Recent Submissions: 2012 December

[owlice]

__________________________________________________________________________________________________

Please post your images here.

Please see this thread before posting images; posting images demonstrates your agreement with
the possible uses for your image.

Please keep images under 400K, whether hotlinked or uploaded.

Thank you!

_________________________________________________________________________________________________

<- Previous submissions


[c]«« Discuss Anything in Astronomy «» Visit The Asterisk Main Page «» See Introductory Astonomy Lectures »»
[hr][/hr]«« Introduce Yourself «» Please Read the Rules »»[/b][/c]

[Efrain Morales]

Jupiter on December 1st reaching its maximum opposition. The Moon Io is shown transiting across the Jovian disc and the shadow slightly ahead due to the angle facing the sun and viewed face on (Opposition) from earth.

Click to view full size image

[ViliMax]

NGC 772 (Arp 78, UGC 1466) - unbarred galaxy type Sb in Aries.

http://www.elateobservatory.com
http://www.irida-observatory.org

Copyright: Velimir Popov

NGC 772 (also known as a peculiar spiral galaxy Arp 78) is an unbarred giant spiral galaxy approximately 106 million light-years away in the constellation Aries. It is notable for possessing a single elongated outer spiral arm. The asymmetric spiral arms are distorted by interaction with the dwarf elliptical galaxy NGC 770. NGC 770 appears to be at about the same distance as NGC 772, so it is most likely a true companion to the larger spiral system. It has a separation of only 160 000 light-years from its larger companion with an actual diameter of only about 40 000 light-years. NGC 772 is huge, having a diameter of 208 000 lightyears, making it twice the diameter of our Milky Way Galaxy.

Click to view full size image

Click to view full size image

Large scale and more information is avaliable here ...

Thank you for looking ...

[mikiclinic]

Detail of NGC1499 in HST-palette
http://www.miki-hosp.or.jp/BIND/pg148.html
Copyright: Nobuhiko Miki

Click to view full size image

[lgym]

Click to view full size image

Jupiter was closest to Earth on 01-12-2012 just as it was rising in Hungary at 16:00 local time. The pic is a composite of a series taken an hour later when the planet appeared on my sky, from 16:54 to 17:12 local time (UT +1 hour). Each shot was 1 minute 50 second apart from each other so both Jupiter and its visible Galilean moons are present. When I begin taking the photoes the sky was clear but soon some small high level clouds arrived in front of an approaching cyclone and these clouds created an oval aureole around Jupiter. The image shows both the clear and both the aureoled planet. There series I took was also perfect for a short timelapse which is even more spectacular regarding the aureole forming: http://youtu.be/cTX1ACnFuBo

An average round aureole can form when any type of thin cloud is present, only the particle size of that counts. Oval aureoles are less common, they form when the clouds contain ice crystals that drift in the cloud horizontally (see explanation at Les Cowley's site: http://atoptics.co.uk/fz732.htm ) so high level clouds are likely to form oval aureoles as they contain ice crystals. The other circumstance needed for an oval aureole is the small altitude of the celestial body by which it forms, so a rising or setting bright planet or star is a perfect object for this. Hunting for oval aureoles is an interesting thing not only for the haunting beauty of the hazy planets / stars but for scientific significance of the exact observations of a less known phenomena.

Individual photoes were taken with Nikon D5100 camera and 55-300 Nikkor lens at 170mm, F 5, ISO3200, 1/1.3 second exposures, composite created with Startrails software.

[astrochuck]

M42 The Orion Nebula by astrochuck, on Flickr


Image taken with QHY9M & Orion ED102CF refractor 10/21/2012,10/22/2012, 11/10/2012 & 11/18/2012

R-3x10min 1x20min
G-3x10min 4x20min
B-3x10min 4x20min

(5x2 seconds for the core area)

Images acquired,aligned and stacked with Nebulosity V2.0
Guiding with Orion 50mm mini guider,SSAG and Phd
Combined & post processed with PS6 and StarTools

[martinm3]

B33

Copyright: Martin Matias Menrath
Web: http://www.astronommmia.blogspot.com.ar/

Click to view full size image

[martinm3]

M42

Copyright: Martin Matias Menrath
Web: http://www.astronommmia.blogspot.com.ar/

Click to view full size image

[talbotj]

Orion
Copyright: Jon Talbot
Web: http://www.starscapeimaging.com

Orion

---

[starsurfer]

Orion
Copyright: Jon Talbot
Web: http://www.starscapeimaging.com

Orion

---

Beautiful image! You can even see the supernova remnant, the Monoceros Loop to the left of the Rosette Nebula! Skies must have been really dark!

