Tuesday, June 16, 2009

Saturn from spring of 2009 in good seeing




this is a monochrome capture from my DMK21AF04 Camera in the Red channel under good seeing on an unknown day in spring of 2009

Thursday, June 11, 2009

Saturn 2009.06.08 - Near perfect seeing


Object: Saturn

Planet

Origin:ObservationManager - SolarSystem Catalog 1.0
ObserverMichael A. Phillips Mr.
SiteHome
Begin2009-06-08 um 20:30:00-05:00
End2009-06-08 um 20:40:00-05:00
Seeing1 (very good)
OpticsC8i
EyepiecePowerMate (V=812.8)
FilterAstronomik LRGB Color
CameraDMK21AF04
Sitzung2009-06-08 um 20:30:00-05:00
Visual impression

  • Capture notes:
    Excellent seeing was forecast for a brief 3 hour period after sunset
    and before a drop back to average seeing.
    Fought equipment issues but got tons of great data, including a mutual
    moon event.  I wasn't sure what settings to use so I ran my regular routine
    hoping for something.

    Processing notes:
    Initially I thought I had caught the dimming of Tethys, but I think that
    because I start captures at dusk the brightness of the sky washed out the
    fainter moons like Tethys.
    I'm still not 100% happy with my routine and feel that with great
    seeing there's always more tweaking to be done!  Take good notes
    everyone!

    Observing notes:
    I didn't spend anytime visually observing as the equipment issues with the
    laptop and being excited for great seeing kept me distracted until the
    seeing went back to the usual average.


References

Sessions: 2009-06-08 um 20:30:00-05:00

Begin:2009-06-08 um 20:30:00-05:00
End:2009-06-08 um 22:30:00-05:00
Weather:Seeing: Perhaps 8-9/10 judged on Saturn only, the collapsed to 5+/10
Transparency:4/5 with a small T-storm cell ~15 mi away and HUGE one 45mi away which was VERY visible despitenot having any haze or clouds nearby.  STRANGE
Forecast: Small window at dusk of 5/5 Seeing! 
Equipment:Ubuntu 9.04 Linux and custom coriander on Lenovo T61 (Cepheus)8" Celestron C8i SCTLymax Cat CoolerDMK 21AF042.5x PowerMateAstronomik LRGB filtersTrue Tek Color Filter Wheel with visu diag
Comments:Great weather locally, but horrible in surrounding areas (see Transparency report!).I made great work of some of the local seeing on Saturn and was excited for a mutual moon event of Tethys and Mimas.I am not sure I captured it or not.Then the inevitable happened I ran out of disk space on the laptop!  Wait that was after the crash, yes linux crashes too!Sill no remote control of the laptop via the computer or long HC cable.I grabbed an external USB drive (formatted fat32) but recording at 15fps was not an issue.Moral of the story is even a short window of great seeing is worth the threat of storms and always be preparedwith a clean hard drive or spare usb drive nearby!
>> Observations <<

Observer: Michael A. Phillips Mr.

>> Observations <<

Site: Home

Longitude:35.682°
Latitude:-78.743°
Timezone:UT-300 min
>> Observations <<

Optics: C8i

Type:SCT
Vendor:Celestron
Aperture:203.0 mm
Focal length:2032.0 mm
>> Observations <<

Eyepiece: PowerMate

Vendor:TeleVue
Focal length:2.5 mm                                                    
>> Observations <<

Filter: Astronomik LRGB

Typ:Color
>> Observations <<

CCD Camera: DMK21AF04

Vendor:The Image Source
Pixel:640x480
>> Observations <<

Wednesday, June 3, 2009

Fun with dancing Saturnian moons

Ful RES:

And animation!


And facebox labels!


Capture notes:
Seeing makes the rings quiver and nowhere as good as a few nights ago. I still have not touched the focus or collimation, but did capture Regulus in Red. My regular routine 1/15s per channel (still all channels full gain). Initially the fps were set wrong as I work the kinks out of this setup. That was not as bad as it sounds, I lost some frame per channel, but it was only 180s per channel. Fixed for the 2nd run at 300s per channel which is what I really like on Saturn especially with variable seeing. Seeing degraded towards the 3rd cap, despite more cooling between 2 and 3

ObserverMichael A. Phillips Mr.
SiteHome
Begin2009-05-30 um 21:00:00-05:00
End2009-05-30 um 22:21:00-05:00
Seeing3 (fair)
OpticsC8i
EyepiecePowerMate (V=812.8)
FilterAstronomik LRGB Color
CameraDMK21AF04
Sitzung2009-05-30 um 21:00:00-05:00











References

Sessions: 2009-05-30 um 20:30:00-05:00

Begin:2009-05-30 um 20:30:00-05:00
End:2009-05-30 um 22:30:00-05:00
Weather:Seeing: 7/10 Transparency: 3/5 Forecast: Initially, 4/5 for both, but recently clouds crept in, which didn't appear at all in dusk. I hope the seeing holds!
Equipment:Ubuntu 9.04 Linux and custom coriander on Lenovo T61 (Cepheus) 8" Celestron C8i SCT Lymax Cat Cooler DMK 21AF04 2.5x PowerMate Astronomik LRGB filters True Tek Color Filter Wheel with visu diag
Comments:Bad drift even after a rough leveling of the tripod and auto-two star eq align. I didn't check the errors per axis, but I can't survive the drift without a reposotion of Saturn after 1 - 2 minutes, which is only annoying as I've yet to get scope control in Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty jackalope in Kstars/Indi. Took a break from Saturn imaging ~2140 for re-cooling of scope... not sure it helped, but back imaging at 2202
>> Observations <<

Observer: Michael A. Phillips Mr.

>> Observations <<

Site: Home

Longitude:35.682°
Latitude:-78.743°
Timezone:UT-300 min
>> Observations <<

Optics: C8i

Type:SCT
Vendor:Celestron
Aperture:203.0 mm
Focal length:2032.0 mm
>> Observations <<

Eyepiece: PowerMate

Vendor:TeleVue
Focal length:2.5 mm
>> Observations <<

Filter: Astronomik LRGB

Typ:Color
>> Observations <<

CCD Camera: DMK21AF04

Vendor:The Image Source
Pixel:640x480
Created: 06/03/2009 20:14:11

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