A brief clearance on 14th January 2010 gave me first light with the new camera and I was able to capture a sequence of Messier 45 - the Pleiades or Seven Sisters. The camera worked well enough, but on processing I found that the field was unevenly focussed. The light of day showed me that the drawtube (which was almost fully retracted to accommodate the AO-8 unit with the William Optics 0.8 reducer/flattener) on my 80 mm refractor was slightly tilted, so one side was approximately 1/2 mm different from the other - enough I presume to affect the focus across the big chip at the f4.8 ratio (f6 scope with 0.8 reducer). I've adjusted the slide bars and it looks better. Next try will tell.... 8 x 5 minute subs, darks and flats applied. Obviously longer subs are required, but weather did not permit. But a reasonably promising start. What is particularly heartening is that I was using the rig on my Autostar DS motor driven EQ3-2 mount. And the AO-8 was able to provide all the correction needed without adjusting the mount at all, indeed it was well within its limits. So an eminently portable system for medium to wide field imaging. No point in supplying a full size image - the quality is very mediocre.

Postscript - on 30th January after a prolonged cloudy spell, a clear night, albeit with some high thin cloud. Full Moon, so no chance of nebulosity, but a series of 5 minute exposures proved the focus adjustments to have been successful - much improved across the field, although still not perfect in the corners, but that is probably optical . The moonlight and haze accentuated the vignetting, but no point in applying flats etc. Same setup as before. Full size

Typically some clear weather around Full Moon at the start of February 2010, so not suitable for deep sky imaging without narrowband filters. But on 2nd there was a 3 hour window of full darkness before the still bright (81%) Moon rose. So at last a chance to give the ST4000 a good workout. And what else but the Great Orion nebula, Messier 42 and adjacent area including the 'Fishes' Mouth' M43 and 'Running Man' NGC 1977. Main image 9 x 10 minutes, central Trapezium region patched from 6 x 2 minutes. I also took 6 x 5 minute subs, but haven't used them. A bit 'noisy' in the fainter outer regions - if I get the opportunity I'll take a set of longer subs, perhaps 20 minutes each to improve those areas. ST4000XCM with AO-8 and William Optics 0.8 reducer on Meade series 5000 127 mm refractor. Full size

 

At last! A crystal clear night on February10th, and although I was out earlier so didn't get started until 11 pm, nevertheless I managed almost four hours of data. Only one frame scrapped when the guide star was lost for some reason. Hazed over a little in the small hours, but no complaints. The Hickson 44 group of galaxies around NGC 3190 in Leo are all very different in type, and nicely framed in the SBIG ST-4000XCM at 2 metres focal length. 15 frames x 15 minutes on the one-shot colour camera have given it a good workout with a satisfactory result despite the relative faintness of the galaxies. 12" LX200R at f7. This image featured in The Sky at Night BBC TV programme, August 2012 Full size

Out of three nights staying at Kielder in early February 2010, only Saturday 13th offered any imaging opportunities. But it was beautifully clear for a few hours, also bitterly cold with a hard frost - Brr! So another chance to put the ST-4000XCM through its paces. This time the Leo Trio, M65, M66 and NGC 3628. 10 x 15 minute subs on Meade series 5000 127 mm with AP 0.7 reducer. Quite a large field, so cropped from the full frame. Thinks: It's time I did a closeup of the 'hamburger' (NGC 3628) Full size

With so many interesting 'faint fuzzy' deep sky targets, sometimes open clusters get overlooked. The evening of 2nd March 2010 was forecast to be clear for a while, and I wanted a fairly bright target that would only need a couple of hours work (before the Moon rose). On checking my images I realised that I'd never imaged M37! And it would fit beautifully into the frame of my ST4000XCM on my 12" meade with a .7 reducer. So here it is. I actually got 12 subs, but had to scrap the last 3 - thin cloud with a rising Moon raised the background level unacceptably. 9 x 15 minutes, one shot colour of course. Full size

