Some of my astro pics

[Petrol]

The Orion nebula is about 1500 light years away making it a pretty easy target in astronomical terms. Although it only looks like a fuzz around some stars, you can see it through a small telescope

Thought I would have a go at something a bit further away. I couldn't see it through the telescope as it's so far away. Long exposures can reveal more than the eye can see though.


M81 Galaxy 12 Million light years away







I just want to put things in perspective here, the speed of light can travel the earth 8 times in a second. It's pretty far away

Heads up for Sunday 9PM - Brian Cox Wonders of the Universe

[Easy007]

Orion Nebula

That looks like a great improvement to me

and that last shot is immense!

[Jonny_T]

Heads up for Sunday 9PM - Brian Cox Wonders of the Universe

excellent again. Good call about Sunday TV. i'll be watching

[G-Bone]

Fabulous pics

[k-kustom]

I just want to put things in perspective here, the speed of light can travel the earth 8 times in a second. It's pretty far away

Heads up for Sunday 9PM - Brian Cox Wonders of the Universe

Brian Cox gave me feelings of Awe and excitement and interest in a subject matter i've not had since I was a child with Wonders of the solar system. He has a Simple but powerful Flair to sharing his passion for Space.

Cant WAIT for this new series..

.. Fantastic photo Petrol!!! .. I just can't beleive the things an 'amature' can capture with some talent!!!

BTW? Whats the light source from inside the nebula?

[Andy]

Orion Nebula



Still working on taking pics. I have bought an autoguider but am having problems

Better pics to come hopefully

That is just awesome

[ads.r]

Brian Cox gave me feelings of Awe and excitement and interest in a subject matter i've not had since I was a child with Wonders of the solar system. He has a Simple but powerful Flair to sharing his passion for Space.

Cant WAIT for this new series..

nobody miss this his series are awesome they expand your mind.

really excited

[Petrol]

I just can't beleive the things an 'amature' can capture with some talent!!!

BTW? Whats the light source from inside the nebula?

Believe me, amateur is the right word I am just messing about in my light polluted back yard. Technology has moved on in leaps and bounds over the years and makes it a lot easier to locate and track objects

I got my first telescope when I was 10 and just wandered around the sky at random – how things have changed! I haven’t looked at the skies for … well… “Many years” I find it really interesting though.

I guess the light source at the middle is lots of stars. Galaxy’s have more stars there due to gravity.

Had a go at taking some pics last night but it was an epic fail It was still good fun though

[Smoothound]

Please do not lower the tone of the forum

This forum is going to burn in hell anyway, but yeah, let's keep this OT and SFW!

[Petrol]

This forum is going to burn in hell anyway, but yeah, let's keep this OT and SFW!

Thats a while off Beetlejuice (star) could go pop anytime, would love to see that in my lifetime but then again, it could take a few thousand years Were only here for the blink of an eye in astronomical terms.

I tried to take a pic of the horshead nebula some time ago. It's pretty light polluted in that region of the sky from my back garden so I used a light pollution filter on the camera. This is what I got




I kind of gave up as I couldn't see anything It's amazing what processing a picture can do though



It's a bit noisy but with more pictures to stack and process, I might be able to do better.

[McRearout]

Cool

[Smoothound]

That's flipping amazing. What processing did you do to clean that one up? :

[Waveydavey]

These pics a flippin awesome.

[Clouder_sx]

What telescope Petrol?

[Bugiebpoolfb]

Brilliant pictures there man

[Petrol]

I used a programme called nebulosity to process the image. It takes quite a while to get your head around taking pics of things you can’t see but it’s pretty amazing what can be done with software.

My scope is a Skywatcher 200P newtonian reflector. The tripod and mount (that’s the top bit of the tripod) are the important bits. You have to track to compensate for the earth’s rotation and it’s not easy to set up. With big magnification and long exposures (up to about 7 mins) any errors are hugely magnified and you end up with trails in the pics. It takes me about an hour to get the kit out and align everything. My pics are “very average” compared to what other stargazers are achieving. Light pollution is a huge problem and my guess is that’s my main problem. It’s still good fun and very interesting though.

I have started to make a vid, I need loads more content and better quality pics would be a bonus. Here’s a preview

[Easy007]

Hmmm video not found.....

[Petrol]

Don't know why it won't embed

Try this linky

http://s574.photobucket.com/albums/s..._edit_2011.mp4

[Smoothound]

Nice vid. I was waiting for the caption "The Moon"

[Petrol]

Latest pic is the Whirpool galaxy. Huge gravitation pull going on here to suck a smaller galaxy in