Tag Archives: Andromeda

Finally – round stars!

This was my telescope’s first outing since I fixed up its mirror cell. A quick glance at a bright star in the city seemed to indicate that the problem was fixed, but there’s no way of knowing for sure without trying some proper photography. Recently the three circles in this Venn diagram have been conspiringContinue reading “Finally – round stars!”

More deep space

I’m still suffering with triangular stars caused by pinched optics, but last night I decided to head out and enjoy some astronomy anyway. I’m still a relative beginner at astrophotogrpahy and there’s always something to learn even if the telescope is misbehaving. The weather was clear and very cold. Frost formed on the car andContinue reading “More deep space”

Infrared astrophotography – first “light”

It’s been quite cloudy recently so I’ve been clutching at any opportunity to make the most of clear skies. Last Tuesday it wasn’t forecast to be very clear at my dark site in Somerset but it was clear at my suburban address in Bristol. Light pollution round here is pretty bad and the sky oftenContinue reading “Infrared astrophotography – first “light””

First light part 2

This morning I published a picture of the Andromeda galaxy, with some notes about my method a vow to improve my technique. I pondered the image processing and decided to have another go this afternoon. This is the same dataset, but different processing. It’s a colour image and unfortunately shows some light pollution, although IContinue reading “First light part 2”

First light: GSO imaging Newtonian telescope

Hot on the heels of my recent post about telescopes for imaging, in this post I’d like to share with you the very first image taken with my new GSO 6″ f/5 imaging Newtonian – which was funded by selling my two previous telescopes and a couple of camera lenses. Tonight was the first clearContinue reading “First light: GSO imaging Newtonian telescope”

Andromeda Galaxy

Some time ago I got a new telescope – a Celestron 130EQ-MD Newtonian rather than a Celestron NexStar 127 SLT Cassegrain-Maksutov formula. In short, it is more sensitive to light but sacrifices magnification. It’s perfect for deep-space observation like nebulae and galaxies, while the Maksutov is better for observing planets which are much brighter andContinue reading “Andromeda Galaxy”