[SkyViking]

The Orion Nebula in Near Infrared
http://www.rolfolsenastrophotography.com
Copyright: Rolf Wahl Olsen

Click to view full size image

Link to full size image (2.45MB)

This image shows the great Orion Nebula (Messier 42) in infrared light. Traditional images of the Orion Nebula taken in visible light primarily display the familiar and striking magenta colour from H-Alpha emission, as well as large dark obscuring clouds of dust. But infrared light penetrates these clouds better and allows for a peek deep into the heart of the nebula, revealing complex details and hundreds of bright young stars that are otherwise completely invisible.
These stars shine primarily in the infrared and appear as golden red in this image. Only a minority of these are even visible in traditional images.
The infrared region seems largely unexplored by amateur astronomers. But using a filter that only allows infrared light (>700nm) to pass through allows obtaining an image of these hidden features. Effectively the band observed is 700-1100nm since the sillicon CCD chip is not responsive to wavelengths longer than that, and this band is called NIR (Near Infrared).
One issue arising from this technique is that the NIR band does not have a colour as such, since it lies outside the visible light spectrum. So I thought for a while about how to best produce a colour image that whould emphasize the NIR data. I decided to substitute the R channel with NIR which nicely brings out the contrast between the nebula itself and all the young obscured stars that shine primarily in infrared.
I used a NIR filter together with G and B filters to create this colour composite. The resulting images were assigned to the different channels as NIR->Luminance, NIR->Red, G->Green and B->Blue.
The CCD sensor (KAF-8300) is no where near as sensitive in the NIR band as it is in visible light so I gathered a lot longer exposure time in NIR than in G an B. Still, the Orion Nebula is so bright that overall integration time was just 1 hour and 21 minutes.
The Orion Nebula lies 1350 light-years away in the constellation Orion and is the closest stellar factory to us. Here new stars are born out of the dense clouds of gas and dust. The nebula is lit up by the four bright young stars in the centre called the Trapezium. These stars form a small cluster and many more are in fact present, as can be seen in this infrared view.

Image details:
Date: 24th and 27th November 2012
Exposure: NIR(Luminance) 72m, NIR(red) 72m, G(green) 4.5m, B(blue) 4.5m, total 1hr 21mins @ -30C
Telescope: 10" Serrurier Truss Newtonian f/5
Camera: QSI 683wsg with Lodestar guider
Filters: Astrodon LRGB E-Series Gen 2
Taken from my observatory in Auckland, New Zealand

[talbotj]

Orion
Copyright: Jon Talbot
Web: http://www.starscapeimaging.com

Orion

---

Beautiful image! You can even see the supernova remnant, the Monoceros Loop to the left of the Rosette Nebula! Skies must have been really dark!

Thank you Starsurfer. The part of the sky where this image was taken was actually under the influence of a partial light dome but otherwise fairly dark. Took a bit of processing finesse to get all the details. I was also surprised to see the Monoceros loop.
Jon Talbot

[remidone]

M52 - NGC 7635 (Bubble Nebula) narrowband
by Luca Moretti
http://www.astrobin.com/users/remidone/

Click to view full size image

Higher resolution

[iko]

Conjunction of the planets Saturn, Mercury and Venus with its reflection in the Mediterranean Sea, photo taken on 12-02-2012.

