Astronomy Cameras Blog

Astonishing Saturn Picture

Xiao Sun — Fri, 03 Jul 2009 04:11:47 +0000

Saturn has been a popular celestial body to photograph among The Imaging Source astronomy cameras’ users, and we have indeed seen many remarkable pictures of that planet here. Alan Friedman recently sent us one of his Saturn images which can be called a master piece.

In this picture, Alan marked three of Saturn’s satellites, namely Dione, Tethys, and Rhea.

More info on this picture is available at

http://www.avertedimagination.com/img_pages/saturn20090415.html

Thank you Alan!

International Sapce Station

Xiao Sun — Thu, 02 Jul 2009 04:23:10 +0000

French astronomy amateur , Laurent Langelez, took this ISS image on 28.96.09.

We have translated his email into English as below:

ISS passed above at 4:26 with magnitude of 3.4.

Kits: Barlow x 1.6 & DMK 31AU03.AS
UV-IR Filters
254 mm Telescope and rear guide 80 mm

Gain of camera is set to 550, and exposure time is 1/1250s.

Processed 13 images to get this picture and applied 200% zoom with Registax5

Deep Sky Images

Xiao Sun — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 13:08:29 +0000

It has been a while since we received deep sky images last time. Ralph Ford, based in Redondo Beach, CA, took the following Messier astronomical objects with his DMK 21AU04.AS astronomy camera and sent them to us last month.

Messier 13

Messier 57

I took the enclosed images with a DMK 21AU04.AS camera mounted to a 16″ F/46 telescope. The images were stacked and processed with RegiStax, each frame being a 4 second exposure. While the field of view is only 6.5 X 4.9 seconds, the large aperture produces bright images with short exposures.

Thank you Ralph for the nice pictures and the info on them!

Black and White Image of Saturn

Xiao Sun — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:41:01 +0000

Máximo Ruiz is a Spanish astronomy amateur who uses DMK 21AU04.AS astronomy camera for his astro-photography hobby. This monochrome Saturn image is another work from him:

We translated his email as follow:

I am now sending you the picture of Saturn that I have captured with a DMK 21AU04.AS camera and a Meade LX 200 10 telescope.

Location: Barbera del Valles, Barcelona

Time: 12-01-09 about 18:30

Tube S/C Meade LX 200 10 f/11

1 video of 100 frames.

15 fps with DMK 21U04.AS monocrhome camera & red filter

Filter: Optec, Bessell U

Process with Regixtax Photoshop and Pixinsight

Marvelous Solar Animation

Xiao Sun — Mon, 29 Jun 2009 08:23:44 +0000

The following picture is the screen shot of an excellent solar animation made by a German astronomy amateur, Ingmar Glass. He took all the images with his DMK 31AF03.AS astronomy camera.

Click the picture to open the animation in your browser.

Vielen Dank Ingmar! Gut gemacht!

Venus

Xiao Sun — Fri, 26 Jun 2009 09:42:12 +0000

Mike Salway has been working really hard lately. The picture below is the 2nd one we received over the past two days.

Here is what he said in the mail:

This image of Venus in Ultra Violet light was captured on the morning of the 23rd June … …

The colours reveal some albedo differences in the cloud tops on Venus, and come from a combination of using a Schuler UV filter for capturing the luminance (detail) data, and processing the image as a false-colour composite using colour data from the RGB channels as well as the UV channel.

The seeing was only average, and Venus was at a respectable 30° altitude – shining brilliantly at mag -4.18.

More here: Venus in UV False Colour - 23rd June

Thank you Mike! Wish you a clear sky!

Mike Salway’s First Picture of Mars

Xiao Sun — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 10:37:11 +0000

We received the picture from Mike this morning.

On Tuesday morning, 23rd June 2009 I captured my first image of Mars for 2009. It’s still very early in the season, with Mars still 288 million kilometres away, subtending a tiny diameter of a 4.9″ on the sky.

Mars doesn’t reach opposition until late January, 2010 when it will be 14 arcseconds in diameter – a lot smaller than it was at its closest in 2003, when it grew to 25″ in diameter.

No polar cap is visible, but the features of Syrtis Major and the Hellas Basin can be seen.

More here: My first Mars for 2009.

Thank you Mike!

Night Side of Venus

Xiao Sun — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 09:08:15 +0000

The observers of Venus get pretty much nothing more than its phase and quickly changing size in visible light. However, the infrared spectrum can reveal the planet’s dynamic atmosphere and weak light on its night side.

Silvia Kowollik, an German astronomy amateur, wrote an interesting article about how to photograph Venus in infrared with The Imaging Source Astronomy Cameras and published it in the July’s edition of the German astronomy magazine “Sterne und Weltraum” (”Stars and Space” in English).

Should you wish to read her article (in German) and view the exceptional images, you can order online at Die Nachtseite der Venus.

Occultation of Mars in May 2008

Xiao Sun — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 08:09:22 +0000

Philippe Morel, the author and president of la Société Astronomique de France (Astronomical Society of France) tested the well known astronomy camera DMK 41AU02.AS for 9 months in a variety of conditions. The review he finished recently will be published in the July edition of the society journal.

The article comprehensive and includes many pictures taken with the camera. Here is one of them which shows the occultation of Mars on 10th of May, 2008:

Merci beaucoup Philippe Morel for the work!

Astro Fair in Taiwan

Xiao Sun — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 04:43:39 +0000

The astronomical annual meeting held by the Astronomical Society of the Republic of China (ASROC) is one of the largest astronomical meetings in Taiwan. This year, the event took place at the National Museum of Marine Biology & Aquarium in Kenting (approximately 6 hours from Taipei by car) between May 23rd and May 24th.

In cooperation with its Taiwan reseller- M&T Optics - The Imaging Source exhibited at the show.The astronomy cameras manufactured by The Imaging Source once again became the focus of many visitors ranging from astronomy amateurs to college students and professors majoring in astronomy.

Here are some pictures from the fair: