Saturn, on the sly

[Camelopardalis]

Folks,

Captured some Saturn data while visiting a mate last week and had been so overwhelmed with the Mars data from that night I'd neglected the Saturn data...until now :D

Not the glowing blue rings like the guys with mono cams get, but to date this is prolly the one I'm happiest with.

Kit: C11 Edge HD, TV Powermate 2.5x, ZWO ASI224MC.

Cheers,
Dunk

[MortonH]

Wow - how sharp is that!!! :thumbsup:

[Atmos]

Still pretty damn wonderful if you ask me!

[oernulfs]

Nice work :)

[Dennis]

You carry your imaging rig with you when you visit friends! LOL! Now that is what I call dedication – I hope they enjoyed the views.;)

Wonderful image with lovely tonality on the disc and excellent ring details.:thumbsup:

Cheers

Dennis

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks for all the comments, guys! That evening the seeing was good and fairly consistent so we managed to pull a hat trick with Jupiter, Mars and Saturn :D

[PeterM]

Lovely, lovely image Dunk. Why does your enthusiasm and getting the very most out of every bit of what gear you have remind me of our late great friend and also super planetary imager Erwin Vandervelden.

[John Hothersall]

A fine image, was going to say you did not get that last night as seeing was average only.

Well done Dunk-its been a great week! Hopefully there will be more?

John.

[astronobob]

Brilliant result there Dunk, , Clean & Sharp to boot :thumbsup:

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Peter - that is the greatest of compliments!



Thanks John! Yeah we've had some good nights and some not so good recently. Hopefully we'll get treated to a few more good ones :D



Thanks Bob! We get what the atmosphere allows ;)

[kkara4]

amazing result Dunk! :eyepop::thumbsup:

[andyc]

Sharper than a page of Oscar Wilde's witticisms rolled up to a point dipped in lemon juice and jabbed in your eye :poke: Really good, Dunk, and a nice big stretch of Encke Division too. :eyepop:

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Krishan, Andy!

[firstlight]

Can't say more than what others have said. Pretty spectacular stuff, Obviously I need a better camera (andd skills :D). Beautiful image Dunk.

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Tony!

[AstroJason]

Far out Dunk, you're smashing out some really impressive shots mate. Top stuff.

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Jase! The 224 really hits a sweet spot with the scope :D

[Decimus]

Wow, Dunk.:eyepop: This is the best image of Saturn I have seen in a very long time - absolutely superb and NASA quality...It should feature on APOD! Well done.

Cheers,
Richard

[Nikolas]

Superb image is all I can say

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Richard, Nik!

[Hol_dan]

Wowsers!! Any tips on the processing process?

[Camelopardalis]

Thanks Holly!

Pick only the best frames :) rubbish stacked is still rubbish. The faster the capture the better, but at the same time you have to balance signal/noise with your camera to find a sweet spot. I've been using unity gain with my 224 for most of my captures recently. F-ratio is also important in image brightness. You want good (but not oversaturated) bright images in your capture. That can be more tricky with Saturn as it's not as bright as Jupiter and Mars.

I used a couple of points on the rings as a white point reference for colour balancing. Some guys with mono cameras get a lot more blue in the rings, and the 224 is a bit weak at the blue end. I really like the blue-white ring renditions I see by the great imagers here, but I'm not game for drawing weak signal out of my data. I'm also - not yet - game to jump in with a mono sensor ;)

[nessmulqueeney]

Incredible stuff! 👍🏻