#seestar — Public Fediverse posts

The AAT's Boltwood cloud sensor recorded it getting cloudy between about 11 pm and midnight, and between about 12:30 am and 3 am, i.e. most of the best (darkest) part of the night between the Moon setting at 12:20 am and astronomical twilight at 5:20 am was cloudy.

I thought that would have wiped out the Thirty Millimetre Telescope for most of the night too, but when I checked what it got this morning i was pleased to see that it soldiered on through breaks in the clouds and seems to have got some good data on a couple of targets I really, really wanted to get while I was here. I think the cloud was worst in the direction I was taking the timelapse, and was patchier in other parts of the sky.

#SidingSpringObservatory #Astrophotograpy #Astronomy #Astrodon #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope

Tonight the Thirty Millimetre Telescope and the Inaction Camera are hanging out together. That way they can share a power bank and the Thirty Millimetre Telescope gets to be in the Inaction Camera's shot, along with the Three Thousand Nine Hundred Millimetre Telescope. And, tonight, I HAVE TURNED ON THE DEW HEATER.

#SidingSpringObservatory #Astrophotography #Astrodon #Astronomy #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope

There is one rule in astrophotography I know perfectly well: don't use an unrepeatable event to learn your new equipment.

Naturally, I ignored it for the August 12 solar eclipse.

New Seestar, improvised solar filter, wrong recording mode — and a lot of manual work afterwards. The result isn't perfect, but the story behind it might be more useful than a perfect timelapse.

https://adfr.io/thoughts/20260818_how_not_to_photograph_a_solar_eclipse

#astrophotography #SolarEclipse #Seestar #astrodon

I have also set up the Thirty Millimetre Telescope, near to the Three Thousand Nine Hundred Millimetre Telescope.

All my imaging devices (apart from my phone) have been given their tasks for the night so that will give me plenty of time to use my binoculars before I have more work to do at around 1:30 am.

#SidingSpringObservatory #Astrophotography #Astrodon #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope

🦢 🦅 AND ANOTHER THING …

… I imaged overnight is this mosaic. It stretches from the sagittarius star cloud at the top to Sharpless 54 (in Serpens) at the bottom.

The in-between bit is what it was about; the nebulae birds. The one on top is the Swan (or Omega) nebula (messier 17) and the one at the bottom is the Eagle nebula (messier 16).

Both are star forming regions, where hot young things irradiate their environment, making it glow pink.

This mosaic is a combination of 380 x 30 second exposures, processed on the :seestar_s30:

#space #astrophotography #Astrodon #seestar

The first predicted clear night for a while, so of course the fog closed in from about midnight.

Still, I got a dozen or so exposures on Comet 10P/Tempel 2 from the rooftop before conditions got too bad.

Behold, a fuzzy dot on a noisy background!

#seestar #astrophotography #space

Ma vidéo de la partie centrale de l' #éclipse vue par mon #Seestar avec un bug au milieu. Le vent a pas mal déstabilisé l'image aussi.
Je vais essayer d'améliorer cette vidéo quand je serai rentrée chez moi...
https://youtube.com/shorts/TO8DfWtUJbM?is=trmhRhRZnZNHgmy8

Well there's a lesson in persistence. The galaxy NGC 300 with just under 3 hours of total exposure time (and some Moonlight) vs NGC 300 with just over 12 hours of total exposure times (mostly with no Moonlight).

As always taken with the TMMT (Seestar S30 Pro) from suburban Sydney (Bortle 7), and processed in Siril with SyQon, GraXpert and VeraLux scripts.

#TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography

I got a bit more exposure time on the Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex tonight and then reprocessed all the data.

This 4 panel mosaic now has a total of about 19 hours of exposure time with my Seestar S30 Pro in it, shot from suburban Sydney (Bortle 7). All processing in Siril with SyQon, GraXpert and VeraLux scripts. Orientation is north right, east left because it fits on computer monitors better that way.

At this point I think I'm going to call this done, at least for the near future. To do appreciably better with the Thirty Millimetre Telescope I think I'd need to get a *lot* of exposure time from a darker site.

Full resolution here: https://drhotdog.smugmug.com/Nature/Seeing-Stars/i-nLFdZKq/A

#Astrophotography #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #TMMT #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Siril #SyQon #GraXpert #VeraLux

Vaya dos fotones ha sacado @eolica de fotogramas del vídeo grabado durante el eclipse. En nuestra zona no ha sido total sino que nos ha quedado una pequeña franja de sonrisa anaranjada. Además luego se ha solapado con la puesta de sol tras un monte cercano y las siluetas de los árboles iban asomando según se apartaba la luna.

