Jacko's space shots

[jacko]

Under minimal pressure from Paul I thought I'd share what I've been doing through lockdown..
A preamble - I've been fascinated by space since 1969 when we sat in front of one of the few black and white TVs in our small North east England mining town and watched Neil, Buzz and Michael make history.  Since then, I've always had a telescope of some sort but only recently (20 years ago) made the step up from basic gear to computerised 'goto' scopes with the abillity to track down thousands of deep space objects at the touch of a button. For quite a while I've been a strictly visual astronomer, using an 8 inch Schmidt cassegrain reflector telescope and enjoying superb views of the panets, the sun, the moon and distant galaxies. However, we lived in a large town and observing got more and more difficult with new street lighting etc.  Around 7 years ago we moved to a 200 year old cottage in a rural location and I started planning a proper observatory.  I cast a cubic yard of concrete and bolted down a permanent pier to mount my telescope to then built a 16' x 8' shed around it with a sliding roof.  4' x8'  of the shed is reserved as a warm control room so I can set my imaging sessions away and watch the results in relative comfort.
I've only been imaging seriously for about 15 months and still have a lot to learn.  The software needed to both capture and process the data has a very steep learning curve but I'm gradually getting the hang of things.
Each image is the end product of up to 3 hours (or more) capturing e.g. 3 minutes of data so for example, the image of the Hercules cluster M13 is made up of thirty 2 minute exposures.
 
I'll post some pics starting with my main imaging scope for galaxies and clusters - this is a 6 inch refractor with a cooled CMOS astro camera (I also have a 3 inch refractor for wide field which is needed for most Nebulae, the moon and the sun).
Not sure how the attachments will work so I'll describe them and hope they come out in the right order.  At the minute, it doesn't get dark in my bit of Scotland but I'll add new images to this thread when I take them.. 


These should be in the order I took them ...
The great orion Nebula M42 - part of the sword of Orion
The Horsehead and Flame Nebulae - the big star is Alnitak, the leftmost of the three stars in orion's belt
The Plaeides M45 (or 7 sisters) this is my favourite object to look at through binoculars - truly beautiful
M31 - the Andromeda Galaxy with it's two companion galaxies - in 30 billion years our Milky Way galaxy will have merged with M31. Should be quite spectacular
The Heart nebula in the constellation of Cassiopeia
The Rosette Nebula in the constellation of Monoceros
M51, The whirlpool galaxy and it's companion galaxy M51B
M81, Bodes galaxy in Ursa Major (we call it the plough, you call it the big dipper)
M101, the pinwheel galaxy, also in Ursa major.


I'll need to continue on a second post


Graeme

[jacko]

second tranche ...


Jupiter - this is actually 50% of around 1000 frames of a 1 minute video. The software evaluates each individual video frame and selects the best 50% of them to stack and process. Otherwise the picture would just be an out of focus wobble. I still have a way to go with planetary imaging.
M13, the great Cluster in Hercules. Estimated to be over 1/2 a million stars in this cluster. The stars at the centre of the cluster are a hundred times closer to each other than we are to out nearest neighbour, Proxima Centauri (about 4 1/4 light years away)
The Elephant's trunk nebula (this is actually a close up of the trunk - there's a lot more nebula than my image shows.)
The eagle nebula - just to demonstrate how little darkness we get at this time of year - this is only 45 minutes worth of 3 minute exposures. maybe later in the year I'll try this one again. Interesting fact - the tiny squiggle in the middle of my picture was made famous when it became the Hubble Space telescope's best known image, The Pillars of Creation.
The 1/4 waxing moon.


It'll be a month or so till I can image anything else - we don't get astronomical darkness now till the end of august but I'll be pointing at the Veil nebula in the constellation on Cygnus soon just to see what I can capture.

[rv_bass]

Those are amazing!  Thanks for sharing

[StephenR]

Way cool…thanks!

[hammer]

Wow! Super cool. Now the question…How much did all the gear needed to take those photos (all inclusive) set you back? Let’s avoid pounds and dollars that have little meaning and get an estimate based on Alembic gear (just specific of you’re talking new or used) 🪐🌖🌏

[David Houck]

Wonderful!  And a gorgeous image of the moon!

I love pictures like these as I hope to someday find my home world.

[jacko]

Wow! Super cool. Now the question…How much did all the gear needed to take those photos (all inclusive) set you back? Let’s avoid pounds and dollars that have little meaning and get an estimate based on Alembic gear (just specific of you’re talking new or used) 🪐🌖🌏

Brian.  For the Scope, Mount and Camera in my first pic you'd be looking at a new Epic or Excel at the prices quoted on the Alembic homepage. I'd put my kit towards the top end of amatuer. If I had the cash I could spend as much as a fully spec'd series 2 on the mount alone.

Graeme   

[jazzyvee]

Wow those are incredible photos Jacko.
One of those made me think of the part outline of a man and hence the cover of a Stanley Clarke album "Time Exposure" which is apt for the topic.

[keith_h]

Those are great. With your personal observatory you've done what I hope to when we finally move to our retirement house.

I do some visual observing with a 6 inch equatorial mount Newtonian telescope from my house. We live out in the county and when we moved in 22 years ago there were few people around and the woods blocked the larger city and towns light bubbles. While not perfect viewing was good enough to observe a number of nebulae and galaxies. Over the years more subdivisions have gone in and the background light has gotten to the point where viewing has become limited to the planets and a few of the brighter nebulae. As a result I don't really take the telescope out much anymore unless we are heading out camping in one of the more remote state parks.

[cozmik_cowboy]

Thanks, Graeme!  I grew up staring at the stars - but haven't seen the Milky Way in decades, due to light pollution.  Those pix remind why I used to look up more (and then take me way past that!)

Peter (who is giving serious consideration to sparking up & staring at the 3rd one in the second batch for a long time while listening to "Dark Star" from Paris, 5/4/72, or the live Achilles Wheel CDs, or Happy Trails, or.........)

[lbpesq]

Stunning!  Absolutely stunning!   Thanks so much for sharing these, Graeme.

Bill, tgo

[bigredbass]

Anyone waving back at you ?

[pauldo]

Graeme I am happy that my persuasion was effective!  :-)

Those are overwhelmingly beautiful.   If I understand correctly the telescope/ camera index to compensate for the rotation of our planet?  And the "goto" software will pin point and track celestial targets? 

Thank you so much for sharing and looking forward to when the darkness returns for you!

[peoplechipper]

wow! those are cool pics! I always thought about getting a telescope to use at my parents place on Gambier Island, but they sold it and moved to Gibsons and I never stay overnight anymore, so an opportunity lost...on the plus side, I don't have to try and sell a used telescope...Tony

[goran]

Oh man there ase such a beautiful shots.... I just got my first telescope to start exploring a bit with these new hobby. I got Skywatcher dobson telescope 130/650 heritage flextube... Actualy it was for my son, I think he'll love the idea of watching stars.