Herm's Astropics
This page is intended to showcase my astrophotography progress, come back often. Feel free to use these images, if you use them in a commercial setting please attribute the source.
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NGC6357: Six 20 minutes exposures taken 5/07/02 at Monument Lake Campground. Slightly hazy conditions probably due to Sahara dust in the air. Film was hypered PJ400, SGNBR used to reduce grain. Should have used the IDAS (Tokay) filter and long exposures to improve this image, compare to my previous attempt taken several years ago, four 20 minute exposures using Fuji Superia 400 (old type).
Pleaides: guided with new 80mm f11 guidescope, two 30 minute and one 15min exposures on E200 film, pushed +3 stops...stacked using "add" mode in Picture Window and processed in Photoshop with curves to correct color. Images taken 10-29-00, just before sunrise at Pay-hay-okee in the Everglades National Park. Good sky conditions.
NGC2362: This beautiful small (8 arcminutes) dense open cluster with a bright 4 th mag. star embedded is one of my favorites, also quite easy to find in any instrument. Two 20 minutes exposures with Fuji 100HQ film, image was cropped to increase scale, equivalent to using a scope of 3000 mm focal lenght. Images taken at the Winter Star Party in the Florida Keys 2/12/02.
Butterfly Nebula: part of IC1318 near Gamma Cygny, four 30 minute exposures stacked to increase faint detail, taken from light polluted Royal Palm site in the Everglades National Park, should have used the Tokai light pollution filter but it seems that I was able to process most of the light pollution effects off in Photoshop.
Film Comparison: here it is!, the shoot-out of the decade...a comparison of two premium Kodak astrophotography films, E200 Pro pushed +3 stops to ASA 1000 vs hypered PJ400 (7hours at 50deg C). This page shows four images, two reduced in resolution to get an overall view and two smaller images at full scanner resolution (2700dpi). Page size is about 300kb. Conclusion?, hypered PJ400 is the choice for galaxy shots..E200 may be better for red nebulas (h-Alpha light).
M33 The Pinwheel Galaxy: a seven shot composite, 4 hypered PJ400 and 3 E200 images taken 11/18-21/00 at Mahogany Hammock in the Everglades National Park..I think this is as good as can be done with an 8" scope on film. Excellent sky conditions.
New Andromeda Galaxy: a much better image, stack of four 30 minute exposures taken with hypered PJ400 film, 11/21/00 at Mahogany Hammock.
LBN667 Nebula : or as I call it, the Baby Nebula.... looks like a baby on its back. Six 30 minute exposures on hypered PJ400 using the Tokai light pollution filter. I made an experiment and had the film pushed 1 stop, this was no good, the results were very grainy...I had to "blend" all six exposures to remove the grain..normally I would have stacked the images to bring out faint detail
IC 443 supernova remnant: this is a very faint object, it is a stack of 10 30 minutes exposures, for a total exposure of 5 hours with my Vixen R200SS 8"f4 newt. 8 exposures were taken on Kodak Elite Chrome 200 slide film, pushed 3 stops, and the 2 other exposures were taken on hypered PJ400 film. All images were individually scanned, processed to remove vignetting, levels adjusted and sharpened in Photoshop, then the images were registered with Picture Window 2.5 and stacked in Photoshop using Jerry Lodrigus' SMI method...even with all this work the nebulas are barely visible, this is an object that requires an IDAS (Tokai) filter and long exposures. 12/31/2000, yes, this was New Years eve...happy millennium.
A picture of me getting ready to start a night of astrophotography, taken in the parking lot of Mahogany Hammock, Everglades National Swamp. Note the mess of equipment I use, not a pretty picture!. 11/21/2000
North America and Pelican Nebula Mosaic: this is a mosaic of 8 images, four images of the Pelican Nebula on the right, and four images of the North America Nebula on the left. Images taken November and December of 2000. Each exposure was 30 minutes long taken with Kodak E200 pushed 3 stops to ASA1000. 1200*1000, 300kb.
The Sword of Orion complex: this is a mosaic of two images, each image is a stack of 4 30minute exposures.
