IC1396 Elephant Trunk Nebula

©2007 Richard Murray

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Here's a more dramatic perspective.


©2006 Richard Murray

This image was processed in CCDStack prior to touchups in Photoshop.


©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 6/15/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6, mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Ha 6nm, one 40 minute exposure, Binning 1x1, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, No Darks, Registax3, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight

Notes: I was having some tracking problems while trying to image this object which weren't resolved until about 3:30am. So I went for broke and decided to do one long 40 minute exposure and just leave it at that. It turned out pretty good. :>))

NGC6820/NGC6823 Open Cluster and Emission Nebula

©2007 Richard Murray

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Techno Stuff: 6/13/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6, mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Ha 6nm, 186 minutes total with 26.6 minute subframes, Binning 1x1, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, Darks Applied, Registax3, Photoshop CS2

Notes: NGC6823 is the star cluster in the center while NGC6820 is the surrounding emission nebula. Note the dark nebula and pillars of cold molecular clouds which probably contain newborn stars obscured by the enveloping dust.

NGC6888 Crescent Nebula Widefield

©2007 Richard Murray

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Techno Stuff: 5/28/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/3 with 0.5 focal reducer, mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Ha 6nm 60 minutes total with 20 minute subframes, Binning 1x1, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, Darks Applied, Photoshop CS2, Image Analyzer

Notes: The Atik 0.5 focal reducer allowed for a wider field of view and good nebula definition. The stars ,however, were a distorted mess and required a lot of processing to get them back to normal. All in all it turned out pretty well.

Abell 1656 Coma Galaxy Cluster

©2007 Richard Murray

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Techno Stuff: 5/9/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Luminance IR 6x600secs Binning 1x1, RG 3x300secs B 3x360secs Binning 2x2, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, Darks Applied, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight, Image Analyzer

Notes: Most of the smaller galaxies are clustered around the two larger galaxies on the left: NGC4874 to the left and NGC4889 to the right. There are well over 40 galaxies in this image.

NGC5985 Galaxy Triplet

©2007 Richard Murray

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Techno Stuff: 4/20/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Luminance IR 8x600secs, , RGB 5x300secs, Binning 1x1, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, Darks Applied, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight, Image Analyzer

Notes: Here's a galaxy triplet in the constellation Draco with a face on spiral (NGC5985), a dwarf elliptical (NGC5982) and an edge on spiral (NGC5981).

NGC7635 Bubble Nebula

©2007 Richard Murray

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Techno Stuff: 5/12/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Ha6nm 2x1200secs, Binning 1x1, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, No Darks, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight, Image Analyzer, Silkypix

Notes: It's a little early in the season for this one in the Northern hemisphere but I was at the end of an imaging sessions and saw that the Bubble Nebula was up so I went for it. :>))

IC1318 Narrowband

Hubble Palette

©2007 Richard Murray

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CFHT Palette

©2007 Richard Murray

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Halpha 6nm

©2007 Richard Murray

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Techno Stuff: 5/4/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Ha Luminance 3x1200secs, OIII 1x900secs SII 1x900secs, Binning 1x1, Luminance Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, OIII and SII Manually Guided, Darks Applied, Photoshop CS2, AstroWave, PixInsight

Notes: This is my first narrowband image made with Ha, OIII, and SII filters. This was taken during a full moon and wind gusts of 20mph which is why I was only able to process a few frames. The top image was processed using the 'Hubble Palette' where SII=Red, Ha=Green and OIII=Blue. The second image made use of the 'CFHT palette' where Ha=Red, OIII=Green and SII=blue. The bottom image is in Halpha.

Hickson 68 Compact Galaxy Group

©2007 Richard Murray


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Techno Stuff: 4/20/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Luminance IR 10x600secs Binning 1x1, RG 5x360secs B 5x420secs Binning 1x1, Autoguided with Atik-2HS and Guidedog from LX90, Darks Applied, Registax3, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight

Notes: This is a cluster of galaxies from Paul Hickson's Catalog of Compact Galaxy Groups. I've counted seven galaxies so far and will be putting up a labeled chart later. There's a substancial green halo around the large yellow star which you can see in the full sized image. I don't know if this is real or an artifact caused by optics.

