2020
M51 60 x 60s lights, 30 x 60s darks, bias and flats. What a difference it makes from my earlier attempts.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker, Gimp and Photoshop Elements.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
M63 30 x 60s lights, darks, bias and flats.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker, Gimp and Photoshop Elements.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
M81 and M82 39 x 60s Lights and Darks with flats and bias frames.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker, Gimp and Photoshop Elements.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
The moon not a regular subject for me but I thought I'd try out video. So shot this taking up some 19,000 frames of which 16,000 or so were used in Registax to produce this image of the moon.
Canon Eos 550D on Skymax 127 Maksutov, EQ5 mount with full drive setup for tracking.
M10 40 x 30s lights, darks, flats and bias files.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker, Gimp and Photoshop Elements.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
M12 40 x 30s lights, darks, flats and bias files.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker, Gimp and Photoshop Elements.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
M57 The ring nebula. Single shot Canon 6D on Skymax 127 on EQ5 mount with full drive setup.
Our cosmic visitor Comet C2020 F3 (NEOWISE).
40 x 2s lights at f8 and 1600 iso, unguided stacked in DSS.
Canon 6D 100-400 zoom on a tripod.
Comet C2020 F3 (NEOWISE) taken a few nights later. This time a single 40s shot at f8 and 800 iso, EQ5 mount with full drive setup for tracking. There is just a hint of the ion tail in this image.
Canon 6D 100-400 zoom.
The Rosette nebula from 2019 reworked. Using Dave Eagle's guide to Affinity Photo. This is a handy little book with a useful workflow. This image is probably the best I have produced from the data I have.
NGC 6992 or the Eastern veil, part of the veil nebula in Cygnus.
27 x 120 s lights plus 20 x 120 s darks, flats and bias files. Cropped from larger image.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker, Affinity Photo with the Astroflat plugin and final finishing in Photoshop Elements.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
M15 20x30s lights only.
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker and Affinity photo with Astroflat plugin.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
M97 the owl nebula 10 x 60s lights only. This was shot in January this year. Since then I've improved on my technique and will be reshooting this with more light frames. I have the central core of the nebula but there is an outer ring which I want to capture. I also want to increase the visibility of the object
Canon eos 550D on Sky-watcher explorer 200p on HEQ5 Pro processed with Deep sky stacker and Affinity Photo with the Astroflat plugin.
Telescope control and image acquisition by StellarMate.
The sun has shown signs of activity of late and I managed to capture this white light image through some light cloud, showing two sunspots.
Canon eos 550D on Skywatcher 200p 1/1000s at iso 800. Baader solar filter on 'scope.
The great conjunction was heavily rained out so I didn't get the picture of the actual event. This came pretty close though taken on the 20th December at around 17:30.
Saturn with Titan barely visible to the right. Jupiter with Io hiding in the glare of the planet on the right and Europa a bit further out. Ganymede and Callisto off to the the left with a random star at the end.
1s at 800 ISO Canon Eos 550D on Skywatcher Skymax 127 on eq5 mount with full drive set up.