Mike Franzyshen sent an image of the Whale Galaxy (NGC 4631) taken using iTelescope.net's 17" Planewave CDK f/6.8 scope located in New Mexico. It uses a FLI-PL6303E CCD camera at -25° with just the Luminance filter then stacked 14x 10 minute subs and prcessed it in Maxim DL/Pxinsight during his downtime through the recent pandemic... April 2020!
Nice work, Mike. Thanks for sharing
Keith
Wow, Howard, you're off the starting line in a FLASH!!
These are really impressive and a great example of your first work in astrophotography.
Howard is a relatively new member of NJAA but if this is an example of his grasp at collecting photons, his newfound dedication to the hobby will provide him (and us) with a lot of fun for quite a while.
He lives in Clinton Twp, New Jersey not far from NJAA's observatory so he is usually within a Bortle 7 night) sky.
For the Eastern Veil Nebula, he used his Celestron 8" Edge on a CGEM II mount with ASIAir Plus guiding and a 0.7 focal reducer to a Celestron OAG ASI290 Mini Guide Scope, a ZWO ASI2600MC camera. He used a Dual Band Antile filter (6.5 hours of 3-minute x 130 subs) and an SVbony UHC filter (4.5 hours of 90 x 3-minute subs) from his driveway.
Howard said he chose to image the Veil Nebula after talking to friends that he met at the Cherry Springs Star Party in Pennsylvania (Bortle 2) with consideration of his local field of view(FOV).
Processing was done in Pixinsight
Howard's very first astroImage was of M101! That's an excellent first go at imaging a difficult target. Impressive!!! 203 subs x 180 seconds each.
Here's his next image ~ the Eastern Veil Nebula as noted above:
And finally, Howard shared his Green Flash photo taken while on his trip to Florida this past spring.
I'm jealous... I've tried to see this phenomenon for years and years (and years)... without success.
Great shot Howard.
Keith
This is the best image that I've ever seen of the Andromeda Galaxy (M31). I think the extra intensity of the cooler, red stars makes all of the difference (IMHO)!
Here is Les' Horsed Nebula (NGC 4631) too; Also great work!