The evening of 4th March 2010 was also forecast to be clear for a while, and as I was out for the earlier part of the evening, again I wanted a fairly bright target that would only need an hour or so before the Moon rose. I had an image of M67 from earlier years, but it was well placed and nicely sized for the ST4000XCM on my 12" meade with a .7 reducer. A little hazy, probably contributing to slight haloing of the brighter stars. 6 x 10 minutes. Full size

In June, light nights are with me, and unless I go narrowband, only brighter objects are of interest for imaging. So here's one of Corona Borealis from the early hours of 3rd. SBIG ST4000XCM with Tamron 17-50 f2.8 lens unguided on the Gemini mount at 50 mm focal length and f5.6. 10 x 5 minute subs, darks and flats used. Of interest is the large asteroid Pallas at mag 9.0, now gradually fading from a maximum of 8.6 in April. Pure chance that it's in the field - I didn't know until I started playing with a Skymap overlay to work out what was stars and what was noise. In fact nearly all stars, just the odd hot pixel that escaped the dark frame but was then removed. Full Size (810 KB!)   And with added spikes to enhance the brighter stars (they already have diffraction spikes, but quite muted in the original). Full size

 

During a prolonged period of wet and cloudy weather a clear window of a few hours on October 1st gave me an opportunity to image comet 103P Hartley as it passed near NGC281 - the 'Pacman' nebula. This comet was discovered by Malcom Hartley in Australia on March 15, 1986 and has an orbital period of about 6.5 years, so this was its third known pass. Very high in the sky with the tail pointing away, so only the coma visible. Estimated at around 7th magnitude, and was just visible in my 15x50 binoculars. SBIG ST-4000XCM and Canon 400L telephoto lens (400 mm focal length) stopped down to approx. 7.1 using an external mask. 21 sub frames x 3 minutes, stacked using the special comet feature of Deep Sky Stacker. Full size (913KB) There are also animations of the comet head as it moved across the sky during the hour or so of the exposures, cropped from the full size. AVI (748KB) DivX Codec. Or for those who don't have the codec, GIF (3.57 MB)

While Earth based telescopes only succeeded in capturing a dot surrounded by a greenish glowing coma, this image was captured by NASA's EPOXI mission between Nov. 3 and 4, 2010, during the spacecraft's flyby of comet Hartley 2. It was captured using the spacecraft's Medium-Resolution Instrument. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UMD

Messier 45, the Pleiades or Seven Sisters in Taurus is a well known bright cluster, beautiful in binoculars. But to see the full beauty of the surrounding nebulosity long exposure photography is a must. And I'm quite pleased with my latest version here! The night of 12th November 2010 remained clear despite a stiff breeze, and I was able to obtain 13 x 10 minute exposures using my SBIG ST-4000XCM one-shot colour camera on the TMB 105 refractor with William Optics .8 reducer/corrector. This image appeared in the April 2011 Sky and Telescope magazine 'Hotshots'. Full size

Early in the evening of December 5th (prior to collecting the rest of the (colour) data for Abell 426), I used the SBIG ST-4000XCM to image M33 - it's always worth a visit! Meade Series 5000 127mm refractor, 10 x 15 minute sub frames. Full size This image appeared in the 'Ask Alan' section of the November 2011 Astronomy Now magazine

The 8th was again clear, and although I was out during the early evening I was able to leave the mount running with my ST-4000XCM one-shot colour camera and Canon 400L lens - about time it earned its keep! 8 x 15 minute frames were saved before the mount reached its 'wrong side' electronically controlled limit, with this result. Clouds arrived later so that was that. I'm very pleased with the performance of the lens - although it's critical for focussing, as can be seen it has very good resolution, freedom from aberration and round stars to the corners. Only some very slight distortions in the bottom left of this image. A little 'noisy - another couple of hours data would be nice! But already my best Andromeda galaxy (Messier 31) to date. More data from 25th December (another 5 x 15 minutes) improved both the processing artifacts and the noise levels. That's it folks!  Full size

It is not often realised just how large M31 is in the sky. To the naked eye it is just a tiny smudge. Even in binoculars only the bright core is easily visible - a telescope is needed to show the full extent of this great galaxy, a 'mere' 2 1/2 million light years away. But this image shows the Full Moon to scale as in the sky. The galaxy is 6 times larger!

 2011