due to the large angular diameter, about three degrees, and a dense star field.
This is a second version of this object, older version can be seen Here.
I have made a 3D-animation about the possible shapes of this SNR, it can be seen Here.
HST-palette, from the emission of ionized elements,
R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen.
1:1 cropped image to show the resolution.
Not a bad one for the 200mm camera lens...
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
Levels, curves and color combine in PS CS3.
Optics, Canon EF 200mm camera lens at f1.8
Camera, QHY9
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~5 arcseconds/pixel
New exposures H-alpha 13x1200s,
S-II and O-III information are from an older image
Monday, March 19, 2012
IC 443, NGC 2174 & neighbors as a two panel mosaic
I managed to get some data for second part of two frame mosaic of IC 443, SNR, and NGC 2174, the "Monkey Head Nebula". Nights are getting shorter and shorter very fast, up here 65N. In a two weeks, we'll be out of astronomical darkness for a six months.
A two frame mosaic of IC 443, NGC 2174 and Sharpless objects 247, 254, 255, 256 and 257
In constellation Gemini
HST-palette, from the emission of ionized elements, R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen.
Note. A largish image, about 2 meg and 1200 x 1600 pixels.
Closeups
An upper half of the mosaic, details here:
Closeup of IC 443
A closeup from bottom Right, Sharpless objects 254, 255, 256 and 257
A closeup from top Right, Messier 35
A closeup from middle Right, Sharpless 247, Sh2-247, at Right
Image in visual spectrum
Image is in visual spectrum from narrowband channels.
IC 443, also known as Sharpless 248 (Sh2-248) or the "Jellyfish Nebula", is a supernova remnant in the constellation Gemini at distance of about 5000 light years. The actual size of the SNR is roughly 70 light years. This image spans about 10 degrees of sky. (Twenty Moons side by side in the sky.)
At top Right lays an open group, Messier 35.
At bottom Right, the Sharpless object 247, Sh2-247, can be seen as a bright dot.
NGC 2174, the "Monkey Head Nebula", (OCL 476 or Cr 84) is an open cluster surrounded by emission nebula in Gemini at distance of about 6400 light years.
A map
Constellation Gemini, Simeis 147 can be seen at upper Right.
Older versions
Older version of IC 443, shot with Tokina AT-X 300mm f2.8 lens and QHY9 at February 2009, can be seen here:
http://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2009/02/ic443-in-hst-palette.html Colors in this new image are partly borrowed from this older one.
A closeup of NGC 2175, the "Monky Head Nebula"
A study about the apparent scale in the sky can be seen here:
Technical details:
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
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~5 arc-seconds/pixel
Only four 1200s exposures of H-alpha emission for both panels.
Other channels, O-III and S-II, are from an older image of mine.
(Link above, under "Older versions")
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Supernova remnant IC 443
This image might be the last image for the Spring season 2012. We'll be out of astronomical darkness at 08.04.2012 and nights are getting shorter very fast. I will try to enlarge this image with one panel, to show the nearby NGC 2175 (Sh2-252), the "Monkey Head Nebula"
IC 443
A supernova remnant in constellation Gemini
Note. A largish image, about 2 meg and 1600 x 1200 pixels.
A closeup
Note. No sharpening or star reduction used, just a perfect focus is maintained.
A closeup
Note. No sharpening or star reduction used, just a perfect focus is maintained.
IC 443, also known as Sharpless 248 (Sh2-248) or the "Jellyfish Nebula", is a supernova remnant in the constellation Gemini at distance of about 5000 light years. The actual size of the SNR is roughly 70 light years. This image spans about 5 degrees of sky. (Ten Moons side by side in the sky.)
At top Right lays an open group, Messier 35.
At bottom Right, the Sharpless object 247, Sh2-247, can be seen as a bright dot.
Image is in visual spectrum from narrowband channels.
Older versions
Older version, shot with Tokina AT-X 300mm f2.8 lens and QHY9 at February 2009, can be seen here:
http://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2009/02/ic443-in-hst-palette.html Colors in this new image are partly borrowed from this older one.
A study about the apparent scale in the sky can be seen here:
http://astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2011/07/ic-443-snr-scale-in-sky-zoom-in-series.html
A closeup in HST-palette. Meade LX200 GPS 12" telescope at f5, QHY9 cooled astronomical camera and Baader narrowband filter set. Total exposure time ~12h. Original blog post and details:
Technical details:
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
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~5 arc-seconds/pixel
Only four 1200s exposures for H-alpha emission.
Other channels, O-III and S-II, are from an older image of mine.
(Link above, under "Older versions")
Thursday, March 8, 2012
The Auriga panorama gets bigger, 12 panels now
As usually, things easily gets out of my hands...
This time I shot eight new mosaic frames for Auriga image, total frames are now 12.
This panoramic mosaic spans about 21 degrees of sky. That's 42 full Moons side by side.)
I combined older long exposure images from Simeis 147 and Sharpless objects 224 and 225 to this new data.
