More Lunacy (afocal)

[astro_south]

With the recent plethora of afocal moonshots being exhibited here I thought I would add mine into the mix.

The following photos were taken over a week ago using my 12.5" dob and 25mm cheap silvertop plossl with a 2Mp Canon Powershot A40 handheld. The different magnifications have come from the camera optical zoom and not from changing eyepieces. The 25mm plossl in my dob gives about 76x.

There has been no processing on the images (apart from resize and save at lower quality)

Here's the first one.....

[astro_south]

here is the second......

[astro_south]

and finally the third.....

[ballaratdragons]

Hooly-Dooly Andrew! Very good!!
Hope I can eventually get mine that clear. Well done.

Look at the different greys in the 2nd one. :eyepop:


p.s. It must be Moon Week LOL

[astro_south]

Thanks BD! There are a whole pile that were pretty blurry due to the handheld nature (but don't tell anyone ;) )

[ballaratdragons]

Same here. I picked the best 4 for mine. Jupiter was a mess tonight.

[[1ponders]]

Nice shots Andrew. You've got some nice contrast along those terminators. Especially in the second shot with the ridges in Mare Serenitatis

[astro_south]

Thanks Paul. The original shows the little craters on Mare Serenitatis much better....all but lost after the resize/resample and save at around 75% quality.

[gaa_ian]

Nice shots Andrew !
I will have to give it a go with my wife's Canon A70 to see what I can get.
I have a Universal Camera Adaptor on the way so Ill have to give it a good go next week !
I have been playing around with a snapshot digital tonight, not a patch on the A40 shots you have here !

[Mick]

Wow, They are very good Andrew.

[astro_south]

Thanks Ian & Mick

Paul, here is a crop from the original image of Mare Serenitatis (saved at 90% :( ) that hopefully doesn't loose too much of the small crater detail on it

[RAJAH235]

Nice pics. Andrew. I can feel a competition coming on. :D L.

[iceman]

They are really, really good Andrew. You're a natural at afocal - I still remember that Saturn shot of yours.

They look remarkably smooth for not having any processing done on them. Great job.

[astro_south]

Thanks Raj and Mike

Raj - maybe we could add a crater or two to the Monthly Observing Challenge !

Mike - (and anyone else), feel free to process the images if you so desire. Not sure what you mean by "smooth" though?

[iceman]

Andrew, the 3rd shot, look towards the lower right hand side, there's very little in the way of bumps and spots between the craters. Lunar images can look like that as a result of aggressive noise removal using a program such as "NeatImage".

If you've done no processing, it's possible the camera has done some internal sharpening and noise removal.

[ving]

great shots andrew :)
nothing much else to shoot at the moment with the moon out hey... (or indeed see)

they look lovely and clear

[astro_south]

I think I see what you mean. The original image is 1600x1200 and I used Irfanview to resize/resample the image down to 800x600. Perhaps in this process it was smoothed a little. I used the point and shoot options on the camera with the only unusal setting being the "close in" option for focus. Everything else was automatic and decided on by the camera. Perhaps it did do some noise reduction in the capture. I don't really know.

Maybe the image at the eyepiece is focused for the centre of the moon (ie top left hand corner of image) and due to the curvature of the moon the focus softens down towards the lower right. I don't know if this is true or can happen..just a thought.

[astro_south]

Thanks for the comments Ving

Mike - another thought is it could be outer edge performance of the eyepiece softening, or the fact that I had zoomed in a little with the camera. E-mail me if you want the original to examine and play with.

[Striker]

Great stuff Andrew.....you must be happy.

[atalas]

Man these are great shots!


Louie:)

[astro_south]

Thanks Tony and Louie.

I encourage everyone with a digital camera and scope to get out and give it ago. I'm not seriously into astrophotography, but I do enjoy tinkering, experimenting and trying things out to see what can be done. Get out and give it a go, it will only take you a minute to grab you camera and rattle off a few shots and you might be surprised by the outcome - I know I always am.