Astrophotography

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Welcome to !astrophotography!

We are Lemmy's dedicated astrophotography community!

If you want to see or post pictures of space taken by amateurs using amateur level equipment, this is the place for you!

If you want to learn more about taking astro photos, check out our wiki or our discord!

Please read the rules before you post! It is your responsibility to be aware of current rules. Failure to be aware of current rules may result in your post being removed without warning at moderator discretion.

Rules

I | Real space images only.

Astrophotography refers to images of astronomical objects or phenomena exclusively.
~~Images that show objects or people below the Kármán Line (100km) will be removed.~~ We won't be enforcing this rule for now, but as the community grows eventually we will split and have a separate space for just landscape astro.
Images must be an accurate representation of a real astronomical object.
See this page for more details

II | Original and Amateur Content Only

Image posts can only be images that you have captured and processed yourself, or discussion about capturing and/or processing your own images.
Images acquired from public sources, professional observatories, or other professional services are not allowed.
If you have done a drastic alteration or reprocessing of a prior submission, you may repost your edit - but only after a minimum of one week has passed.

III | Post Types

Image posts are to link directly to the image, not to landing pages, personal galleries, blogs, or professional sites. Link to these in the comments. (AstroBin and Imgur, are allowed)
Questions are welcome here for the time being.
Links to blogs, articles or external websites should be interesting and promote discussion about amateur astrophotography.

IV | Titles

All image posts should just include include the name of the object being photographed. Extra info such as equipment, it being your first image, or other information should go in a comment along with your acquisition info. Please see this page for more details.

If your post is removed, try reposting with a different title. Don't hesitate to message the mods if you still have questions!

V | Acquisition and Processing Information

All submitted images must include acquisition and processing details as a top-level comment. All posts without this information may be given a warning, and if not updated will be removed.
This includes the telescope, mount, camera, accessories, and any other pieces of equipment you used to capture the image.
You must also include processing details, i.e. the programs you used and a general rundown of the workflow/processes you used within those programs. “Processed in Photoshop” is not enough.

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bigborpa@lemmy.world

lefty7283@lemmy.world

Very high resolution Lunar photography with a 20" telescope (lemmy.world)

submitted 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago) by bdeclerc@lemmy.world to c/astrophotography@lemmy.world

9 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Last year, I had my mirrors tested optically because I was never 100% content with even my "sharpest" results - there was always a feeling that there was an unnecessary bit of blur in the raw data.

Happily, the 20" mirror itself turned out to be quite good (not perfect, but at Strehl 0.89 and lambda/10 it is completely within spec and not worth refiguring) - however, the secondary turned out to show a frankly ridiculous lambda/2 (!) astigmatism. Since it was also on the small side for use in deepsky imaging (4" mirror on a 20" F/4 scope) I opted to replace it with a 5" diagonal from Ostashowski optics. The terrible weather in Western Europe in the last 6 months prevented me from doing any real testing (or even reinstalling the telescope in the observatory...) until now.

However, the 19th & 20th of March were finally "good" - good seeing (by our local standards...) and on the 20th, transparent skies.

This allowed me to finally stretch the renewed scope's legs a bit, resulting (among a mass of other still to be processed data) in this 62 megapixel mosaic of the Lunar North pole at 0.08"/pixel

Check out the full resolution image on https://www.flickr.com/photos/bartcentral/53618375534/sizes/o/

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[–] mipadaitu@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Uhhh, that moon shot is awesome, but I want to see pictures of the telescope!!!

[–] bdeclerc@lemmy.world 7 points 7 months ago (3 children)

I have an album of the construction of the observatory, telescope in one of the last pictures : https://flic.kr/s/aHskPFierJ

[–] DessertStorms@kbin.social 2 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

Wow, that's so cool! I'd love to have a setup even half that impressive (I have none currently lol and am renting, so anything on this scale is not an option, but one can dream!).
The photo is great too! lol

[–] mipadaitu@lemmy.world 2 points 7 months ago

That's amazing! Thanks!

[–] Gnomie@lemmy.world 1 points 7 months ago (1 children)

That is a very sturdy observatory. Did you manufacture all of the metal parts yourself?

[–] bdeclerc@lemmy.world 3 points 7 months ago

No - found a local metalworker (specialising in metal staircases and metal gates for properties) - the design was based off of a wooden concept designed by an engineer friend with astronomy experience. Because of the type of scope and mount, I wanted a low wall and not just a roll-off roof. I got inspiration from a local public observatory which has a big observation platform housing a 24" scope and a bunch of others where the entire roof and sidewall rolls back, but the final design is very different - I'm super happy with it, it's extremely sturdy yet can be opened with one hand.

[–] Gnomie@lemmy.world 4 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Terrific! What kind of exposure times are you using?

[–] bdeclerc@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago (1 children)

Individual recordings are 5000 frames at 133fps, the field of view of the ASI462mm camera is about 4x2 arc minutes, so a number of individual stacks were combined in a mosaic to reach this resolution and field of view.

[–] bdeclerc@lemmy.world 5 points 7 months ago

Planetary and lunar imaging works very differently than deepsky imaging. The technique behind it is called 'lucky imaging'. Only about 20% of the sharpest recorded frames actually are used in the final image.