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All the material on this website is copyrighted to J-P Metsavainio, if not otherwise stated. Any content on this website may not be reproduced without the author’s permission.

Have a visit in my portfolio

Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Astro Anarchy gets published



My astrophotos are selected as a public content to a pedestrian zone in my hometown Oulu, Finland.
There is a very large display unit at the main square, 5.12 x 3.2 meters (over 16 x 10 feet).

Six different sets of my astronomical photographs and animations are running there as a slideshow during the January 2016. The show will run at every 15-25 minutes and last about three minutes at the time.

The public slideshow in Oulu, Finland
January 2016

My shot of the Bubble nebula at 5.12 x 3.2 meters LED-screen (over 16 x 10 feet)

All my astronomical photographs can be found from my PORTFOLIO.


Monday, January 11, 2016

Abell 85 (CTB1), a dim Galactic Supernova Remnant in Cassiopeia, project finalized



I started this imaging project at January 2015. This January 2016 I was able to shoot more exposures for this dim target to finalized my imaging project. It's always a pleasure to have the image ready after a long period of time. As usually, I compared my exposures from different years to see has anything happened up there during the year. Usually there are no difference other than seeing conditions but this time I spotted a suspected variable star in the image field. (NSV 26187) There is an animated image in this post to show the difference between the years 2015 and 2016. 

Abell 85 (CTB1) 
SNR G116.9+00.1 in constellation Cassiopeia, click for a large image.

Image spans about one degree of sky. The photo is in mapped colors from the light 
emitted by an ionized elements, red=sulfur, green=hydrogen and blue=oxygen.


Abell 85 in visual colors
Please, click for a large image

Natural color composition from the emission of ionized elements, R=80%Hydrogen+20%Sulfur, G=100%Oxygen and B=85%Oxygen+15%Hydrogen to compensate otherwise missing H-beta emission. This composition is very close to a visual spectrum.

INFO

Abell 85 is a very faint supernova remnant in constellation Cassiopeia. It's difficult to image with any details due to extremely low surface brightness. Abell 85 has a largish diameter, about half a degree, it has a same apparent diameter as a full Moon. The physical diameter is about 98 light years across. This SNR locates about 9800 light years from the Earth. CTB1 was originally thought to be a planetary nebula and it was included the Abell catalog of planetary nebulae under a name Abell 85. It was confirmed to be a supernova remnant by Willis & Dickel at 1971.

Suspected variable star

An animated image showing a suspected variable star, NSV 26187, brightness variation between the years 2015 and 2016.

Technical details

Processing work flow

Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 21 iterations, added at 25% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.

Imaging optics
Celestron Edge HD 1100 @ f7 with 0,7 focal reducer for Edge HD 1100 telescope

Mount
10-micron 1000

Cameras and filters
Imaging camera Apogee Alta U16 and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x2 and SXV-AOL

Astrodon filter, 5nm H-alpha
Astrodon filter, 3nm O-III
Astrodon filter, 3nm S-II

Exposure times
H-alpha, 21 x 1200s =7h
O-III, 9 x 1200s binned = 3h
S-II,  6 x 1200s binned = 2h
Total 12h

A single uncropped, calibrated and stretched 20 min. H-alpha frame as it comes from the camera


This really is a dim target...


Saturday, January 9, 2016

NGC 1499, the California Nebula



At the night of January 4. I was shooting exposures for the Filaments of Cygnus image. After few hours the constellation Cygnus was getting too low in the horizon and I had to select a new target for rest of the night, the NGC 1499.


Detail of the NGC 1499
Please, click for a large image

Image area spans about one degree of sky. The photo is in mapped colors from the light 
emitted by an ionized elements, red=sulfur, green=hydrogen and blue=oxygen.


An older wide field photo of the NGC 1499
Please, click for a large image

A wide field image of the NGC 1499 from January 2012 was shot with a Tokina AT-X 200mm f2.8 lens, QHY9 astrocamera and Baader narrowband filter set. The white circle at lower right corner shows an apparent size of the full Moon at the same scale. (Moon has an apparent diameter of 0.5 degrees = 30 arc minutes.) This is a large target with a lowish surface brightness, total exposure time is around 30h.

INFO

The California Nebula is an emission area located in constellation Perseus. It appears to resemble outlines of State of California on long exposure photographs, like this one. It has a very low surface brightness and it's very difficult to observe visually. Distance from my hometown Oulu, Finland, is about 1000 light years.
this image spans around five degrees horizontally. The Wikipedia article states, that the angular size is about 2,5 degrees (Five full Moons side by side) but as can be seen in this image, the actual size, with a dim outer parts, is much large.

Detail of NGC 1499 at visual colors

Natural color composition from the emission of ionized elements, R=80%Hydrogen+20%Sulfur, G=100%Oxygen and B=85%Oxygen+15%Hydrogen to compensate otherwise missing H-beta emission. This composition is very close to a visual spectrum.

Technical details

Processing work flow

Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 21 iterations, added at 25% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.

Imaging optics
Celestron Edge HD 1100 @ f7 with 0,7 focal reducer for Edge HD 1100 telescope

Mount
10-micron 1000

Cameras and filters
Imaging camera Apogee Alta U16 and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x2 and SXV-AOL

Astrodon filter, 5nm H-alpha
Astrodon filter, 3nm O-III
Astrodon filter, 3nm S-II

Exposure times
H-alpha, 15 x 1200s =5h
O-III, 3 x 1200s binned = 1h
S-II,  3 x 1200s binned = 1h
Total 7h
Some S-II and O-III signal is borrowed from the older wide field photo.


Thursday, January 7, 2016

My first photo for the year 2016, Filaments of Cygnus



We have had few clear nights in this year. I was able to finalice a two frame mosaic project of the central Cygnus at freezing temperature of - 27 degrees centigrade (-17 fahrenheit) Lights are from three nights between 3. - 6. january 2016. Total exposure time 15h.

Opening image for the year 2016, Filaments of Cygnus
Please, click for a large image, 1800x900 pixels and 1.7 MB

A two frame mosaic of the central Cygnus area spans about two degrees of sky. Image is in mapped colors from the light emitted by an ionized elements, red=sulfur, green=hydrogen and blue=oxygen.

Orientation in Cygnus 

Area of interest is marked as a white regtangle in this older wide field image of the area.
More info about this photo can be found HERE.

Technical details

Processing work flow

Image acquisition, MaxiDL v5.07.
Stacked and calibrated in CCDStack2.
Deconvolution with a CCDStack2 Positive Constraint, 21 iterations, added at 25% weight
Color combine in PS CS3
Levels and curves in PS CS3.

Imaging optics
Celestron Edge HD 1100 @ f7 with 0,7 focal reducer for Edge HD 1100 telescope

Mount
10-micron 1000

Cameras and filters
Imaging camera Apogee Alta U16 and Apogee seven slot filter wheel
Guider camera, Lodestar x2 and SXV-AOL

Astrodon filter, 5nm H-alpha
Astrodon filter, 3nm O-III
Astrodon filter, 3nm S-II

Exposure times
H-alpha, 27 x 1200s =9h
O-III, 9 x 1200s binned = 3h
S-II,  9 x 1200s binned = 3h
Total 15h

A vertical composition

As many of my astronomical nature photos, this works well as horizontal or vertical composition.