Total exposure time, with an older data, is now about 70 hours together.
12 panel mosaic of Auriga
21 degrees of sky
21 degrees of sky
HST-palette, from the emission of ionized elements, R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen.
Note. Large image 2200 pixels wide and ~3MB. Original resolution about 15000 x 9000 pixels.
Image in visual spectrum
Note. There is a small circle at lower Left corner. It show the angular size of the full Moon in the sky.
(Apparent size of the full Moon is 30', or 0,5 degrees)
A composition from the central parts of mosaic
Note. Large image 2200 pixels wide and ~3MB. Original resolution about 15000 x 9000 pixels.
Note. There is a small circle at lower Left corner. It show the angular size of the full Moon in the sky.
(Apparent size of the full Moon is 30', or 0,5 degrees)
Images above are more informative, than beautiful, I think.
There are some rarely imaged objects, like Sharpless supernova remnants Sh2 224, 225 and 240 (Simeis 147). At middle there are several open clusters and Sharpless objects. (Look for an attached map at end of this page.) Outer parts of IC 405 and 410 Nebula complex are seen too. There is an interesting looking loop of gas at the Left end of the complex.
A composition from the central parts of mosaic
I made a cropped image out of this panorama. I think, it's more visually pleasing.
HST-palette, from the emission of ionized elements, R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen.
Eight panels are used for this mosaic image. Original resolution about 9000 x 7000 pixels.
Previous version, a four panel mosaic
Original resolution about 7000 x 5000 pixels.
Original resolution about 7000 x 5000 pixels.
Blog post, with technical detail, can be seen here:
http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2012/03/four-panel-panoramic-mosaic-of-auriga.html
Detail images from the mosaic,
to show the resolution, click for large version
NOTE
No sharpening or star reducing methods are used!
Mosaic image is build around this one frame image, original blog post, with technical details, can be seen here:
Messier 38 at middle of the large image
A closeup of IC 410
Sharpless 232
Sharpless 224
Image, with technical data, can be seen here:
A map
Image is implemented in a map from Cartes du Ciel
An animation
This experimental GIF-animation shows the image without stars and
the actual nebula complex is better seen.
Wednesday, March 7, 2012
A four panel panoramic mosaic of Auriga, IC 405 & 410
This image shows a wider field view to Auriga Nebulae, IC 405 and 410.
Also Sharpless 232, Sh2-232, IC 417, Messier 38 and NGC 1907 are seen in the image.
Image is composed from four panels and covers about nine degrees horizontally, that's equal to area of 18 full Moons side by side in the sky. There are not many images around to show the whole nebula complex.
IC 405 & 410
In constellation Auriga
HST-palette, from the emission of ionized elements,
R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen.
An older study about the scale in a sky can be seen here:
mage is in Natural color palette from the emission of ionized elements,
R=Hydrogen + Sulfur, G=Oxygen and B=Oxygen + Hydrogen.
An animated image to show the nebula with and without stars.
Click to see an animation
Click to see an animation
Mosaic image is build around this one frame image
http://www.astroanarchy.blogspot.com/2011/11/ic405-410.html
Technical details:
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
Guiding, Meade LX200 GPS 12" and a Lodestar guider
Image Scale, ~5 arcseconds/pixel
Total exposure time for all channels (H-a, O-III and S-II) about 10 hours.
A map
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Siemis 147, the scale in a sky
"How much your telescope magnified?"
This HST-palette zoom in series has a "Moon circle" as a scale, to demonstrate the angular scale in a sky.
People generally seems to have a false idea, that high magnification is needed to capture deep space images.
In fact, many times it's quite contrary, targets are so large, that I have difficulties to fit them in my instruments field of view. Sample image here, Simeis 147, is shot with 200mm camera optics and it barely fits in image area.
Much more important, than magnification, is the light gathering power = aperture.
High magnification is needed for planetary imaging and some small angular size objects, like planetary nebulae and small galaxies.
I have placed a white circle in image series below, to show the angular size of the full Moon in the sky.
Moon has an apparent diameter ~30 arc minutes, that's equal to 0,5 degrees.
At first panoramic image at the Left three main objects are seen. At bottom lays IC 405 and IC 410, at top Siemis 147 (Sharpless 240, Sh2-240)
Original images used for the zoom in series, with technical data
Simeis 147:
IC 405 & 410:
A large collection of my scale studies can be found here:
Friday, February 24, 2012
Astro Anarchy gets published, again...
SPACE PICTURE OF THE WEEK, second in row...
National Geographic published my picture of Simeis 147, the "Expansive Nebula", as one of the Space pictures of the Week, Today 24.02. Actually this is a second one in two weeks, I'm kind of shocked...
Here is the link to a National Georaphic news:
Simeis 147, Sharpless 240 (Sh2-240)
In constellation Taurus
Image is in mapped colors, from the emission of ionized elements, R=Sulfur, G=Hydrogen and B=Oxygen.
Original blog post for this image, with technical details, can be seen here:
A closeup
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