At the end of 2005, I made a "The Planets - 2005" composite of the images I'd taken during 2005. I'd always planned to do one at the end of 2006 as well, but only just got around to it.
"The Planets - 2006" is a composite created from planetary images taken during 2006. All images were taken with my 10" dob on the EQ platform, using a 5x powermate for image scale. I used a ToUcam from January to June (inclusive) and a DMK21AF04 from July to December.
No images of Mars in 2006, as it was too low when it wasn't behind the Sun.
When compared with my Planets - 2005 image, I'm very pleased with the progress I've made. However it's worth noting that a lot of the 2005 images were without tracking (still with the 10" dob + ToUcam).
View the composite by clicking on the link below (500k jpeg):
Wonderful image Mike. I just used a plug in from Genuine Fractals http://www.ononesoftware.com/detail.php?prodLine_id=2
to enlarge the image to 4000x13000 pixels and saving it in PS at max quality (12) gave a file of size 10,520KB. Using the usual bicubic algorithm gave a file size of 8,317KB again at max quality.
I think it does a much better job of producing larger images for printing posters say. There is a free trial version.Below are a couple of crops from each.
That is a beautiful portrait of those members of our Solar System that you worked your magic on. The images are very evocative, taking me back to the times I enjoyed clear skies for these planets!
Bert,
Thanks for the enhancements, but please, issue a warning with them the next time, as I nearly fell of my chair when I saw how large these were, and the detail you had retained in them.
Bert that program looks very interesting - I was surprised by the detail even at that large scale. Definitely will be giving that a try before printing some images for the SPSP and CWAS competitions this year.
Okay, please disregard my ignorance, but wouldn't a webcam be inferior to a camera, in terms of lens quality? I have had a typical 'giveaway' webcam for years on one of my computers, I used it once to see if it worked and it's sat there idle for years now. I realise the better webcams are worth more and are obviously much better than my $30.00 unit.
Seeing you did all those awesome images with a webcam, and assuming you had a proper camera (in the hands of someone who knows how to use it), wouldn't the images be even better?
Once again, please note despite now owing the Canon 300D I still have not taken one shot yet due to the weather, but it's clear today so hopefully tonight I will begin my personal journey into the world of astrophotography.
Correct me if my assumptions are wrong, for I only have a sense that a camera is better than a webcam, but when viewing your images I become confused because it would appear that excellent results have been obtained for a seemingly cheaper price.
Could it be that there is no appreciable difference at the end of the day and the quality of the image is the only consideration that should be made? I wish someone would show me a small selection of images of the same or similar subject taken with different devices and different settings, so that I could actually see the difference.
Hey Tailwag (what's your real name, btw?). It's not an uncommon question, and one that mojo has asked me many times "why aren't you using your 350D to take images of the planets?"
Yes, the 350D has a much bigger chip and much more resolution - 8mp (over 3000 px) as opposed to < 1mp for the webcam (640x480 resolution). However you can generally only take a few shots at a time in burst mode, 3fps at the most for a few seconds before it needs to write out to the card.
Compared to the DMK21AF04 webcam (yes, it's better than a $30 webcam), I'm doing 30fps for as long as I need to record. For the short exposures we're using, the webcam has a more sensitive chip and will pick up fainter detail during that exposure.
The stacking process we use in planetary imaging means we take all the "good/sharp" frames and stack them (to reduce noise) and throw away the bad frames. When you start with 1000+ frames at 30fps, you can afford to do this and you can capture those moments of steady seeing. You might end up stacking 100-300 of those.
At only 3fps (or less), you're more or less taking single shots which mean (on average) you have much less of capturing a frame during that steady seeing. You'll also end up with far less frames to stack to try and reduce noise.
I have seen some planetary images taken with a DSLR or digital camera, and some have been quite good, but I have never seen a DSLR shot beat the best webcam shots in the hands of the experts.
There's plenty of digital camera shots of the moon, and because it's so big it's great for those "whole moon" shots either at prime focus or afocal. However for closeup shots of the moon (individual craters or features at high resolution), then again the webcam will beat the almost DSLR every time.
The webcams we're using aren't $30 jobs - the ToUcam is the best of the budget range, at around $150 and is great in low light, fairly low noise and for the price, is a superb introductory webcam for planetary/lunar imaging. As you get more experience, you can spend much more ($600-$2000) on a webcam which has a more sensitive chip again, less noise, higher framerates, faster interface (no compression), larger format chip, more dynamic range (12 or 16bit as opposed to 8bit).
Hey Tailwag (what's your real name, btw?).
--snip--
Hope i've helped a bit.
Bummer, I just typed a very long reply and lost it all
Okay, well the short version is, my name is Ron (not another Ron, I hear you say ), and yes you have really made a few things very clear. The most important thing I have gleaned from your reply is, astrophotography is very affordable, the entry level is quite minimal and technology has improved a great deal in the last half a dozen years.
The stacking process we use in planetary imaging means we take all the "good/sharp" frames and stack them (to reduce noise) and throw away the bad frames. When you start with 1000+ frames at 30fps, you can afford to do this and you can capture those moments of steady seeing. You might end up stacking 100-300 of those.
At only 3fps (or less), you're more or less taking single shots which mean (on average) you have much less of capturing a frame during that steady seeing. You'll also end up with far less frames to stack to try and reduce noise.
With respect to stacking (Thank you for your description), I downloaded RawShooter yesterday and read the 71 page manual late into the night, however nowhere did it mention stacking.
I have zero experience with the RAW format, so here is yet another dumb question, when you 'process' in RawShooter does this automatically behind the scenes do the stacking, or is it just doing the corrections to the image. If the answer is the latter, then where and when and with what do you do this frame stacking? Sorry, I bet everyone except me knows the answer to this
The Planets - 2006: A Pictorial Review
The images are very evocative, taking me back to the times I enjoyed clear skies for these planets! 
....oh, wait, not a planet anymore 
