There are a lot of narrowband astrophotography astronomy filters on the market with a wide variety of prices. Several manufacturers boast seemingly identical products, but with a massive price difference. The most common astronomy filter products are Hydrogen Alpha (Ha), Oxygen III (OIII) and Sulphur II (SII). Although exotic filters can be obtained such as helium and nitrogen II, for most normal purposes the trio of Ha, OIII and SII are all we are shopping for. So which narrowband astrophotography product is best?
I like to use inexpensive SLR lenses designed for 35mm film with my ICX285 CCD camera and narrowband filters. This approach has a number of advantages and you can quickly get a whole different set of fields of view without great expense. Read more...
After lots of construction work over the last couple of weekends, I've got some Meade DS motors rigged up on the homemade equatorial telescope mount. Using Meade Autostar I can slew in both directions - right ascension and declination. Read more for the video.
Yesterday evening I was paid a visit by an LX200 weilding friend and some clearish skies. Much time was spent with hammers and spanners making the equatorial wedge servicable and testing the polar alignment.
Read more and see the photo.
Read more and see the photo.
My seemingly never ending DIY project to produce a homemade GEM equatorial telescope mount continues to progress, albeit slowly.
Read more for an updated photograph of this project.
Read more for an updated photograph of this project.
How many of you can put your hands up and say that if your hard disk gets damaged or stolen today, will you have enough backups to recover everything you want to? Or will you loose all the images you've work so hard on, except for the jpgs on your website?
A happy chance has lead me to acquiring an Astrodon SII narrowband astrophotography filter for a very low price.
I've now got the replacement IR filter for my Canon 350D DSLR camera. Last night Pete and I did the filter swap.
It is over two years since I published my results concerning the breakthrough modifications to a SC long exposure toucam webcam which finally cured all the problems relating to amp glow.....
Direct bias amp off modification for long exposure webcams
Direct bias amp off modification for long exposure webcams
With all the discussion about filters lately, you'll be suprised to discover I've purchased another narrowband filter. I can't afford additional Astrodon narrowband CCD camera filters, but I can afford the Baader prices.
Using my prefered astronomy supplier, Bern at Modern Astronomy, I've got hold of one of the Baader OIII CCD Filters. These are specifically for CCD imaging and they block in the IR, unlike the popular visual filters, where cost is saved on the IR side of things because humans can't see in the infra red.
Using my prefered astronomy supplier, Bern at Modern Astronomy, I've got hold of one of the Baader OIII CCD Filters. These are specifically for CCD imaging and they block in the IR, unlike the popular visual filters, where cost is saved on the IR side of things because humans can't see in the infra red.
For years I've had an old LXD55 mount - most folks laugh when they hear about my mount - but I've made it do most of the things I want it to do. I've just dug up some comments I made in 2006 relating to periodic error that I'd like on the web, so i'll put them here.
They relate to a "magical" adjustment that I made to my mount that gave a large improvement to the autoguiding and tracking and periodic error of my LXD55 mount.
They relate to a "magical" adjustment that I made to my mount that gave a large improvement to the autoguiding and tracking and periodic error of my LXD55 mount.
30/08: New Toy Alert: Canon 350D
I finally got fed up of my Fugi Finepix A120 and puchased a new camera. I've frequently found myself getting frustrated at not getting nice terrestial photos - I'm forever snapping pictures of things in the workshop, observatory, or when I'm out and about, and whilst the A120 has been super-reliable and a good performer, it was time to upgrade