Friday, April 26, 2013

Moon Mosaic 23/4/13



I really wanted to capture a full moon, but with the Moon being quite low and lots of clouds I opted for the only clear night. So here is an almost Full Moon!

I captured 29 separate avi's with my Philips Toucam Pro II and Skywatcher 80ED Pro. First stacking the avi's with registax, then stitching the best images together using iMerge. I did try out for the first time Microsoft Ice, which is a very impessive app, it did a fine job of stitching the images, but you could see the brightness variations. 

Friday, April 05, 2013

Comet Pan-Starrs at last!




After a few night Comet hunting I finally managed to capture this little beauty! I think it is because it is so low down that it is difficult to see with the atmospheric 'blur' and light pollution. Now that the comet has got feinter, but at the same time moved up towards the Andromeda Galaxy it has become easier to find. I used my proven method of following the the two stars from the W of Cassiopia to find Andromeda and then set up the camera to look in that general area.



I used my Canon EOS 350D and 200mm zoom lens on a tripod sat on top of my garden table to get the height and see over the fence.

I'm really pleased with these images!