Mars & Saturn Feb 14th UT in good seeing

Quark (Trevor) · #1 16-02-2012, 06:55 AM

Hi All,

Mars in quite reasonable seeing and Saturn in good seeing. Still tinkering with my capture regime for Mars, the Flea3 is just so much more sensitive than was the DMK. The NPC seems to be a bit dusty at the moment.

There is a bright spot within the storm remnant on Saturn in both RGB & 807nm IR. This is the first time for the year that any such detail has been visible in IR. This is probably the highest res data I have captured this apparition of Saturn.

Have attached an RGB & 807nm IR data set form Mars. I continue to tinker with the capture regime for Mars and I think I am making progress.

Have attached a couple of Saturn RGB's and an IR that splits them in time. By blinking the IR with the RGB's the bright spot is clearly visible in IR. Have also attached a very hi res animation of RGB data.

Thanks for looking.
Regards
Trevor

PS: will also try and post a "B" channel straight out of R6 with absolutely no post processing at all. I am having problems with my internet connection so this might take a while to upload.

Clayton · #2 16-02-2012, 07:00 AM

Lovely detail Trevor

Lester · #3 16-02-2012, 07:31 AM

Wonderful crisp views there Trevor, thanks.

lepton3 (Ivan) · #4 16-02-2012, 07:56 AM

Great images Trevor. The spot really shows up in the animation. Things getting interesting on Saturn?

-Ivan

Quark (Trevor) · #5 16-02-2012, 09:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Clayton

Lovely detail Trevor

Thanks Rob, must say I am pretty pleased with these also.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lester

Wonderful crisp views there Trevor, thanks.

Thanks Lester, appreciate your comments.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lepton3

Great images Trevor. The spot really shows up in the animation. Things getting interesting on Saturn?

-Ivan

Thanks Ivan, I am pretty pleased to get this spot in IR and what that might mean, regarding whats happening within the storm remnant.

Quark (Trevor) · #6 16-02-2012, 09:17 AM

I see in another thread that Mark suggested posting just 1 raw frame from each channel as a guide to the seeing.

Have attached 1 "R", "G" & "B" frame. These were captured as 543 Kb FIT files and to post here I have saved them as greyscale JPEGs. These images are 1 frame of approx 3,000 frames that I capture for each channel.

Regards
Trevor

multiweb (Marc) · #7 16-02-2012, 09:20 AM

Superb shots. Love the sharpness and colors. Amazing stuff.

Deeno · #8 16-02-2012, 09:29 AM

Wow! Really sharp.
Wonder how long it would take to drive out to Broken Hill one new moon?

Paul Haese · #9 16-02-2012, 09:34 AM

Nice work Trev, seems everyone is having the luck with the seeing. I am still waiting patiently (well maybe not).

Try stacking this data in autostakkert. I have found it does a great job and is better than registax both in terms of speed and sharpness. I reprocessed the Broken Hill data from last year and it came up really sharp. I am sure it will work for you too.

samilag (Giuseppe) · #10 16-02-2012, 09:35 AM

Trevor fantastic!!!!
Mars image has a quality very good and Saturn animation gives the possibility to see very well band evolution during the rotation

Again fantastic !

Tank you to share the this images

Giuseppe

John Hothersall · #11 16-02-2012, 05:38 PM

These are your best yet, especially like Mars with such fine detail. Interesting to see the stills too. IR for Mars does not show the detail as well compared to Red but does show better contrast than the Red.

John.

DavidU (Dave) · #12 16-02-2012, 06:28 PM

Now those images impress ! Well done.

Quark (Trevor) · #13 16-02-2012, 07:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by multiweb

Superb shots. Love the sharpness and colors. Amazing stuff.

Thanks very much Marc, appreciate your comment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Deeno

Wow! Really sharp.
Wonder how long it would take to drive out to Broken Hill one new moon?

Thanks very much Deeno, when I go over to the SPSP it takes me 2 days. Broken Hill is about 1,200 km from Sydney. I always get a kick out of watching the weather report when we visit Sydney, they count Dubbo as the far west which is not even half way out to the Hill. When Bird comes out to observe it takes him a couple of days to get here.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paul Haese

Nice work Trev, seems everyone is having the luck with the seeing. I am still waiting patiently (well maybe not).

Try stacking this data in autostakkert. I have found it does a great job and is better than registax both in terms of speed and sharpness. I reprocessed the Broken Hill data from last year and it came up really sharp. I am sure it will work for you too.

Thanks very much Paul, might have to pack your gear up and have a return visit. I am using Autostakkert for Mars as my Mars captures are 8 bit avi but I capture Saturn in 16 bit FIT format, well really 12 bit as Bird tells me the last four digits in each file are all zero's. I am very happy with the job R6 does with my Saturn data, however I probably will capture some Saturn avi at some point. In good seeing it just doesn't seem logical to capture 8 bit data when I can get 12 bit. I know over on CN a while back there was great discussion on the merits on not of capturing anything other than avi 8 bit, all of the experts seem to think it was pointless to go with 12 bit data, but I am happy with my results. By the way, Saturday morning is shaping up as even better seeing than this was.

Quote:

Originally Posted by samilag

Trevor fantastic!!!!
Mars image has a quality very good and Saturn animation gives the possibility to see very well band evolution during the rotation

Again fantastic !

Tank you to share the this images

Giuseppe

Thanks very much Giuseppe, this was the highest res animation I have put together this apparition and I am most grateful for your comments.

Quote:

Originally Posted by John Hothersall

These are your best yet, especially like Mars with such fine detail. Interesting to see the stills too. IR for Mars does not show the detail as well compared to Red but does show better contrast than the Red.

John.

Thanks very much John, what a corker of a Saturn season this is shaping as and it is great that such hi res amateur imaging is coming from right across our vast country.

Quote:

Originally Posted by DavidU

Now those images impress ! Well done.

Thanks so much David, I just couldnt wait to process this data. Its not the best I have seen but was pretty reasonable, it sure lifted my spirits.

Shiraz (Ray) · #14 16-02-2012, 08:14 PM

wonderful hi res images Trevor - good seeing and well honed technique. regards Ray

SkyViking (Rolf) · #15 16-02-2012, 09:28 PM

That's one stunning Mars image! Very impressive. And Saturn looks great too. Thanks for such a nice view.

Derek Klepp · #16 16-02-2012, 09:45 PM

Great Mars and like the animation. Hopefully some more activity coming

Kevnool (Kev) · #17 16-02-2012, 11:25 PM

Very crisp image of Mars Trev.
Great seeing is the key.
Cheers

iceman (Mike) · #18 17-02-2012, 01:36 PM

Nice work Trevor, some great images there.

Quark (Trevor) · #19 17-02-2012, 02:39 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by iceman

Nice work Trevor, some great images there.

Thanks very much Mike.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kevnool

Very crisp image of Mars Trev.
Great seeing is the key.
Cheers

Thanks very much Kev, don't forget our observing night Friday Feb 24th out the Nine Mile. Just back from giving a presentation at the Hospital and looks like we will get a crowd, weather permitting.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Derek Klepp

Great Mars and like the animation. Hopefully some more activity coming

Thanks very much Derek, appreciate your comment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by SkyViking

That's one stunning Mars image! Very impressive. And Saturn looks great too. Thanks for such a nice view.

Thanks very much Rolf for your most generous comment.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Shiraz

wonderful hi res images Trevor - good seeing and well honed technique. regards Ray

Thanks very much Ray, it is great to see so many Australian imagers producing quality work of late.