Here is a image of Mars from 2022-08-28 make by stacking 400 frames from a 34 second video.
Size of Mars at the time: 9.6"
10 inch f/5.6 (1407mm fl) Newtonian
Camera- Canon Rebel T7i (APS-C size sensor) (24Mp) (3.70 micron pixels)
Eyepiece Projection with 15mm eyepiece (8110mm efl @ f/32.3) (5.76 x prime focus) (Field 0.152 x 0.099 deg)
The video was taken at 5.2X digital zoom on the camera - (42,170mm eff f.l. @ f/169, actual optical is still @ f/32) (30x prime) (Field 0.028 x 0.019 deg) (105" x 68")
Converted the video from MP4 to AVI for stacking using PIPP conversion software.
Stacked using Registax 6
Enhanced contrast and sharpness using wavelets in Registax 6. Also adjusted the registration of the RGB channels using Registax 6.
I think the "double image" artifact on the lower left is due to the optics being out of collimation a little. I could see it on the screen but could not focus it out. I noticed 2 days ago using the scope visually that the collimation looked out a little so I checked, sure enough both the secondary and primary were out a little so I re-collimated it.
Looking at the S&T Mars Profiler (see the screenshot below) the dark area on the top (South) is Mare Sirenum. A little bit North Polar Hood appears to be visible at the bottom as well. Some of the limb brightness on the right side is probably an artifact of the image processing but I'm pretty sure some of it is due to limb clouds (this is the morning side of Mars). The bottom image is the stacked image with only slight contrast enhancement using a histogram tool (curves) and is close to what the Mars looked like visually.
Hi Paul, good job on a tough target! I don't think I could get anything much with my 140mm and Mars.. My 11" is back home but I am not. So hope to get some Mars images in the coming months.
Terri
Here is a image of Mars from 2022-08-28 make by stacking 400 frames from a 34 second video.
Very nice, Paul! This is a planet I've never had much luck with getting a photo. It will be a challenge trying this again. Very nice annotations as well.
Greg
Mars, Deimos and maybe Phobos, 2022-11-03 in the AM
Took some longer exposures of Mars Thursday Morning, 2022-11-03 to see if I could image Mars moons Deimos and Phobos. Earlier I had seen on my planetarium software that they would both be favorably positioned in their orbits (away from the glare of Mars. I was successful but turns out the telescope "spider vanes" holding the secondary mirror are in just the wrong place making it harder than it needed to be. I'll have to try again after I rotating the tube assembly a little.
10" f/5.6 Newtonian, Canon T7i DSLR, used eyepiece projection using a 24 mm Konig eyepiece to get high magnification (~4866 efl @ f/19, 3.5 x prime), 20 sec @ ISO 400. On the camera's display I could just make out Deimos on the best images. I stacked the 3 best images yesterday. It wasn't until today that I spotted what I believe to be Phobos in the image.
Star map showing location of Deimos and Phobos.
Deimos-location-map-2022-11-03-AM-1.jpg
Mars 2022-11-03, 3:01 AM EDT
The same morning I imaged Mars and it's moons I imaged the planet itself. The seeing was very good. My best views were at 282x with my 8" f/6 Dob using a 2x Barlow with my binoviewer. It was a little better than the 10" f/5.6 at 333x using the Barlow and binoviewer. I did not try the 10" without Barlow which would also have given me 282x. In retrospect that would have been another interesting comparison.
Technical Data:
10" f/5.6, Canon Rebel T7i DSLR in video mode, 2x Barlow producing 2.65 x prime with the camera for 3,728mm e.f.l. @ f/14.8, 10x digital zoom, 1/400 sec @ iso 400.
Stacked 20% (725) of 3624 frames (a 2 minute video clip) using AutoStakkert!3 (I have been hearing and reading about this software so I recently downloaded it and started using this. I highly recommend watching a tutorial because the step details, though fairly short and straight forward, are not at all obvious. Here's one tutorial I found - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g67DfADSWvA ). I also did a stack using 50% of the frames but it did not produce better results. Sharpened in Registax 6 using wavelets.
Scott mentioned today, at the observing site, that he thought there is a dust storm interfering with observations of Mars. He may be right. In this image I noted that 2/3 of the North Polar Hood (top) looks darker and brownish. This is not how it has been looking. Also the last couple of times imaging Mars the East (right) side has exhibited odd banding artifacts when over processed (see bottom image).
Size of Mars- 15.3 arc sec (North is up)
Paul, great images!!! Keep them coming.
Terri
11-20-2022
The seeing was predicted to be bad tonight. It was not great, but it was OK as evidenced by this image of Mars. Mars size 16.9", almost at it's maximum this apparition of 17.2". Looks like the North Polar Hood is starting to thin out. Below the image of Mars is an image of S&T Mars Profiler showing the features visible ( https://skyandtelescope.org/observing/interactive-sky-watching-tools/mars-which-side-is-visible/# ).
