NGC 7000 Mexico Region of North American Nebula

©2006 Richard Murray


Techno Stuff: 8/15/06 LX90 8" SCT, ATK-16hr, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Taurus .50 focal reducer for about F5, 4 x 720 secs manually guided, Darks and Flats applied, Binning 1x1, Processed in ImageViewca, Registax 3, Photoshop CS, PixInsight.

IC5070 Pelican Nebula

©2006 Richard Murray

This is first light with my new Atik 16hr ccd camera. Once I get past the learning curve, I think this will be an exceptional imaging device. At first I'll be concentrating on all kinds of nebula so expect to see a lot more images in the coming months.

Techno Stuff: 8/5/06 LX90 8" SCT, ATK-16HR, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60 for about F3, Guided with Guidedog, No Darks, Binning 1x1, 1 frame at 100 secs, Processed in Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight.

M27 Dumbell Nebula L[HA]RGB

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: RGB Images: 7/29-7/31/06 LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60 for about F/3, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, R: 100 sec x 15, G: 120 sec x 16, B: 100 sec x 13, 60-80% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 25-
50%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight, Neat Image.

Ha Luminance Image: 6/15/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, 8 frames at 300 secs each, 55% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 15%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight.

M16 in Halpha and Ha+RGB

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 7/16-7/17/06 LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60 for about F/2, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, R: 100 sec x 8, G: 120 sec x 6, B: 110 sec x 12, 53-60% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 100%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight, Neat Image.

Ha Luminance Image: 6/24/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60 for about F/2, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, 15 frames at 120 secs each, 48% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 100%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight, Neat Image.

See Halpha version several images below.

NGC6888 The Crescent Nebula

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 7/6/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA
Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60
for about F/2, Guided with Guidedog, No Darks, 5fps, 9 frames at 150
secs each, 55% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 100%, Sat 50%, Processed
in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight, Neat Image, iPrep.

NGC7635 The Bubble Nebula

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 6/24/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60 for about F/2, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, 24 frames at 150 secs each, 52% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 100%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight, Neat Image.

Here's One Good Reason Not to Retire Hubble

NASA Hubble Space Telescope

M27 The Dumbell Nebula in H-Alpha

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 6/15/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, 8 frames at 300 secs each, 55% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 15%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, PixInsight.

NGC6823 Open Cluster With Nebulosity

©2006 Richard Murray


©2006 Richard Murray

This is my first successful attempt at taking an image with a Hydrogen Alpha filter which helps to bring out nebulosity in objects.

The bottom image is an example of how creating a pseudo red image in Photoshop, bluring it, and then placing the HA filtered image on top of it as a luminance layer can bring out even more nebula details.


Techno Stuff: 6/6/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, HA Filter, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60, Guided with Guidedog, Darks, 5fps, 9 frames at 300 secs each, 55% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 15%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, Loreal, PixInsight.

NGC6946 Spiral Galaxy in Color

©2006 Richard Murray

This is the first image I have taken in color using RGB filters. I used the black and white image below as the luminance layer and combined it with the RGB images in Photoshop. Since I had only a few color images to process I used multiple luminance layering for an LLRGB image to enhance color detail.

Techno Stuff: LLRGB, 5/29/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, Baader IR, DSI Pro RGB Filters, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60, Guided with Guidedog, No Darks, 5fps, RGB 5-7 frames each at 200 secs each, 75% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 0%, Sat 50%, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, Loreal, PixInsight, Astrowave.

NGC6946 Spiral Galaxy

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 5/23/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, Baader IR, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60, Guided with Guidedog, No Darks, 5fps, 61 frames at 100 secs each, 65% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 0%, Sat 50%, White Balance nothing selected, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop, Loreal, PixInsight.

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The image below of NGC6946 is a 61 image stack done in Registax before any further processing was done. I know, I can't believe it either! The histogram stretch is a miracle tool for astrophotography. Compare it to the final processed image directly above.


©2006 Richard Murray

High Velocity Winds From Dying Stars

Chandra's X-ray and Hubble Images

Dynamic elongated clouds envelop bubbles of multimillion degree gas produced by high-velocity winds from dying stars. In these images, Chandra's X-ray data are shown in blue, while green and red are optical and infrared data from Hubble.

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Nervana

This is what it looked like in my obseratory at 3:00am on the morning of 4/24/06.

My planetarium program is synced perfectly with the telescope, the Sunflower Galaxy is dead center in K3CCDTools and Guidedog is locked on and tracking its guide star.

At this point in time I am either at one with the universe or at one with my machines and probably both. :>)
















©2006 Richard Murray

M94 Spiral Galaxy

©2006 Richard Murray

Techno Stuff: 4/28/06, LX90 8" SCT, ATK-2HS, Taurus Mini Tracker, Baader IR, Used 2 focal reducers in tandum - a Taurus .50 and a Mogg .60, Manually Guided with Guidedog, Darks Used, 5fps, 41 Images at 53 secs each, 55% gain, Brightness 50%, Gamma 20%,Sat 50%, White Balance nothing selected, Processed in K3ccdTools, Registax 3, Photoshop and PixInsight.