Horsehead Nebula: a stack of four 30 minute exposures. Elite Chrome 200 pushed 3 stops.
East M8 and M20 nebula complex: a stack of four 20 minute exposures on hypered PJ400, 5/19/2001, Monument Lake. This image is slightly out of focus, which affects mostly the stars in the outer corners. I focused in the early evening and started photographing about 5 hours later, there was a 15degree temperature drop and I believe this caused the focus problem.
East and West M8 and M20 complex mosaic: a stack of four 20 minute exposures on Kodak Royal Gold 400, 9/15/2001, Keys Bridge site. A test of the new astrophotography film.. This image was combined with the East M8/M20 complex image taken on 5/19/2001 to form a widefield mosaic.
Nebulosity surrounding Sadr in Cygnus: this is a mosaic of 8 30 minutes exposures taken with Kodak Royal Gold 400. 9/20/01, Keys Bridge site. Compare to Butterfly Nebula image above, note that a Tokai filter was used for that one.
Articles
Dry Air Purge setup: I use a dry air generator to keep film dry during an exposure, this prevents film creep and the resulting trailed images during long exposures.
E200 slide film push processing comparison, 3 stop push vs. 1 stop push (1000ASA vs 400ASA), this compares grain and color balance on two images, both images taken on the same night with the same instrument and the same exposure.
Vignetting example with SCT focal reducer. Image taken by Mike Smith in Key Biscayne, Florida. C11 SCT with Celestron f6.3 focal reducer.
Another Vignetting example: M1 picture taken by Mike Smith, 80minutes, E200 slide film pushed 1 stop, Celestron C11 with Celestron f6.3 focal reducer.
This is a comparison between two negative/slide scanners, the old HP Photosmart and the new Acer Scanwit 2720s.
Old Images
M8 and M20: Apogee Widestar 4" f6 achromat refractor test, 25 min single exp. E200 film pushed +2 stops with the Tokai deep sky filter. 800*1200 150kb
M20 close-up: this image is a composite of two 60 minute exposures using a 1.8x barlow on the Vixen R200SS newt, 1500mm f7 with the barlow. E200 film pushed three stops. This large scale image is at full scan resolution, 2700dpi, it represents and area of the slide of 12mm*13mm, note the fine grain. This large scale image probably represents what a 48" wide mural print of the slide would look like.
IC444 and IC443: a single overenhanced 90 minute exp. with the Tokai deep sky filter, not a very good image but it shows a lot of nebulosity in the area. 800*500 140kb
IC443 detail: a comparison between two different exposures
Horsehead Nebula: A composite of several Horsehead shots, two 45min shots using a light pollution Tokai filter combined with a 30 minute shot, no filter. 1000*635 160kb
Horsehead Nebula: Two 50 minute images with Lumicon Deep Sky filter, pictures taken early Jan 2000. Compare color rendition and image depth with above image. 1200*800 100kb
Rosetta Nebula: two images taken on 3/4/00, two 45 minute pictures stacked, E200 film pushed 3 stops. 1000*700 207kb
Seagull Nebula: Northern portion of IC2177, with a couple of open clusters...this image reminds me of a parrot. two 90 minute exposures with the Tokai filter, E200 film pushed 3 stops. 1000*900 177kb. One of the images had trailed stars in one corner, due to not using the dry air purge system. The trailed stars were corrected in PS and Picture Window.
Orion Nebula complex: This is a rescanned and reprocessed image from the November 99 dark period. 1000*1350 130kb
Another Orion Nebula complex: same image as above but one of the four image stack was discarded due to elongated stars.
Andromeda Galaxy: One 45min and one 50min shot stacked using Jerry's SMI method. E200 film pushed 3 stops. These images were taken in between clouds, a front was moving through.
M8 and M20 Nebulas This picture was taken from Monument Lake campground in the Florida Everglades swamp a couple of days after I got the scope, on April 23 1999. Two 20 minute exposures stacked, with image processing to reduce vignetting. "old" Fuji Superia 400, full frame. First light for the Vixen R200SS
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