Tuesday 30 October 2007

Where to look for Comet 17/P Holmes

Comet 17/P Holmes



I managed to see Comet 17/P Holmes last night for the first time. Cloud has plagued me all week and if not cloud something else has stopped me from enjoying the view. As you all should know it was only supposed to be Mag +17 but due to an outburst it has become a naked eye object of +3.8. I have not seen one before so this is the first for me and WOW what a beauty it was. Didn't stop smiling all night. As soon as i went outside last night i could see it as clear as day, even under the BAD LP here in London. My Celestron gave me lovely views and am going to get the 5" out tonight as well to try and get some images. A friend of mine took these images which are fantastic but i want to try and get some afocal images to add to my little collection. Fingers crossed.

Monday 29 October 2007

First Mosaic of the Terminator




This is my first attempt at stitching my images together. Taken on the 20th October but have only just managed to sort them all out. Equipment used was my Celestron 4 SE, Toucam pro II with 600 frames stacked and processed then put together in iMerge. Another lot of free software that a friend of mine showed me, very easy to use. I'm very pleased with the result being as it's my first but was unable to get the balance right towards the middle, no matter what i tried, but hey, all comes with practice. I have put 2 up as the one is in JPEG and the other in BMP. Can't decide myself which one i prefer...

Monday 15 October 2007

Trifid Nebula by Chris Dixon




Needed to practice my processing with DSO's but haven't had much luck with my own images(if you can call them that!) so Chris very was kind and let me use his images. This one of the Trifid Nebula is one of my favs, just one word to descibe his image.....Beautiful. Chris has done an excellent job, better than any of mine. The first image is my attempt, the other is Chris's original.Using Gimp I played about with unsharp mask and then sharpened it up a tad, added a little more hue and saturation and finally adjusted the curves to darken some of the background and the blueish tint towards the bottom. To be completely honest i had no idea what i was doing and just played about with different functions to see what the result would be. I don't think it's that bad but do prefer Chris's to mine.

Saturday 13 October 2007

ISS PASSES FOR LONDON

Seems to be a few chances from tonight to catch a glimps of the ISS passing over. All passes are very bright so you won't miss it. Here is a table for the times and where to find it. The minus in the mag coloum means it's bright ie: -2.4 is brighter than 0.2 and 0.2 is brighter than 1.2. Hope that makes sense.
DateMagStartsMax. altitudeEnds
TimeAlt.Az.TimeAlt.Az.TimeAlt.Az.
13 Oct-2.419:08:0910W 19:11:0188NW 19:13:0717E
13 Oct0.220:43:1710W 20:44:3022W 20:44:3022W
14 Oct-2.519:31:2110W 19:34:1685NNE19:35:1835E
14 Oct1.221:06:3010W 21:06:4211W 21:06:4211W
15 Oct-2.418:19:2310W 18:22:1888NE 18:25:0910E
15 Oct-2.519:54:3110W 19:57:3073S 19:57:3073S
16 Oct-2.218:42:3310W 18:45:1677WNW18:48:1810E
16 Oct-0.820:17:4210W 20:19:4133WSW20:19:4133WSW
17 Oct-2.419:05:4010W 19:08:3874S 19:10:3118ESE
17 Oct0.620:41:0310W 20:41:5415WSW20:41:5415WSW
18 Oct-1.519:28:4810W 19:31:3543SSW19:32:4626SSE
19 Oct-2.218:16:4410W 18:19:3875S 18:22:2910ESE
19 Oct-0.319:52:0610W 19:54:2722SSW19:55:0421SSW
20 Oct-1.418:39:4910W 18:42:3844SSW18:45:2110SE
20 Oct0.820:16:2710SW 20:17:0811SW 20:17:2810SW
21 Oct-0.119:03:0410W 19:05:2523SSW19:07:4610SSE
22 Oct1.019:27:1910SW 19:28:0511SW 19:28:5110SSW

Tuesday 2 October 2007

Plato

This was taken on the 21st September using a 2xbarlow lens. 450 frames stacked and processed. Am really pleased with this, one of my fav craters of the Moon.



Copernicus n Plato

These were taken on the 21st September with my toucam pro. 30 sec avi's, 450 frames stacked and processed.The closer image was taken using a 2xbarlow. I think i'm starting to get the hang of it all now, time to move on to other objects me thinks :)

Copernicus n Plato