Pluto - a "wandering star"

I know that Pluto is no longer defined as a planet, but for most of my life, Pluto captured my imagination as a planet. So far out. So cold. I remember seeing artists' impressions of what it would be like to stand on the surface. Looking back at the bright star 5 billion km away. But I have never been able to see it with my eyes. Only in pictures. It moves slowly across the sky. Barely visible to the eye in a large amateur telescope. But with a short exposure, it is possible to spot. Not in itself, but by the very definition of the word planet. The word comes from Greek "Planetes aster", or "wandering star". The old Greeks didn't have telescopes, so to them, everything on the night sky, save from the Moon, where stars. And some of them moved. These are what we now know as planets. I decided a week ago to try to capture the movement of Pluto, the planet, on three days. To see it moving against the stars in the background.
The following image shows Pluto on November 11th. Try to find it! It is literally finding the "needle in the haystack".

And it is no wonder that nobody found it until 1937. First of all, it is very faint. Around magnitude 14 (which is more than 1000x fainter than the faintest star we can see with an unaided eye). But even when you use a long exposure like above, it looks just like a star in the image. It is impossible to discern it from the stars. But if you compare images taken a few days apart, it becomes apparent. Clyde Tombaugh compared the images taken a few days apart using a blink comparator. One of the stars moved. Today, we can use a computer to create an animation, and suddenly, it stands out from the background.
I added three images, taken a few days apart, and it is obvious that one of the "stars" is moving. It is a "wandering star", "planetes aster". A planet. The planet Pluto. Click on the image to get a bigger version.

The heart of the universe

The heart nebula (IC1805) in the constellation Cassiopeia. Last night, it was a beautiful, clear night here at Harestua Solar Observatory outside of Oslo. Only problem was a storm on the western coast of Norway that had its effect even around these areas. The winds made guiding a challenge. With some peaks of more than a pixel on my guider. But all in all, I managed to collect 4 hours of exposures. This is the best I have ever managed to capture of this beautiful nebula. I will later attempt the twin nebula (Soul nebula).

Tech details : Pentax K5, ISO 400, 48x5min, William Optics FLT98 CF w/WO AFR-IV reducer/flattener (F/5). Stacked in DSS, processed in PS and IrfanView.

A sky full of stars

Last night there was a clear sky, so I wanted to do some astrophoto. At least for the hours the weather forecasters predicted would be clear. So I set up my scope and spent the better part of an hour setting up the polar alignment. I got it pretty good at the end. Then I set up the autoguider, and set the telescope for 3 hours of exposures on M27. When I came this morning to check on progress, I found my laptop had died due to lack of juice (I had actually forgotten to switch on the power from the outlet, so it ran on battery only...). And when I checked the camera, I had not pressed the plug in properly, so the last 10 or so exposures were obviously just due to a wiggly connection, so they varied between 1/33th of a second to 7 seconds. In total, I got 15 exposures of 5 minutes each. They had, on the other hand, very good guiding on them. Round, sharp stars. So, with only 1 hour 15 minutes of exposure. What can I do. Well. Not as much as I had hoped, but I did get something out of it. And I decided to upload almost the whole frame. I love the view of all the stars in the Milkyway. And then, M27 in the middle of the myriad of stars. The universe is truly beautiful!
Tech details : Pentax K5, ISO400, 15x5 minutes, William Optics FLT98 CF w/ WO AFR-IV flattener/reducer (F/5), on Celestron AVX mount. Guided with QHY5II & PHD2. Stacked in DSS, processed in PS and IrfanView.

Western veil

Last night, I finally had a clear night after a few weeks of overcast. Despite the half Moon only 90 degrees away, I wanted to give it a go. So I did 2.5 hours on the western parts of the Veil nebula. (I actually did 4.5 hours, but the temperature dropped so much during the night that the last 2 hours were out of focus...) After stacking the images in DSS, I noticed a strange effect that I was unable to remove. It only happened in green and blue. Red was mostly unaffected. So after a bit of trial and error, I gave up on trying to create a colour image. Although I managed to create one, it looked like something I didn't want to publish here. I will give it some more tries in the future. Using the red channel as luminance worked fairly well, but the colors were weird. So I'll see if I can make them better in the future. So for now, this is the red channel, as a luminance image in greyscale. (Click on image to get bigger version).

Tech details : Pentax K5, William Optics FLT98 CF w/ WO AFR-IV flattener/reducer (f/5), Astronomik CLS filter, Celestron AVX mount, guided using QHY 5II camera and PHD2 guiding sw. Stacked in DSS, processed in PS and Irfanview.

Edit : I made a color version. I checked the image above, and found that it looked like crap on a bigger screen. Sooo. Maybe I should do a better job before publishing my images here. The picture below is a first version in color. Not perfect. But I managed to remove much of the strange colors. Enjoy!

M31, first of the season

Last night, I did a "first light" run with my new telescope. A William Optics FLT98 CF w/ AFR-IV. I did a quick processing run this morning to see the results, and I have to say I am quite pleased with the result. Sharp image, despite the autoguiding was under par. When I left it, it had a rms of about 1.2"... I will tune that better for the coming season, but for now, I'm happy with the results. The scope at least performed brilliantly. So I cannot complain.

Tech det : WO FLT98 w/ AFR-IV flattener/reducer (0.8x). Pentax K5, ISO 400, 30x5min. autoguided using QHY5II and PHD2. Stacked in DSS, processed in PS.

Edit : New version with more colour.

M82 - "The Cigar"

M82 is part of a galaxy pair in Ursa Major. It is about 12 million lightyears away. It doesn't have the usual shape that we are used to see for galaxies. And there seems to be strings of gas flowing out from the galaxy. It is therefore called an "irregular galaxy". On January 24th, a supernova was detected in this galaxy. I took a photo of the galaxy a week before. But due to terrible weather in the weeks to follow, it took a long time before I was able to see it in an image myself. I decided to take a longer exposure of the galaxy using a remote telescope.
Tech details : 20" F/6.8, FLI PL09000, 3x3 binning. Exposure : Luminance 20 min, R, G & B : 5 min 20 sec each. Stacked in DSS, processed in PS.

NGC4565 - The Needle

This is one of my favorite galaxies. An edge-on galaxy in Coma Berenice. I have tried my luck at this several times, but this is the first time with a bigger scope with longer focal length. It is obvious that the oversampling in this picture does it good. Lots more detail than I have previously been able to aquire. And in such a short exposure. But I guess that is from the fact that the camera uses 3x3 binning... Should be a lot faster then.
Tech data : FLI PL09000 camera, 3x3 binning, Luminance : 15x50 sec exposure, RGB : 5x40 sec exposure. Telescope : 20" F/6.8. Stacking in DSS, processing in PS.

NGC2903, another try

After a dismal spring this year, we have finally had quite a few nights of clear skies. And I and a few friends had to exploit his. Especially since the weather forecast is looking bad in the coming days, and the Sun is intruding more more. In a few short weeks, there will not be more astronomical twighlight this winter.
I decided to try an oldie goldie. The NGC2903 in Leo. This was the very first deep sky object I imaged in the late 90's. It was just a smeary blob on the film. This time, I decided to try autoguiding for longer sub-frame exposures. 2 minutes seemed ok, since that would allow me to evict all the frames containing satellites and bad guiding. There were a lot of satellites this night. Three satellites in different orbits raced through the tail of Leo simultaniously at one point. So it was obvious there would be a lot of streaks. Only had to evict 7 frames from the stack, so I guess I was lucky.
Tech : Pentax K5, ISO 800, 59x2 min guided exposures, TPO 6" RC, w/APCCD67 reducer (f/6), Celestron Advanced VX, stacked in DDS, processed in PS.

Black-eye galaxy

The skies do have a "black eye". And I have taken a snapshot of it. M64, in the constellation Coma Berenices. The "black eye" is quite obvious in this picture. Taken from one of our usual spots outside of Oslo. I tried a bit longer exposures this time around, using autoguider. Still haven't quite mastered the technique, and the guide-scope iced down, so PHD guider was struggling to follow the star properly, but it managed to keep the stars round'ish.
Tech details : Pentax K5, ISO 800, 45x2 min guided exposureTPO 6"RC w/APCCD67 reducer (f/6), Celestron Advanced VX.

3C273

This may possibly be of the farthest object I will ever photograph. The quasar 3C273. It is also the brightest of the quasars.
Tech details : Pentax K5, ISO800, 4x1min unguided exposures. TPO 6" RC w/AP CCD67 reducer (f/6). Stacked in DSS, processed in PS and IrfanView.

M63

The Sunflower galaxy. A beatiful galaxy. I had some problems with my guiding last night. Kept jumping up and down, but I managed to get about 2 hours with sort-of round stars. At the Harestua Solar observatorium, the skies where exceptionally clear. We could clearly see details in the belts of Jupiter, so I figured I'd try this galaxy. The small galaxy at the bottom right corner is UGC 8313.
Tech details : Pentax K5, ISO-800, TPO 6" w/ AP CCD67 reducer (f/6), Celestron Advanced VX mount, 23x5 min guided exposures, QHY-5II guide camera, Orion Mini Guider scope. Stacking in DSS, processing in PS and IrfanView.

The Iris nebula

While reading up on which objects to shoot at first chance I got this Monday night, I came across an object I had briefly heard of. The Iris nebula. I jotted down the details on a piece of paper I brought with med to Bysætermosan outside of Oslo. A reasonably dark place that many amateurs use for observation and astrophoto. While waiting for the Markarian Chain to get into position, I decided to try and shoot the Iris. A couple of other guys where there that evening, and we looked at a number of nice objects through an 8" cass. The skies where surprisingly sharp. The air was dry, and the atmosphere was steady. I got 55 usable exposures of 1 min length. Stacked them, and did some processing afterwards. It is obvious that this nebula needs darker skies and longer esposure. The nebula was in the direction of Oslo, and was bathed in "yellow hell". But I managed to wringe out some photons that make out some of the nebula, and its darker surroundings.
Tech details : Pentax K5, ISO 1600, 55x1 min unguided exposures, TPO Ritchey-Chretien w/ AP CCD067 reducer (F/6). Stacked in DSS, processed in PS and Irfanview.

