YAfter acquiring our
100acre property high up in the Tinderry Mountains 56km south of Canberra, back in late May 2021, then
turning the first sod for the future Eagleview Observatory on 7 Dec 2021 and then the long and complex logistical project to
complete Eagleview Observatory and then when finally completed, being frustrated by all the extra cloud cover caused by the La Nina effect here in eastern Australia, shock horror, I was eeeeventually lucky enough to be able to get enough clear sky time over the current New Moon, to cobble together the very first colour image to come out of Eagleview Observatory! phew!..and Woohoo!
While the cloud cover has been considerably greater in recent times, due to La bloody Nina, when it actually
is clear, the other important atmospheric qualities have proven to be excellent at Eagleview, with both sky transparency and seeing conditions revealed to be of an excellent standard on the mountain. These conditions have been noted on every observing and imaging session over the last 18 months or so too. So, coupled with the excellent Bortle 1/2 dark sky conditions enjoyed at the location and despite the increased La Nina cloud it is proving to be an excellent spot to do astronomy and is a significant improvement in conditions compared to my
previous observatory location at Wallaroo, much closer to Canberra.
This first full colour image is composed of only a pretty modest 6.2hrs worth of total exposure, which is not the sort of exposure length I would normally be satisfied with, especially considering it is data from five filters!...but hey, I was very keen to acquire my first full colour image within 12 months after starting the observatory and because I had shot this target with all the same imaging gear, from my previous observatory site, I kept the exposure almost exactly the same, so I could compare results more critically...so...voila, I did it and with a few days to spare! so, here it is!
NGC 1232 view in:
Pbase Galleries and on
Flickr (click on image to enlarge)
Comparison Tinderry vs Wallaroo site and an
animated Gif (also attached)
Raw sub frame comparison
Comparison Eagleview vs La Silla in Chile
Happy days!
EDIT: Courtesy of Allan (alpal) and using MaximDL processing software to analyse the FWHM of multiple stars across the raw Luminance frames used in this image, confirms an average FWHM of 1.7" with some figures as low as 1.512" which is excellent and I have seen similarly sharp sub frames on all four imaging session done at Eagleview so far...fingers crossed this proves common place up there!
Mike
Now, we just need to go back into drought, with much less clouds
....
