Well after some pretty dodgy weather over the last couple of weeks, the Gods of Astronomy relented for a night and I was able to get in some sky time. After getting frustrated with trying to get a decent polar alignment and not being able to get a shot of the carina area I decided to try the first favourite. Popped of 3 quick avies of Saturn and initial on the spot processing looked favourable.
After editing (virt Dub) one of the avies and using reference frame for the first time (in the optimize section of Reg3), and using a variety of Registax process a couple of times on each avi I ended up with about a dozen images. I then stacked all of them together in Registax and a quick adjustment in PS. Nearly all the original BMPs looked ok but I'm very happy with the final. Comments on improving always welcome
Last edited by [1ponders]; 17-02-2005 at 02:04 PM.
Thanks for the complement Stuart. Though there is something screwy going on here. The colour looked much better on my laptop. Not as yellow. I'll play around with it on my desktop pc and see if that makes a difference. Hmmm
Simply stunning Paul. It's even better considering how low Saturn is in the sky for us!! Well done.
You must have had a good nights seeing. It great to see such progress on this group with planetary imaging...
Cheers
I've had a bit more of a play with some of the images. I think part of my problem with the colour is I've had the saturation set to high. My better coloured images from before had saturations around 60 -75% These were take at 90% at least. Still too much yellowness.
My pick is the first one below or the first image I posted
Yes lovely shots Paul, you da king on Saturn that is for sure. Could not muster something anywhere near that. I think I will stick to Jupiter at least when I get the observatory running.
Incidently I read yesterday that most of the pros, image Saturn with nearly 3000 images. Maybe something to consider. Great shots though.
I've though about that Paul, using a couple of thousand images, but the thought of wading through 3000 images with Vitual Dub on my laptop makes me shudders. If I can get my laptop networked with my PC I'd definately consider it.
Gary, just using my f/10 8" meade with a 2X omni barlow before the star diagnal (about 3X there I believe), and my trusty unmodified ToUcam. I wanted to use K3CCDtools to acquire (as I think it does a better job) but unfortunately when I started it my key had run out. So I use the capture software that came with ToUcam. Did use WcCtrl to adjust settings though.
Hopefully I'll get to try again this weekend and I'll leave the saturation down a bit. I find it makes the image too yellowish.
I used two different settings for the 3 avies, I took. 1st setting were: Exp 1/25sec, 10 fps, gain set about 40 -50, brighness around 80-90, Saturation around 90,
2nd were similar to 1st except Exp 1/33sec and 15 fps
The seeing was only just above average. Stars were still jumping around all over the place when I was focusing. Can't wait for an excellent night.
Sounds similar exposure wise to what I would use, except I seem to have this fixation about using gain. I need to see a shrink.
My first shots ( few nights ago, and crap I might add) were at 5fps, but last night I returned to the old standard, 10fps.
We will have similar effective focal lengths, and there will not be much difference between an 8" f10, and the 7" f12, surely. (Well OK in cost perhaps).
If you are like me and too scrooge to pay for K3, try IRIS, it is a very good capture program, and I also use it for autoguiding with Rob's StarMate, mate. (no stutter intended).
I would like to also add what Robby has stated, it is awesome to see the group grabbing this planetary imaging by the throat and going for it, really great.
Gary
Just terrific Paul, awesome shot. The first shot looks really smooth, but almost too smooth. It looks like it could do with a bit of unsharp mask.
I (personally) prefer one of the lower ones in your composite, because the detail on the disc looks sharper.
I'm not sure why your colour is different than mine.. When I shot thru Rod's LX200 last friday, my images turn out much different in colour, with the rings a pale shade of white. The settings I used were almost identical to what I use at home.
Have you tried increasing the image scale with a bigger barlow (or stacked barlows)? What's the focal length of your 8"?
Oh also I found that clicking "histo stretch" with an edge value of 1 or 2 (on the stacking page) produces a brighter image when you get to wavelets.. In almost all cases when I use that feature, I have to decrease contrast to about 80 or 85 so that the disc doesn't look washed out.
Those pictures are awesome Its looks like a pic taken from the cassini probe. If I get a picure half as good I'll be well pleased. Did you use your toucam or the LPI. I've got a way to go to get a pic like that. Gotta do my home work on Registax.
Mike I don't have any problem with brightness, infact when I get to waveletting I end up dropping the contrast and, upping the brightness. Here's my processing for the top image.
Alignment- FFT 4, Quality setting - 3 & 5, human visual 4, compression 60, autofilter. Quality estimate - classic, lowest quality 90%. Alignment box 128, use colour but no LRGB.
Optimization- Optimizer, search area 2 pixels, optimize til 1%. No reference frame for this one. No resampling or drizzling. Optimize and stack (stack using default settings)
Stack settings- Histostretch ticked
Waveletting - See next two images
Unprocessed wavelet page
Last edited by [1ponders]; 18-02-2005 at 11:29 AM.
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Its looks like a pic taken from the cassini probe. If I get a picure half as good I'll be well pleased. Did you use your toucam or the LPI. I've got a way to go to get a pic like that. Gotta do my home work on Registax. 