I went with a longer video (3 minutes) on the idea that with our seeing we are not likely to notice a difference in smearing do to the rotation of Mars between a 1 minute and a 3 minute video.
2022-11-20, 10:35 PM EST, 10" f/5.6 Newtonian, 1/160 sec @ ISO 1600, eyepiece projection using a 15mm, stack of 1000 (20%) of out of 5412 frames (3 minute clip)
Video clip converted to AVI format with PIPP, stacked with AutoStakkert!3, wavelets (sharping), histogram stretch and RGB alignment in Registax.
Mars, 11/22/2022, 9:45 PM EST
Note the time of this image of Mars above. Mars is high enough now mid-evening to get some good views and images.
10" f/5.6 Newtonian telescope, Canon T7i DSLR camera, magnification method-Eyepiece Projection using a 15mm eyepiece (8110mm eff. focal length @ f/32.3) (5.76 x prime), 1/200 sec @ ISO 3200.
Used 3x digital zoom, yielding 24,330mm efl. and a Field of view of 184"x104" @ 1920x1080 pixels. Image scale- 10.4 px / arc sec (0.096 arc sec / pixel)
Mars profiler map
2022-11-22_9.41PMEST_ST_Mars_Profiler.jpg
Patches of clouds can also be seen on the morning side (right) at about 2:00 and from about 2:30 to 3:30 and may extend all the way to the North Polar Cap. There also appears to be a cloud over the South Polar Cap (12:30 position). There is indications of evening clouds as well on the left edge of the disk.
Paul, nice images on a tough night. It was another challenging night. I was able to take some images between 10pm and midnight before the wind did me in. I just don't enjoy sitting in the wind and trying to keep things from blowing away. Seeing for me was maybe 4/10 at best. This image has quite a lot of detail in it if you compare to a standard and I can even see the leopard skin mottling. Even though I was disappointed in the night, I was happy with the results. I used my tec180 with only 2X barlow and ADC. I didn't think it would take more magnification last night so kept f ration lower. I was shooting pretty fast frame rates of 5ms and less and for 4 minutes. I was getting >40,000 frames per video but only using 3-6% of them (max around 2K frames). I'm going to play around to see if more gives me any added detail. I used autostakkert3 plus astrosurface. I take a very light hand to wavelets and sharpening. BTW.. thanks for fixing the colors on the site. I like the way they are and it gives pleasing user experience for me on both OSX and Windows 10.
Paul, nice images on a tough night. It was another challenging night. I was able to take some images between 10pm and midnight before the wind did me in. I just don't enjoy sitting in the wind and trying to keep things from blowing away. Seeing for me was maybe 4/10 at best. This image has quite a lot of detail in it if you compare to a standard and I can even see the leopard skin mottling. Even though I was disappointed in the night, I was happy with the results. I used my tec180 with only 2X barlow and ADC. I didn't think it would take more magnification last night so kept f ration lower. I was shooting pretty fast frame rates of 5ms and less and for 4 minutes. I was getting >40,000 frames per video but only using 3-6% of them (max around 2K frames). I'm going to play around to see if more gives me any added detail. I used autostakkert3 plus astrosurface. I take a very light hand to wavelets and sharpening. BTW.. thanks for fixing the colors on the site. I like the way they are and it gives pleasing user experience for me on both OSX and Windows 10.
Great image, Terri!! That's really great, especially as bad as the seeing was last night. Nice work.
Greg
Here is one that's been edited in PS a bit.. bit brighter.. rind peeled and discarded.
Here is one that's been edited in PS a bit.. bit brighter.. rind peeled and discarded.
Wow! Even better. Beautiful.
Greg
Yes, I too am surprised you got such good results last night. I didn't even bother trying it was so bad down here. And big improvement on 2nd processing, wouldn't think it was the same data.
I took a chance on the night @pwalker since it was clear for a few hours. When I set up the wind was howling and discouraging bur around 10pm it settled down for a couple of hours. I took some images and tried visual. Visual was not good and stars were just a mess but still did a tour around Cetus for all of the objects I put in my last COTM presentation. All but one of the galaxies was pretty easy in the 7", one of galaxies took some work of moving the tube slightly to see the smudge. I ended up breaking down at midnight. I like that I can handle the 180 by myself. It has that big captains wheel in front of the focuser and I can just hold that with my left hand while putting the tube across my body to the right shoulder. When I can no longer handle it it's either time for a permanent mount or to sell it to someone who can use it. I may get 10 years out of it. Here is my new baby in case curious.
