Climbing the Hill (Part 1)

I often read about newcomers to this hobby learning the ropes of what it's all about, so I thought I would write an entry about my journey through the waters of how we do this.

Let's dispel some myths first. Deep sky objects are faint, no matter what size scope you use, and the sky is a large place to find a small object. The joy of finding a new object is akin to discovering a needle in a haystack, or a gem in a mountain of rock. But unlike those experiences, this one comes with some tools to help make the job easier. I came to this hobby in the 70's, and back then things were a little different when it came to learning the sky. But those experiences are still the same today, the technology will only help you to a certain extent, and beyond that, it is this root level knowledge that gets a griphold and kicks in when everything else can't bail you out.

Begin with a basic planisphere. Some will say to use Stellarium, but then you are lugging a laptop outside, and ruining your dark adapted eyes with it. A simple planisphere will get you in the ball park of what's up and where as far as constellations are concerned. Put away the telescope for now, just use a planisphere, grab a chair, and a red covered flashlight, and begin to learn the constellations. Start with a really prominent one, like Orion in the Winter, easy to find, and then work your way out from there in larger and larger circles. Once you've grown the circle a bit, familiarize yourself with those constellations that lie on the ecliptic, the series of constellations that the sun and planets follows. Use software if you like to use the moon's position in the sky to determine the rough location of some of the constellations. You can watch the moon move across the sky on a monthly basis, and it is a highly visible indicator that can be very helpful.

If you are really bent on using a telescope, stick to easy targets like the moon or brighter planets that you can identify. Enjoy the craters, practice changing eyepieces, centering targets, print a moon map and enjoy the thrill of first hand discovery. It never quite goes away, even years later, so don't think mastery at this stage. And don't forget to use the locations of those planets to learn the constellations and vice versa. If you are going to use your telescope's finder, aim at a distant daytime object and set the crosshairs dead on between the finder and main scope at a medium to high magnification. The finder will be hard enough to use at night without it being accurately pointed. Learning how to point a telescope properly is an exercise in growth itself, how to deal with the mount, it's motions, damping after movement, etc, all are important. Aim it at stars, learn the names of a few bright ones as you learn the constellations, begin to memorize their names. Night after night and time after time this begins to grow as the stars in the east gradually wander to the south and finally the west and the seasons pass onward. In 12 months you will have come full circle with the plane of the ecliptic and learned many new constellations. And don't think you will learn it all in one year, but that first year will bring a lot of growth.

This hobby takes time, patience, practice, a little gear, more patience, some mistakes, some success, a bit of reading, and some interaction. Good luck in your great new endeavour.

Wintertime and Future Plans

The recent cold snap has forced me indoors to retreat and plan for better evenings ahead. This is a hobby and as such I am not required to participate in it when conditions are not favorable to my enjoyment of it. Some will endure cold weather and some have made reasonable steps to do so with observatories and heated clothing, but I am not there yet.

So taking stock, as this year of my return to the hobby comes to a close, I am proud of my accomplishments so far. I have acquired some decent gear including a pair of Garret Optical 15x70 LW binoculars on the very stable Far Sight binocular mount and Orion Paragon tripod back in early May. My drive for a telescope lead me to purchasing the LXD75 SN6 in late June. I added a few accessories to it in July, including a dew cap, a custom made accessory bracket for mounting cameras and a guidescope and a Meade LPI to image planetary and lunar shots. I spent some time paying for all of this, and went on to purchase an additional counterweight, and the Canon XS dslr camera in October. Recently in November I picked up an Orion ST80 and brackets to mount on the SN6 for use as a guidescope and a grab and go scope. I now have pretty much everything I need to at least attempt to do some visual astronomy and both wide and narrow field imaging, as well as begin to work outreach programs with kids.

In the coming months I would like to sell the Cave 10 inch f/5 and provide someone with a nice scope to use. I am very pleased with the SN6 and even though it lacks a bit of aperture, it's portability and views more than make up for it all. I'm at a stage in my hobby where I really know what I want and also know what I don't need. My simple plans include adding a few additional eyepieces, a Meade DSI for use as an autoguider, and a basic diagonal for the ST80, all low cost and affordable items. I plan to focus my efforts in astronomy on astrophotography and finally reach beyond a beginner stage with my imaging and to a point where I can begin my ultimate quest, and that is to image the entire Messier catalog. It is a simple plan, but in the process of doing so I will get to know them all in great depth.

My love for astronomy in general may wax and wane a little, but it never quite goes away, and the longer I sit on it, the more the desire grows to do it again.

I want to take a moment to thank everyone who reads this blog, from all over the world. I know that I have inspired some of you, and if nothing else shown you a little of what can be done when you set your minds to dream beyond this pale blue dot.

Progress So Far

I am pleased to report that digital astrophotography is not the bear that many people have lead me to believe. Like conventional film astrophotography, there will be disappointments, but the basics are pretty similar. Don't let the disappointments get you down, they are necessary for learning.

The following is a pretty basic guideline for how I image with my Canon XS DSLR.

