My Best Saturn So Far - Page 2

bird (Anthony Wesley) · #21 22-01-2006, 10:26 AM

Well done Matt - nice image!

Bird

matt · #22 22-01-2006, 10:50 AM

Thanks Bird.

Still coming to grips with capturing and processing but I think it shows real promise for the 9.25.

Haven't seen much of your great stuff lately. What's doing?

rumples riot · #23 22-01-2006, 11:16 AM

Matt, nice images, wish I could get out there myself at the moment. Keep em coming.

matt · #24 22-01-2006, 11:38 AM

Thanks RR

Wouldn't mind asking you and Bird how you think that red fringing managed to work its way into my images along the forward edge of the rings and to the rear where the rings approach the planet's globe?

Is it a problem during capture or do you think I'm introducing it during processing, at wavelets in RegiStax?

Could it be a result of the UV/IR filter used on the webcam?

Cheers

matt · #25 22-01-2006, 02:14 PM

Think I've fixed the red fringing issue or certainly improved it....

Any suggestions for next imaging session most welcome.

Robert_T · #26 22-01-2006, 04:24 PM

excellent Matt, a gem in the making!

did the RGB align help with the red fringing?

matt · #27 22-01-2006, 04:31 PM

Yeah, I think it did Rob.

I also think some minor adjustments with the histogram RGB had some positive impact and I also made some adjustments in wavelets.

How'd you go with that TIFF I sent you?

Any suggestions for next imaging session? Does collimation look OK to you? Will it just be a case of better seeing and scope temp?

I'd really like to get the CD all the way round.

rumples riot · #28 22-01-2006, 04:41 PM

Collimation looks pretty good, but you know how it is with an SCT. It can always be better.

The red and blue fringing is caused by atmospheric dispersion. As the light travels through the atmosphere the droplets of moisture cause a prism effect. Like that of a rainbow or through a prism. It is most evident while a planet is below 30 degrees from the horizon. As Robert has pointed out it can be removed mostly with RGB shift in Registax. An IR/UV filter will also help to minimise it a little. Try to image above that height if you can.

Suggestions; get your scope nice to ambient as soon as possible. Not too hard with the heat travelling across the continent at the moment. But either use an SCT cooler or allow plenty of time. Then check collimation.

Keep em coming.

Robert_T · #29 22-01-2006, 04:42 PM

Hi Matt, I sent you an e-mail to your other e-mail address on the TIFF - for some reason the attachment got stripped out on the way over as "unsafe"? You could try again from your home PC?

This is looking very promising but I would like to see what some decovolution processing in Astra Image could do. Hard to tell from an image if seeing or collimation is a limiting factor. It's looks reasonable for ordinary seeing conditions - what would you have rated the conditions out of 10?

The only two things I'd suggest at this stage, is run longer avi - say 200 sec to get 2000 frames to play with aiming to stack about half of em. The second is to up your exposure a little. If you're already at 1/10th sec 10fps then this will have to be via more gain and or Gamma or Brightness. On the brightness/light meter, histogram thingy (tech term) in K3CCD tools somewhere between 180 and 200 for Saturn seems good.

hope that helps,

cheers,

Robert_T · #30 22-01-2006, 08:13 PM

Hi Matt, I processed the TIFF you sent in Astra Image 2. Your original at left and the reprocessed at right below. The original has some faint halo - not sure what's caused that.

Processing details were as follows:

Converted and cropped to BMP and brought into Astra Image 2.

Split colour frames and ran LR deconvolution on each - 4 iterations at 1.8 curve

Recombined in Astra Image and saved as BMP file.

Played with colour and luminance in Made Safe Photo Paint using curves and brightness/constrast.

Saved as jpeg.

What do you reckon?

matt · #31 22-01-2006, 10:01 PM

That's cool Rob

Although the rings appear to have suffered even more of that reddish tinge?

Sorry about the tiff. I think the halo was the result of adjustment to the RGB histogram, or possibly too much wavelets?

Anyway, thanks for your efforts.

bird (Anthony Wesley) · #32 22-01-2006, 10:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by matt

Thanks Bird.

Still coming to grips with capturing and processing but I think it shows real promise for the 9.25.

Haven't seen much of your great stuff lately. What's doing?

Work has kept me pretty busy for the last few weeks, plus some unsettled weather round these parts has knocked out those evenings when I felt like having a go.

Tonight was the first light for my new 13.1" scope, I've spent the last 2 days working on it to get it done. No images tonight, just checking basic stuff - e.g. does it come to focus :-) etc. I was glad to see that my mount can carry it, it's a fair bit larger than the old scope, the tube is 1.8m long :-)

If the weather cooperates tomorrow night then I might have a go at saturn and see. I've got to pull it apart tomorrow and finish a few bits and pieces.

regards, Bird

davidpretorius · #33 22-01-2006, 10:58 PM

congrats bird,

this is very exciting, i know how you feel!!!

i really hope the weather is nice to you and that you can have a lovely time playinig with it!!

yay yay yay