Here is a shot I took tonight from an AVI in some pretty good seeing. I hope you like it, I am still playing around with the best method of sharpening, it seems to put a donut ring around the planets disc.
Anyhoo, thanks for taking a look. More to come hopefully as my PC chugs along doing the next lot.
I think I am struggling with getting accurate focus, the camera's screen is too bright for me to see clearly as the details glare out at me in the dark so I am thinking there is some possibility of improving this. Practice is helping though.
Nice work.
It's so very hard doing it afocal, I appreciate the blood sweat and tears that go into your image.
You may want to cut down a bit on the number of frames you stack though. Old Jup spins pretty fast and you'll smear the picture with his rotation.
Some of my best images of Jup were made from only a couple of hundred frames.
For a sharper image you need to become ruthless with deselecting dodgy frames. Only keep the best of the best.
Put the .avi in Virtual Dub, click on "File" and save the "image sequence" as a series of .bmps.
Open the .bmp in Windows Picture and Fax Viewer and cull your frames there. It's quicker than doing it within Registax.
Thanks for posting.
Hi Chris, I reckon you could get this a lot clearer by adjusting the position of your colour channels. Your reds and blues are getting split apart - see the blue fringe on one side and the red on the other. This used to happen to me a lot when I imaged with a acro refractor or when imaging jupiter at too low an altitude (eg anything below say 45deg).
It's a pretty easy fix I think in registax though I haven't done it for ages and never in registax 4. There will be an option in the later combining stages where you can set RGB offset and so shift your colours into alignment - bit trial and error but once done your pic will be considerably sharper and better colour balance.
Perhaps someone who has better recall that me could chip in with a better explanation
Amazing Jupiter image for the afocal technique. It's great that you've captured the GRS.
As Rob says, some RGB alignment would help. In Registax 4 there is an "RGB Align" tab at the "Wavelet" stage. There is a button "Estimate" that does a pretty good job automatically or you can manually align the channels.
Applying an unsharp mask after you are finished with Registax can help heaps too. I use GIMP to do this as it is free but most use Photoshop.
I assume you are processing in colour with Registax. I've been getting heaps better results by splitting the frames into separate red, green and blue bitmaps and processing each colour seperately in Registax. I then use GIMP to combine them, align the colours and unsharp mask.
Mike's tutorial describes how to work with the colours separately:
In this way you can stack the best frames and get the best wavelet settings for each colour rather than for the full colour image as a whole. Sorry to hassle you if you are already doing this.
Thanks everyone for your kind words and advice, I am trying different things and have split into RGB channels as suggested as well as dropping down to only 250 frames in registax and aligned the rgb channels there also.
I have had another go at this batch and the result is below (minus all the pic info).
Doug, with respect to the unsharp mask in Gimp, what settings do you use please? I have played around with radius of about 1.5-2.0 and the amount varies from about 1.0 to 3.0 with the threshold left at zero. Does this sound about right?
Also, I have been applying Mike's "mild" Jupiter settings to each RGB channel separately when processing them in Registax, should I be trying something else for these wavelets on each channel?
I appreciate the help, once I can get a little more experience in the processing stage, I should be right.
those seeings sound about right for the unsharp mask to me... but as Mike stated in the processing guide, its a bit of a dark art, much like wavelets. I generally sit at the unsharp mask controls for 20mins trying to find what works best on each image depending on its own merits.
Wavelet manipulation for me involves using mike's 'mild' settings in registax, then having a little bit of a fiddle up and down a bit on 3, 4 and 5, again, to the individual images' own merits.
Persistance is the key with processing.. I've found the longer I spend in processing, the happier i usually am with the end result.
Perfection in astrophotography, isnt that the holy grail that everyone strives for but doesnt exist?
I did take some 7MP stills one after the other using my tricky new IR remote control for the camera which allowed me to get 50 or so shots in quick succession without vibration and at the highest resolution my camera can push out. The problem was that after stacking these 50 shots (jpg) without PCFE trimming, I had to shave again and change the oil in my car, and THEN after waiting all day watching it grind away, found out that my focus wasnt any good and therefore was a waste of time. Oh well, next time is a charm.....
Thanks for the encouragement though, the tricky thing is trying to balance how much time and effort I spend squeezing the best from this method when I could probably blow these results away by spending a little bit of money (read - A LOT of money) on a better setup.
The main advantage of what I have is predominately the fact that it didnt cost an arm and a leg and the pictures are actually starting to resemble the object being photographed
The main advantage of what I have is predominately the fact that it didnt cost an arm and a leg and the pictures are actually starting to resemble the object being photographed
Cheers
Chris
Too right, and where ever possible, thats how I like to keep things... The ultimate way to go though (and not overly expensive) would be keep your setup as is, adding only a prime focused webcam...
I fiddled with a-focal imaging of planets for about 3 sessions however the frustration of a good exposure with bad focus, or great focus with bad exposure etc won out fairly quickly.. And although my webcam images of Jupiter and Saturn arent anything to write to nasa about, my imaging has come a VERY long way in 3 weeks, and is a much more rewarding prospect...
Food for thought perhaps.
One thing I have to say is this, If I had a-focal results like yours, I would have stuck with it... Mine were HORRIBLE!
Chris,
I had to stick with afocal photography for 3 years for the same reason. No funds, no fun.
Though I now have a camera and scope I can use for DSO imaging, I still go Afocal for the moon and planets.
You're still learning valuable processing skills and if, like Alex said, you can achieve recognisable results, I reckon that makes it all worthwhile.
Too right, and where ever possible, thats how I like to keep things... The ultimate way to go though (and not overly expensive) would be keep your setup as is, adding only a prime focused webcam...