1. Use a high ISO setting, at least in the beginning, like 800 or 1600. Aim your camera at the target. Make sure the camera is set in RAW + JPEG mode. I use a timer to control mine but you can use a laptop. I prefer the timer.
2. Use a good lens (the kit lens in my case), make sure your focus is good. Focusing is perhaps the hardest part of the whole operation.
3. Expose for a few minutes (I use 3 now) on a stable vibration free platform. You can shoot several exposures of the same length (and should). The more the better.
4. Your stable platform should be a good quality and well aligned mount, in my case, the LXD75 with the SN6 on it, camera riding on a bracket on the back. Your image is as good as your ability to keep it stable and tracking properly for the exposure duration. I view my object directly in my scope to check tracking.
4. Shoot a number of exposures on targets of the same length, use 2 or 3 minutes as a good starter. Cover the lens or whatever the camera is hooked to and shoot an equal number of dark frames of equal time which are used for subtracting the thermal noise from the images using software. Do this when you are done imaging what you want.
5. Load all the frames of your target object (lights and darks)in Deep Sky Stacker, stack them. DSS is a simple software package to use. Use the default settings, dig into the manual and online information for more help.
5. Take the final image and adjust it to your liking. I've recently began using PhotoShop and it makes it very simple to achieve pleasing results. PhotoShop is a world of its own, but it's basics have really helped me a lot.

This simple process will yield satisfying results, or at least it has for me.

About 4 weeks into this process, I am getting decent enough results to use as a basis for the hard part, which is working to achieve exceptional results. This is where it gets into precise polar alignment, much longer exposures, many more frames, learning how to use autoguiding, and learning a whole lot about post-processing. Start simple so you are not compounding your mistakes and wasting a lot of time making them.

I am amazed that I have gotten this far, and if I can do it, you can as well.

Constellation Imaging

I had to give this a shot to see how it would look, so I centered the scope on Orion and shot a sequence of 10 shots of Orion at 3 minutes, 55mm at f/5.6 and ISO 1600, and then selected the best 5 images to stack with Deep Sky Stacker for a total of 15 minutes of integration time. I've been advancing with my processing technique's having finally learned how to adjust some of the levels and obtain decent contrast and color, and this is evident in the results with Betelgeuse (upper left) and Rigel (lower right) showing some proper colors. In the larger image there is some red nebulosity visible in M42, the center star in the sword of Orion, although, as expected, the whole nebula is a little "blown out." This one has been a good learning experience and demonstrates some progress in what I am learning.

A Dazzling Trio

The 3 belt stars in the constellation of Orion are perhaps one of the most recognized asterisms in the Winter sky. Many people are drawn to these 3 beauties almost immediately. Let's take a closer look at these 3 stars.

From left to right, the stars are named Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka, and they are some of the brightest and hottest stars in the sky.

Alnitak is a triple star system, about 800 light years distant, and is sometimes referred to as Zeta Orionis, and the primary star is a class O type blue supergiant. In fact it is the brightest star of it's class visible in our night sky. It is 28 times more massive than our sun, and over 20 times larger. It's companion, Alnitak B is a B type star and orbits the primary once every 1500 years. Alnitak Ab, the third star is also an O type star and was only recently discovered. Nearby this star system is the flame nebula and the horesehead nebula.

Alnilam lies at a distance of 1000 light years and is referred to as Epsilon Orionis. It is a B type blue-white supergiant, and in spite of its farther distance than the other two, is actually the most powerful visible bright star in the sky. This star stands to turn into a red supergiant in about a million years and stands an excellent chance of becoming a supernova.

Mintaka is the right most star in the belt, and is also known as Delta Orionis. It is a multiple star system with a class B giant as the primary and a smaller but hotter class O as a secondary. The stars move very rapidly, orbiting each other about once every 5.7 days. One can only imagine the chaos in this region, some 900 light years distant.

So while we look at this configuration calmly and as a place of great beauty, it is one of the most cataclysmic regions in the heavens, both a stellar nursery and a graveyard, somewhere out on a spiral arm in our own Milky Way galaxy.

The Fair, The Bad, and The Ugly

I was pleased with the results of M45, 20 frames at 3 minutes each, ISO 800 at 55mm, f/5.6, the sky background came out reasonably clean, there is decent nebulosity, and the framing was about right. I had an enlargement made of this one and it looks good.


My M42 was imaged with 20 frames at 3 minutes each, ISO 800 at 55mm, f/5.6 as well, but I am displeased with the background on this one. I've tried processing it a couple of times, but I think the problems lies in my dark frames.



M31 is a nice target, but this photo does no justice to it. Shot 20 frames at 3 minutes each, ISO 800 at 55mm, f/5.6 and using the same dark frames as used with M42 above, this was very well placed in the sky, the night was perfectly clear with excellent seeing so I can't blame it on anything like that.

With practice, all of this will improve.

A Much Needed Accessory

These little multi-target red dot finders are one of the most useful items I have found. So far I have purchased two of them, one for my binocular mount, and one for my telescope. Using them to sight a guide star is very useful in the dark when a crosshair is invisible.

So tonight I came up with a great idea. Someone should build an adapter to allow mounting one of these on the accessory shoe of a camera. This would greatly assist in sighting the camera when fastening it piggyback style on a telescope, simply because using the optical camera sight is near impossible and it is an inconvenience to align it.

Other applications that could be developed for this base would include a replacement dovetail that would fit the base for both Meade and Celestron telescopes. I consider these little items to be among the most valuable convenience items one can have while working in the dark.