My Adventures in Astrophotography

[Kirin]

These photographs are the beginnings of one of my semester-long projects for my Astronomy 4101 class (a class that focuses on observational astronomy). This semester, I'm going to be using the school's observatory to make, among other things, a catalog of planetary nebulae and globular clusters.

I'm just now learning how to use a CCD camera, so these pictures are pretty crude. Right now they're only in black-and-white--to give them color, I've to take separate photographs in various wavelengths of light, then merge them together (which I've not learned to do yet, but I will soon).

The telescope I used is a 16" Cassegrain reflecting telescope (http://www.valdosta.edu/phy/astro/opticaltel.shtml).

Here's what I have so far:

Albireo, a double star:
http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/Alberio.jpg

The Dumbbell Nebula:
http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/Dumbbell1.jpg

M13, a globular cluster located in the constellation Hercules:
http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/M13.jpg

Beta Lyrae, another binary star system:
http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/BetaLyra.jpg

The Ring Nebula. In the center you can see the white dwarf star, surrounded by the halo of gases that were blown off during the supernova:
http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/RingNebula-1.jpg

[IRC]

Nothing's showing up for me.

[Kirin]

D'oh. Stupid geocities and its bandwith limit. Lemme change the links to photobucket.

[Misty]

How cool! Reminds me of my days in Astronomy class when we got to look at simulated stars on a ceiling. It's nothing compared to the real thing.

[Rodak]

Nifty!

I tried this amateur style decades ago.

Got nowhere. Couldn't afford good equipment and the cheap stuff was not enough fun, given that none of it was digital. It was too much work for too few decent images.

I only ever got good shots of really bright stuff like The Pleiades.

Keep at it!

[Kefka Jr.]

Space is awesome.

[John Mora]

My dad had a big coffee table book called Galaxies that was beyond amazing in its photography.

BTW, I almost typed "****." D:

[Nixon]

NERRRRRRRD!

I'm jealous of your pictures of the universe. Show us more.

[Misty]

Kirin's a cool nerd, Nix. A cool nerd!

I'm just a nerd. :lol

Anyway, yeah, yeah, please show us more. I don't get to see stars that much where I live.....except for the occasional Paris Hilton and her spoiled poodle in Hollywood. :(

[Karr Lord of Chaos]

when i was younger and more disposed to have free time i use to look at the stars at night. its always fun to dream as you look at them and wonder what else is out there. are you planing to become an astronomer or is it just a hobby?

[jvrlopez]

The last one reminds me of a condom.

[Kirin]

are you planing to become an astronomer or is it just a hobby?

Both; I'm majoring in astronomy, but I've only recently been introduced to astrophotography; as soon as I started using the equipment, I automatically loved it. I can see myself camping out in the observatory many a night once I really learn how to work the camera.

That last one does look like a condom. :lol

[Ωbright]

WAY too cool...and next to digging up lost ancient cities, staying up late in an observatory is one of the coolest jobs ever...or...so I would imagine...sigh :(

You should take some cool closeup shots of the moon!

[Rodak]

You should take some cool closeup shots of the moon!

Hey!

Keep it clean!

This ain't The Playground.

...

Oh wait...

THAT Moon.

Nevermind.

[Duel]

Where's E.T?

[Misty]

Hey!

Keep it clean!

This ain't The Playground.

...

Oh wait...

THAT Moon.

Nevermind.

You're not saying peace at the end of every post, player!

:shakefist

[Perversion]

To paraphrase Steven Wright:

My girlfriend and I used to lie out on the roof of the observatory and look up at the stars.

[Misty]

How romantic.

[Caciss]

You might call Steven Wright that...

[Fushigi na Renamon]

Those are pretty awesome pictures. I would love to take a class like that! Please show us more! :D

[Denmo]

I keep telling her that, but she's so humble about it. :p

[Karr Lord of Chaos]

Both; I'm majoring in astronomy, but I've only recently been introduced to astrophotography; as soon as I started using the equipment, I automatically loved it. I can see myself camping out in the observatory many a night once I really learn how to work the camera.

make sure they dont pull that black ink on the eye piece joke. i rarely hear of anyone going into that profession so kudos for doing something different then becoming lawyers and doctors.

[Kirin]

It's the end of the semester-- here's a collection of the images I've taken over the last few weeks. Some of them are black and white images that I took using a telescope on Kitt Peak (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kitt_Peak)-- I got to remotely operate a telescope in Arizona from a computer in Valdosta, GA, which was a lot of fun. Others were taken with the same CCD camera and telescope (belonging to Valdosta State University) that I used earlier. Most of these are pretty big, so I figured I'd just post the link here instead of the picture.

Color photographs were created by using the program MIRA v.6 (http://www.mirametrics.com/mira_pro.htm) to process the images.

The Helix Nebula (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/240SecR.jpg)--the telescope at Kitt Peak had some tracking problems, which is why you see star trails in the picture. This nebula was so faint that I'd to take a 240-second exposure just to be able to see anything.

The Blue Snowball Nebula-- in a 2-second exposure (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/2sec_Rfilter.jpg) to capture the nebula's core and a 10-second exposure (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/10Sec_Rfilter.jpg) to capture the nebula's outer layers. Here's a color photograph (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/BlueSnowbal_nofilter-LRGB.jpg).


Blinking Planetary Nebula (NGC 6826)-- color photograph (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/NGC6826.jpg).

The Little Dumbbell Nebula-- color photograph (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/LittleDumbbell2.jpg).

NGC 40 (aka PLN 120 +9.1)-- color photographs in 5-second exposure (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/300secNoFilter.jpg) and in 300-second exposur (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/300secNoFilter-LRGB.jpg)e.

Binary Star SAO 75051-- color photograph (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/NoFilter-LRGB.jpg). This star was so bright it nearly wrecked my CCD camera by saturation of the pixels and making the image bleed out. Despite that, I decided to keep this image because the color processing turned out nicely.

Saturn Nebula-- color photographs in 60-second (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/60SecNoFilter-LRGB.jpg) exposure and 240-second exposur (http://i224.photobucket.com/albums/dd54/KamikazeKirin/240_2.jpg)e.

Most of the time spent doing this project wasn't with processing images--it was spent dumping out countless ruined or crummy ones and picking out the few that were good enough to present. It seems that in order to get a really good image, you've to have good weather (as in absolutely NO cloud cover), mild ambient temperature, properly fan-cooled CCD camera (but not too cold, otherwise ice'll form all over the lens--not fun), and lots of luck. Many of my images were ruined when a stray cosmic ray flashed in front of the lens; it's pretty frustrating when you spend 30-45 minutes taking one image only to find out that cloud cover, ice, a telescope with poor tracking, or cosmic rays ruined it. Lots of times I'd spend 4-5 hours in the observatory and only get 2-3 good photographs.

[SirTMagus]

These are cool. Space IS awesome. Is this what you're gonna do?

[Goufunaki]

I like these pictures. :D