I fiddled with a-focal imaging of planets for about 3 sessions however the frustration of a good exposure with bad focus, or great focus with bad exposure etc won out fairly quickly.. And although my webcam images of Jupiter and Saturn arent anything to write to nasa about, my imaging has come a VERY long way in 3 weeks, and is a much more rewarding prospect...
Food for thought perhaps.
One thing I have to say is this, If I had a-focal results like yours, I would have stuck with it... Mine were HORRIBLE!
Ha ha ha, thanks Alex, don't worry, some of my earlier efforts are pretty bad too, especially pre tube replacement, but dont get me started on that one.....
The main drag with lack of funds and such is the fact that not only a webcam is needed, but something to drive it...ie Laptop. I don't relish the thought of putting the scope on the front lawn and runnin a long usb cable to the computer room through the window to try and get a decent shot. However, necessity being the mother of invention, you never know! I have contemplated the AV out cable for the camera and a long RCA cable to my TV capture card on the PC and stream the Pentax straight to disk. Possible with Jupiter, but not much else. Time will tell.
If only I could drive a decent webcam from a windows based PDA (HP Ipaq) which I do have. Then I could capture and wirelessly transmit the data to the processing PC or simply store it on the SD card like I do now for the Pentax. Hmmmm, I wonder if there are any such beasts out there?
Thanks Alex, your support makes the technique and the equipment I have a lot more valuable than I first thought.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jjjnettie
Chris,
I had to stick with afocal photography for 3 years for the same reason. No funds, no fun.
Though I now have a camera and scope I can use for DSO imaging, I still go Afocal for the moon and planets.
You're still learning valuable processing skills and if, like Alex said, you can achieve recognisable results, I reckon that makes it all worthwhile.
You are right Jeanette, Afocal on the moon is a lot more fun and easier! I havent really had a good go at the moon since I got the new OTA so next waxing Luna, I might give it another go. I would love to do some DSO stuff, I tried to take a 4 second exposure stack of the Jewel box with the Pentax with the IR remote control (simply because I could see the stars on the viewfinder screen) but it didnt really turn out.
My 5 inch scope hasnt really been able to see any DSO's for the reasons that 1) I cant pinpoint them easily with the pathetic RA/DEC setting circles or accurate star hopping and 2) When I do think I am on target, there isnt enough light (into my eye - admittedly) to see anything anyway. This is why i thought a DSLR might be the go. Then I can open the shutter and get some longer exposures than 4 seconds.
Oh well, like I said, I have some bits and pieces here (HP Ipaq, an OLD 35mm SLR and an old CMOS webcam as well as the AV cable for the Pentax) so I might have a bit of a think tank on what I can whip up MacGyver style and see what happens......
Cheers for all the encouragement...
Chris
PS. A thought just struck me.... What if I had a security type webcam with IP transmission over wireless that worked really well in the dark and had a sensitive ccd chip and transmitted the data to a PC on the network?? I could hook that up in prime focus and leave the scope tracking outside and capture from inside a la no wires?
Hmmm, ideas a plenty but technology may not solve the lack of light issues through the 5 inch reflector...
That reprocess is more natural looking but you really need a webcam. The SPC900NC is really cheap and gives good results. There are several people using them here so you can get good advice. The cam plus Mogg adapter comes to around $130. Just ask if you need more information.
Like Alex says, you really need to play with the settings for wavelets and unsharp mask for each image. I find the wavelet settings I use for the blue channel are often a bit different to those for the red and green. I often apply each wavelet setting in isolation to see which ones have the greatest effect and then work from there to find a good combination.
As you are realising, the processing is so time consuming it is well worth the effort to get better data.
If you look at Matt's posts, you see that he still uses his SPC900NC webcam a lot for the simplicity even though he has a DMK and filter wheel.
The webcam is by far the easiest (and low cost) way forward from here. Your old CMOS webcam probably isn't worth the hassle. The SPC900NC has awesome low-light sensitivity.
Thanks, I figured out how to correctly align the channels in Registax after I recomposed them in Gimp. I have also just used the same settings for the wavelets as Mike's "mild" Jupiter settings and it didnt turn out too bad, certainly one of my best efforts on Jupiter so far. I think the central donut ring is part of the unsharp mask settings, I will have a play with that further on subsequent images and see if I can perfect that.
As for the logitech cam, I did a quick mod (unscrewed it and popped out the lens) and then superglued it to a redundant lens cap for the focuser and plugged it into the scope through the office window and tried to see if i could focus on a street light 1km away. You were right, I shouldnt have bothered! the amount of noise and "sparkles" present in the background was ridiculous. The CMOS sensor is next to useless in anything below supernova brightness from 1AU away. Oh well, at least I have tried it and ruled it out.
I am scouting around for a cheap webacm that is easy to mod, as you said, the SPC900c and the Toucam look like the go, I might also try a few garage sales and markets to see what turns up on the cheap.
In the meantime, I will (when the rain stops) endeavour to capture some streamed video to the PC directly from the camera when Jupiter is closer to zenith and also try some 150x mag with macro focus on the camera. From memory this last shot was taken using infinity focus and fine tuning with the electric focuser and I have read that macro focus gives better autofocusing results.
What I have noticed is the much better quality of image through the original Skywatcher plossl's when using the barlow, simply because I think they have less lens elements than the 10mm WA and the 15mm super plossl so there is less light degradation after the barlow. With the exception of the 12.5mm ED eyepiece I am going to try the 20mm with the 2.5x APO barlow (125x) and then use the 3x optical zoom in macro mode and see what I can get from that.
As Jeanette said, sooner or later I am going to be a gun at wringing the very best out of what I have, then when I get a webcam........look out....!! ha ha ha
Cheers for now, and sorry for the essay, once again.