Markarians chain

Springtime is galaxy time. At this time of the year, the constellations of Virgo and Coma Berenices are high in the sky. And in them, a myriad og galaxies. The below image is an approximately 3 hour integration of the Markarian Chain. A chain of galaxies strung out across a small piece of the sky. If you click on the image to see it full size, you can make a myriad of smaller, faiter background galaxies. This area is littered with galaxies. But most of them need a bit of exposure to be revealed.
Technical details : Pentax K5, ISO 800, TPO 6" Ritchey Chretien with AstroPhysics CCD067 reducer (F/6), 64x3min exposures, guided with an QHY-5II attached to an Orion Miniguider, PDH guider. Stacked in DSS processed in PS and IrfanView.

NGC2903

This the very first deep sky object I ever tried to image. It was in the late nighties. On film. It was just a small blob. The only difference between it and the stars around it was that it was more oval. I tried imaging it with a 6" newton, and it was a totally different thing. I could clearly see the spiral arms. It is truly a beautiful object. Using a 20" scope on a high location, gave stellar view (pardon the pun).
8x50 sec luminance, 4x40 sec R, G and B. Stacking in DSS. Processing in PS and Irfanview.

IC434, the Horsehead

A beautiful object just underneath the belt of Orion. This is one of my favourites, although I have rarely imaged it myself. But I have plans to do a really long and deep exposure of the whole Orion-area. Was planning to this winter. But the bad weather has rendered this impossible. A couple of days ago, I ordered five exposures of this object from a telescope on Tenerife. And here is the result. Not too bad, considering this is just 12.5 minutes of exposure.
20" F/6.8, FLI ProLine PL09000. 15x50sec Luminance, 5x40sec each of R, G and B. Stacked in DSS, processed in PS and Irfanview.

M51 from a favorable location

There can be little doubt that taking astrophotos from a dark site high into the mountains is favorable to inner city with light pollution. But the difference is truly staggering. The following photo was taken with a remote telescope on Teide, Tenerife. The telescope is 20" f/6.8. And has a FLI ProLine FL09000 camera with LRGB filters. I ordered three images of the galaxy M51, and stacked them and combined them manually. The result is staggering, despite the short exposures. 6x50 sec Luminance and 3x40 sec each of R, G and B.

M42, new take on the oldie goldie

I guess M42 is one of the most photographed objects in the sky. And I have taken my fair share of exposures of this beauty in the sky. This Saturday, at an astronomy gathering at Harestua Solar Observatory, the weather was apalling to say the least. So I gave a lecture/workshop on astrophoto processing instead. A couple of the people attending managed to get quite astounding results using "my" methods of processing. This inspired my to go back to this old photo I took in Australia in 2012, and give it another go. I changed the colouring slightly compared to how I have done it previously. And I have changed the way I have added sharpening effects. I will probably do several more rounds in the years to come. Maybe adding more exposure. But with the rather dismal weather prospects, I think processing old images is probably the only thing I'll be doing for a long while ahead. (Click on the image for a full.size view). For some weird reason, Blogger makes the background of this image strongly reddish... Ignore that...
Tech : Pentax K5, ISO 1600, 100x30 sec unguided exposures. TS triplet APO w/ WO field flattener, SkyWatcher EQ-3 Pro Synscan. Stacking in DSS, processing in PS and IrfanView.

M51

After shooting the supernova in M82, I pointed the telescope at an object I have been trying to shoot many times. M51, the Whirlpool galaxy. But either it was too small in the scope, or the exposure was too short. But on monday, I decided to try exposing the rest of the night on this magnificent object. We see it almost straight down, and the spiral structure is clearly visible. It is obvious that I could probably spend more time enhancing this beautiful object. And I could probably spend some more time exposing. But for a first try both at a successful exposure, and at a reasonable size, I am happy.
Technical details : Pentax K5 DSLR @ISO800, 278x1m unguided exposures (total ~4.5 hours), TPO 6" Ritchey-Cretien w/Asrtophysics 0.67 reducer, riding on a Celestron Advanced VX mount. Stacked in DSS, enhanced in Maxim, PS and Irfanview. Click on the image for full size version.

Supernova SN2014J

Finally, after weeks of overcast and bad weather, the skies cleared last night, and I was able to capture an image of the famous supernova in M82. In the image below, it is framed with its trusty companion M81. I love this pair. One of my favorites. And now with an extra feature. A new star! Only that this is putting on its final show.
Pentax K5, ISO 800, 50x1min exp unguided, 6" TPO Ritchey-Cretien with Astrophysics 0.67 reducer on a Celestron Advanced VX mount. Stacked with DSS, enhanced in Maxim/Irfanview.