Jovian System

In the evenig 24-Apr-2017 [@21:46(UT+3)] Jovian moons made interesting configuration.

Setup: Canon 600D + NPZ Barlow x3 + SW 15075 OTAW / EQ5 with motor drives.
Video taken directly by Canon EOS 600D (stored to a card); ISO=1600; Tv=1/60s; 25 frames/s

Processing: PIPP (90s fragment was extracted); Registax6; RawTherapee; GIMP 2.9

Ambient temperature was about 5*C; gusty wind.

2017-04-24 21:46(UT+3); Kyiv

To the right from Jupiter: Io, Europa, Ganymede (bright), Calliso (dim)

Moon and Jupiter near Conjunction

Moon and Jupiter 10-Apr-2017 at ~22:50 (UT+3) from Kyiv.
To the left and below Jupiter is θ Virginis.
The four Galilean moons are lined up: Io, Ganymede, Europa, Callisto.

This is a combination of three different exposures: 1/2s for Jovian moons, 1/128s for Jupiter itself, and 1/640s for Moon.

The camera [Canon EOS 600 D + EF-S f/4-5.6 55-250 IS II] was mounted on EQ5 with motor drives.

[Canon EOS 600D + EF-S f/4-5.6 55-250 IS II. Exp 1/2s + 1/128s + 1/640s (30 frames in total); ISO 400; F/13]

Comet 41P (TGK) Remastered

Images of a comet 41P in my previous post were processed with DeepSkyStacker. It is a very good program to get a quick-and-dirty result of an astrosession. Hovewer, I always got a better output with another free astrosoftware: IRIS. I've never tried to process comet's images yet with IRIS so it is my first attempt to use the special comet-tracking functionality of it.

I reprocessed the same set of frames as in my previous post: 50 frames x 30s, taken at ISO 800 using Canon EOS 600D attached to SkyWatcher 15075 Newtonian on top of motorized EQ5 mount (no guiding). I used 19 dark and 19 offset frames for calibration.

The frames were captured between 23:23 and 23:54 local Kyiv time (UT+3) on 2 Apr 2017.

I should say that IRIS gave a less noisy picture; comet's coma is seen better. In general, the image looks "softer" and "more natural".

A size of the cropped image is 45x45 arcminutes.

Comet 41P Tuttle-Giacobini-Kresak

Comet 41P (TGK) 2 Apr 2017@23:23-23:54 (UT+3) Kyiv

Setup: Canon EOS 600D + SW 15075 OTAW Newtonian on EQ5 with motor drives (no guiding)

50 frames x 30s; ISO 800 (19 darks, 19 offsets)
Processing: DSS + FITStaker + RawTherapee.
The angular size of the resulting cropped picture is 0.75x0.75 degrees; resize 25%.

I could not distinguish the comet by eye trough 28mm eyepiece. Probably it was because of poor transparency of the atmosphere that night. At the beginning I even saw iridescent corona around the Moon, then it disappeared.

The night was very warm (for the season here); the temperature gradually reduced from 16*C to 11*C; calm.
The Big Dipper was near zenith...

It was my first attempt to picture non-planetary object through my new Newtonian. 30-s exposures are good even without guiding.
I could see the comet shift between frames even for such a small interval (33 s from frame to frame)!

The first picture is stacked "by a comet"; the second one -- "by stars". You can see the shift of the comet during ~30min (size of the pictures is 0.75x0.75 degrees -- 1.5 of the visible diameter of the Moon).

An animation (23:23-23:54 (UT+3)); frame size 15'x15':

Shadow of Io on Jupiter

Jupiter, Io (small yellowish spot pointed by arrow) and its shadow: an animation of pictures taken during approximately one hour near local midnight (EEST UT+3).

Kyiv (Osokorky district)

Setup: SkyWatcher 15075 OTAW + NPZ x3 Barlow + Canon EOS 600D.
Processing: PIPP, AS3!, Registax6, VirtualDub.

2017-03-28 ~23:50 - 2017-03-29 ~0:50 UT+3


One frame from the animation with somewhat better resolution:

Barlow lens introduces chromatic aberration so colors of the image are somewhat distorted. Probably I will replace Barlow in the future.

Comet 45P Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova (3a)

Eventually I managed to stack frames by the comet (see link).
Two stacking modes were used: "average" (right image) and "sigma-clipping" to reduce stars brightness. Comet's tail is clearly seen.
Size of each image: 3x3 degrees.
2015-02-25; 23:04-23:55(UT+2)

An animation of a proper motion of the comet.
2015-02-25; 23:07-23:52(UT+2)

Comet 45P Honda-Mrkos-Pajdusakova (3)

Last night: 2017-02-25 23:05-23:55(UT+2)

Kyiv, Osokorky

Setup: Canon EOS 600D with Jupiter 37А lens [135mm] @f/5 on EQ-5 motorized mount.
42x60s frames.

Processing: DSS+FITStacker+RawTherapee.

Because the comet was too dim, I could not make alignment by the comet so alignment by stars was used. This caused distortion of the comet visible nucleus.

Crop 3x3 degrees