Another type of moon shot

crashmaster

Lunar craters Atlas and Hercules.

This shot was not done with a DSLR, but rather with a $30 webcam attached to a modest 8" reflecting telescope. To compensate for the effects of atmospheric turbulence at high magnification, an AVI is taken of the area at about 15 fps for a couple of minutes or so in an attempt to capture the best moments of atmospheric seeing, or stability. The best frames are hand picked, then registered and stacked to increase S/N since a single webcam frame, is well, very, very noisy.

Phillips ToUcam webcam, Celestron C8 optical tube operating at F20 (4000 mm FL), 270 frames stacked.

I hesitated to post this, but thought that it might interest some out there, to simply illustrate that you dont need a bunch of high dollar equipment to get detailed shots of the moon. If its out of place, OT, or not relevant to this site I will gladly remove it.

zweiblumen

Very cool concept. Do you have any more to share?

pyry

Nice work!
That could be the most frames in a single post on the forum

It's not often that astrophotography pops up here, nice to see some once in a while.

To offer some critique, unless you were after this particular feature, you could select a bit nearer the terminator to get some contrasts

crashmaster

Yeah I have a bunch more of the webcam images of the moon and Jupiter and Saturn. Dont want to bore you all with them though, I mean hey, its from a freakin webcam.

I was going after those two particular craters at a high sun angle actually. Its very interesting how different sun angles bring out different features in the same craters, but yes, you are correct, much more contrast is availible closer to the terminator. Thanks for the kind word guys!

pathfinder

Very interesting indeed.

pyry

crashmaster wrote:

Yeah I have a bunch more of the webcam images of the moon and Jupiter and Saturn. Dont want to bore you all with them though, I mean hey, its from a freakin webcam.

It only limits the pixel count of the end product ('less you make mosaic too). A p&s with the lens cut off might be worth a thought...

crashmaster wrote:

I was going after those two particular craters at a high sun angle actually. Its very interesting how different sun angles bring out different features in the same craters, but yes, you are correct, much more contrast is availible closer to the terminator.

Now there's an idea! Shoot a whole set of the same region at different times and make a gallery of shadows

crashmaster

pyry wrote:

It only limits the pixel count of the end product ('less you make mosaic too). A p&s with the lens cut off might be worth a thought...



Now there's an idea! Shoot a whole set of the same region at different times and make a gallery of shadows

Actually earth based lunar and planetary imaging has gone a bit more high tech these days. There are now good low noise chips in cameras that have an 80 fps capability but still sensitive enough to capture the planets at a high frame rate. A couple of these units are now actually designed with lunar and planetary imaging in mind. They run about 1200 bucks though. However, the faster frame rate means that you have more "good" images to extract from the AVI and the lower noise means you dont have to stack nearly as many for a smooth image. As you might imagine though, processing can be quite time consuming.

The folks that pioneer this way to image the moon and the planets only a few short years ago were onto a brilliant concept, hence dedicated cameras have come about. They started with webcams, video cams, P&S with the lens removed in AVI mode, etc. It was actually a real revolution in lunar and planetary imaging. It enabled folks to get images with a level of detail that before was thought impossible when shooting though the earths atmosphere, even at locations with the steadiest skies, and all it cost swas sticking a $30 webcam onto the scope. The images these folks took with small backyard telescopes and webcams were far superior to images taken at the largest earth based professional observatories. Pretty cool.

If youre interested in some good stuff, I give you Mr Alan Friedmans website. http://avertedimagination.com/ The guy does amazing lunar and planetary work. But after looking at his stuff, you will think mine is nOObish.

DaddyO

Your not boring anybody... well maybe some un saids by they are not saying.
You could show in landscapes also. It is a landscape. Just no cows
and a barn.

Nice work for sure. Just re reviewed many of the Apollo mission pics to
compare for fine. Earth based, space based.

I think your circumpolar shot had more frames than this one.

Agree with Pyry that your setting frames per shot records for this site.

We are treated to your high end effort and time in the field. We all
benefit back and forth.

Looking forward to your other works also.... Say... you got a duck shot
yet? A little duck at 4000mm? Wonder if that would be considered
macro. Hmmmmm. I'm thinking yes. Try and stack that one.
Michael

crashmaster

Yeah, I have a few duck shots, but none at long FL. However I do have a new 16803 based camera coming and an RCOS OTA later this summer, so we shall see.:D Hopefully before the duck and other summer objects go to bed for the year.

DaddyO

Thats putting some serious $'s on the line. Hehe. I won't be going
there but will look for your shots.

Bought a Megrez 110 ED last December. It is only now seeing its
second light this last Friday on the moon with a 30D. Sharp was
not that impressive via camera but by eyepiece it was and is outstanding
crisp. Have to work on figuring that one out. Frankly I expected more
fine at prime focus with this set up. The seeing seemed fine for a sharp
shot and yet I didn't pull it off. Errrrrr.... So close.

Skippy

crashmaster wrote:

Lunar craters Atlas and Hercules.

This shot was not done with a DSLR, but rather with a $30 webcam attached to a modest 8" reflecting telescope. To compensate for the effects of atmospheric turbulence at high magnification, an AVI is taken of the area at about 15 fps for a couple of minutes or so in an attempt to capture the best moments of atmospheric seeing, or stability. The best frames are hand picked, then registered and stacked to increase S/N since a single webcam frame, is well, very, very noisy.

Phillips ToUcam webcam, Celestron C8 optical tube operating at F20 (4000 mm FL), 270 frames stacked.

I hesitated to post this, but thought that it might interest some out there, to simply illustrate that you dont need a bunch of high dollar equipment to get detailed shots of the moon. If its out of place, OT, or not relevant to this site I will gladly remove it.

Hi Crashmaster, wow that is a really cool shot
270 stacked frames gawwwwwwwwd, that is one awesome shot.

I hope you will show us some more of your Unique shots here on Dgrin.

Very very interesting thread you started here ... Skippy
.

pyry

Hey, you managed to change Skippy's leading smiley

Crashmaster: I was thinking of using the p&s in still mode, for resolution. You could load the chdk-software in it and let it churn away, looking through the finder to keep the guiding on track like old man Hubble used to.

Ahh the simple life, sitting there with the scope, in the minus plenty temperatures, all the stars out, visual world extending less horizontally than you can reach, listening to the oohs and aahs of the rest of the group.

"Hey where was Cygnus again?" - "It's right above you, in the middle of the milkyway."