Full size http://cdn.astrobin.com/images/1c5ffd24 ... d0b8e2.jpg

Full size http://cdn.astrobin.com/images/cc173dce ... af4432.jpg

[owlice]

Flaming Star Nebula
Copyright: Martin Pugh
http://www.martinpughastrophotography.i ... ar-SHO.jpg
[attachment=2]FlamingStar_Pugh.jpg[/attachment]

Helix Nebula
Copyright: Terry Robison
[attachment=1]Helix Nebula LRGB Low Res.jpg.jpg[/attachment]

Spiral Galaxy NGC 7331
Copyright: Stefano Conti
http://www.astroconti.com
[attachment=0]NGC-7331-LRGB-2-rid.jpg[/attachment]

[Efrain Morales]

Jupiter on December 2nd, 04:24ut and less then 24 hours from maximum opposition. The Storms Oval Ba and GRS are heading towards the dark side of the planet.

Click to view full size image

[whwiii]

Helium in M27.
Here's the M27 Dumbbell Nebula in nitrogen (NII-red), oxygen (OIII-teal), and Helium (HeII-blue)

Click to view full size image 1 or image 2

Copyright: William Warden
hover over image for a blink of NII OIII and HeII for reference
While the high energy helium at the center of the nebula does not provide much detail, the color seems to give a window focusing attention on the center of the nebula and giving excellent contrast for the red knots of NII photoionization.

full size


Thank you for your consideration
Bill W
astro.whwiii.net

[John Bunyan]

John Bunyan
Leaving Mauna Kea
[attachment=0]Leaving-Mauna-Kea.apod.jpg[/attachment]

[Ayiomamitis]

Sim 3-188 - Pickering's Triangle
http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-DSO-Nebulae-Sim-3-188.htm
Copyright: Anthony Ayiomamitis

Click to view full size image

A hybrid result involving the central area of the Veil Nebula Complex in Cygnus comprised of 150 minutes of h-alpha, 150 minutes of O-III and 30 minutes each for RGB.

Both the h-alpha and O-III filters do an admirable job in picking up significant signal which otherwise is missed or overlooked, thus yielding a very impressive hybrid result.

[jlake]

The Dust surrounding the Pleiades
http://i.imgur.com/pAFMv.jpg
Copyright: Josh Lake, Pomfret School Olmsted Observatory

Click to view full size image

I used a small amount of data (27 x 4 minute Luminance, 7 x 3 minute RGB) and used PixInsight to reveal the dusty surroundings of M45. It becomes clear that the beautiful blue nebulosity is a reflection of the light from the stars.

[StevenMx]

Object: LBN (Lynds Bright Nebula) 438 in Lacerta
Imaging by: David Kopacz
Processing by: Steven Marx using PixInsight
Coordinates RA: 22 41 05.7 Dec: +37 43 35
14hr integration at F/2.8 700mm FL with ASA N10 Newtonian Astrograph.
LBN438 is a cometary shaped galactic dark nebula illuminated by an
interstellar radiation field located in the constellation Lacerta.
Copyright David Kopacz (data acquisition), Steven Marx (image processing)

Click to view full size image

Click to view Original FULL scale image

[Sergio]

NGC 1313 in Reticulum - A Star Making Machine

Deep South in the Constellation of Reticulum, lies this asymmetric shaped Galaxy which is also considered as a Starburst Galaxy. There is evidence of brilliant clouds and massive blue stars scattered though its disc which spans through 50.000 light years. NGC 1313 is also rich in powerful Wolf Rayet stars of which 70 candidates where detected.

The image was taken with an 6” f5 reflector Orion Optics UK and a QSI WS 583 riding on a SW NEQ6 110 km north from Buenos Aires City Argentina.

More information at http://www.baskies.com.ar

Thanks for looking and Best Regards !!
Sergio

[Efrain Morales]

Jupiters Opposition cycles of 9 years in this collage.
[attachment=0]Jupiter_Morales.jpg[/attachment]
http://www.jaicoa-observatory.com/Jup-2 ... 12-EMr.jpg

[Bob Andersson]

Click to view full size image

5 x 1,000 second blue subs plus 5 x 200 second subs in each of red, green and blue, all captured with a TEC 140 at f/7 plus an FLI ML16803.

Processed in PixInsight and Photoshop

Bob Andersson.

[avdhoeven]

Melotte 15 in the Heart nebula. Reprocessing from data obtained in the last 3 months.

High resolution