M101 Pinwheel Galaxy

©2006 Richard Murray

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Full Size Image With Enhanced Star Color

Techno Stuff: 4/16/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Luminance IR 12x300secs Binning 1x1, RG 6x300secs, B 6x360secs Binning 2x2, Manually Guided from LX90, Darks Applied, Registax3, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight

Notes:One of my first color images for some time because I finally had several clear nights for a change. :>)

There are a couple of small galaxies in addition to M101. I think the small one directly below at the edge of the frame is NGC5477 and I'm not sure about the one located in the upper left.

PK164+31.1 Planetary Nebula

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 4/10/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Ha Filter 6nm, 45 mins total exposure with 1x10mins, 1x15mins, 1x20mins, Binning 2x2, manually guided from LX90 with ATK-2HS, no darks, Photoshop CS2, Image Analyzer, Silkypix

Notes:Also known as the Headphones Nebula, this is a very faint, 14.0 mag, planetary nebula located in the Lynx constellation. The image was taken at a low altitude with low level fog and in the direction of the most heavy light pollution at my site. The Astronomik 6nm Ha filters ability to cut through these obstructions is the only reason this faint object registered on the CCD at all! :>))

NGC3628 and the Trio in Leo

©2006 Richard Murray
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Techno Stuff: 3/20/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Red filter and IR filter, 6x600secs, manually guided from LX90, no darks, Binning 2x2, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight, Neat Image

Notes:This is the often imaged 'Trio in Leo' of three Galaxies located in the Leo Constellation. The framing isn't the best but it was a balance of trying to remain in as close as possible and finding a suitable guide star. The brightest galaxy, NGC3628 ((mag 9.5) is at bottom.

IC443 Jellyfish Nebula

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 3/17/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Astronomik Ha 6nm filter, 8x600secs, autoguided with LX90, darks applied, Binning 2x2, Processed in Registax3, Photoshop CS2, PixInsight

Notes:This is the second image taken with my new Megrez 80mm APO which is piggybacked on my LX90. I used an Astronomik 6nm Ha filter which does an excellent job of filtering out light pollution even at very low altitudes.

This image is my first tenative step towards learning nondistructive image processing through the use of adjustment layers where no permanent changes are made to the image except at the last stage of processing. I'm using R. Scott Ireland's excellent book, Photoshop Astronomy, to learn this technique.

The top image was stacked in Registax3 and the middle image was stacked in Photoshop CS2.

The bottom image is the result of applying a technique in Photoshop CS2 to the middle image which was learned in the Astro-Narrowband Yahoo Group as follows:

Create a duplicate layer
Apply a minimum filter with 1 pixel
Apply a high pass filter with 3 pixels
Set blending mode to Overlay
Set Opacity to taste (I used 80%)
Flatten image.

M51 Whirlpool Galaxy - First Light With Megrez 80mm APO

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©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 2/23/07 ATK-16hr, Megrez 80mm APO at F/6 mounted on LX90 8" SCT, Red and IR filter, 2 x 480 secs, autoguided with LX90, no darks, Binning 1x1, Processed in Photoshop CS2, PixInsight

Notes:This is the first image taken with my new Megrez 80mm APO. After aligning the scope on top of the LX90 and a few mishaps, adjustments, balancing etc., etc.. I only had a short time left to image so only got two images. Next time out I should be able to get a lot more.

Current Equipment

©2006 Richard Murray

This is my latest equipment configuration. The 80mm refractor on top which I just received in the mail is a William Optics Megrez Super APO which I'll be using for widefield imaging and to autoguide with. My main imaging instrument is an ATK-16hr which is attached to the APO. And of course my trusty LX90 SCT sits below the refractor.

Despite the somewhat awkward appearance of this setup it actually is very stable in all the positions I'm likely to encounter during imaging.

Oh and the toy robots in the background were really enthused when I first started to set everything up but they seem to have lost interest now. :>)