Moon on 30th Dec

Hi guys,

I was quite pleased with this shot I took on the evening of 30th Dec. Used my Minolta Dynax 5D camera at the prime focus of my new Meade LXD75 6" Newt - not lined up etc as the shutter speed was only 1/500th!



Clear skies,

Paul.

Hi Paul,
Thats a great shot, with some fine detail, you managed to get terminator detail while not overexposing the central areas.
Seems like the LXd is a grand scope when it works.
Is this a single image, did-you/can-you do processing on this image ? (photoshop etc).

Hi Dave,

That's a single image, crop and mild USM applied resized to fit through the Internet ottherwise pretty much as it was taken.

On the only two occasions I've used it at length due to the weather, I've been very pleased with the LXD - a great scope that will give me a lot of fun just as soon as the weather improves - did I mention the weather?? I'm waiting patiently for this "Global Warming" to kick in.

Here's what it can really do - this one's a stack of quite a few exposures and processed to remove the light pollution that is a fact of life here in Larne!



Clear skies,

Paul.

Paul - both shots are sweet. The moon is really good. M42 shows up some tracking errors - but its only a minor issue.

Colour in both images seems a tad harsh on my monitor. There seems to be an overall purple cast on both images. Again, only a minor issue...

Your setup should soon be cranking out equally good shots. Well done!

Dave

Hi Paul,
I like the M42 image, a nice wide field of view, light pollution is just a pain!
I'd greyscale the lunar image if possible, it also looks a little purple to me.
Colour processing on a nebula is probability one of the hardest things you'll do in astrophotography, its very tricky, with time you either become an expert or it'll drive you mad. I'd tone down the blue a little.

I hope you take this as suggestions, we're not criticising here, just trying to help.

Thanks guys, really good tips! I have a bit of work to do with the scope as I haven't yet trained the drives and the location is still set as Belfast - I need to create a custom one for Larne - that 20 miles may not make much difference but it's about getting the last drop of performance out of it. And I think my alignment was a bit on the rough side too

It's a terrible addiction this isn't it? When I look at stuff I took a couple of years ago which I thought was real cool at the time - well it looks a bit rubbish now, but then one becomes a perfectionist and realises there's still a way to go. And it just takes time - loads of it!

Clear skies,

Paul.