#eclipse #eclipse2026 #eclipsesolar #astrofotografía #astrophotography #seestar #seestars30

☀️🌑🌍 Setup en place. Seulement des prises de vue au #Seestar.
Bonne #eclipse à toutes et tous !
Et partagez vos clichés 📷

I took advantage of the clear and moonless (but still light polluted) skies last night to get some more exposure time on the Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex.

For the second half of the night I did some more experimenting with using the Thirty Millimetre Telescope to go after galaxies. Most are too small to make for an interesting picture by themselves at this magnification, but with multiple objects in the field of view you can make something work.

Here's the Sculptor Galaxy with the globular cluster NGC 288, and the Fornax Cluster of galaxies.

#Astrophotography #SeestarS30Pro #Seestar #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #TMMT

Checked in to a flight to Barcelona and packed up the #Seestar S50 telescope to capture the upcoming solar eclipse. Let's see if I will be able to post regular updates here. The photo is stolen, because the luggage is already zipped up.

Right, this was a challenging image mosaic to process!

It the Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex, near the bright yellow star Antares (upper left) and Crab Globular Cluster, M4 (lower left).

It's a 4 panel mosaic with a grand total of 8 hours exposure time with the Thirty Millimetre Telescope, taken over two nights from suburban Sydney before the Moon rose. This would definitely benefit from a *lot* more exposure time (and darker skies) but this will do for now. All processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux scripts. It took a bit of trial and error to iron out the residual sky background gradients but I got most of the way there in the end. It's oriented north right, east left because it fits on computer monitors better that way.

Full resolution version here: https://drhotdog.smugmug.com/Nature/Seeing-Stars/i-hdHKKGF/A

#Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Astrophotography #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux

Well this came out better than I expected. It's NGC300 as seen with just under 3 hours of total exposure time on the Thirty Millimetre Telescope (Seestar S30 Pro), taken from suburban Sydney (Bortle 7) while the Moon was up.

Galaxies are not what this telescope is best at, but I wanted to try this one anyway as I feel a personal connection to it. It was the first target that we pointed the first "Huntsman Eye" single lens prototype of the Huntsman Telescope at during our first observing run. It is also the official deep sky object of the Golden Dragon Chinese Restaurant in Coonabarabran, near Siding Spring Observatory.

Processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux scripts.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux

Vanmorgen rond 06 uur nog een maan foto gemaakt #moon #astronomy #astro #SeeStar

Huh, the Moon doesn't rise until almost 11 pm tonight and clear skies are forecast. I have a Plan!

The Seestar is set up outside, I've taken twilight flats and checked polar alignment, and the Plan is loaded and ready to start as soon as it gets a bit darker. Going to work on a Rho Ophiuchi Cloud Complex mosaic until the Moon rises, before switching to other targets for the rest of the night.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope

And now the Prawn Nebula gets a similar treatment. For this one I had a little over 1000 30 second exposures in the bank, and put 600 of the best into the stack.

Seestar S30 Pro with dual narrowband light pollution filter, all processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux scripts.

#TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux

After much farting about in Siril I now have my version of the Lagoon, Triffid and Chinese Dragon nebulae. It's certainly different to the results from the Seestar app, and overall I think I prefer this version. Plus it's more satisfying doing it this way!

To get the best possible result I dug up all the data I had on this target (almost 1000 30 second exposures) and selected 560 of the best to stack together. Some were taken in Kurrajong with lower sky background but worse focus, while most were taken from Sydney with measurably more sky background (despite the light pollution filter) but better focus.

All processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux scripts.

#TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux

While I still think it's possible to get better results, and certainly more control, processing astrophotography images on my computer in Siril I have to admit that the latest versions of the Seestar firmware and phone app can produce some pretty good looking results by themselves. The adjustable star reduction feature makes it easy to get nice looking nebulae shots, like the Lagoon, Triffid and Chinese Dragon nebulae here from last night. I didn't even restack the images for this, it's just the live stacking result run through the app's "AI enhance" with minor tweaks to the settings.

#Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope

I had a couple of :seestar_s30: :seestar_s30: out overnight and scored some goodies. The older seestar had a problem (I think the usb cable I used was too short and it got stuck whilst tracking) on the first mosaic target, so I won’t be posting that. I am happy to ignore the few rubbish frames that caused the weird trails on corona australis.

The rest of the images turned out well though, despite the Moon and a giant pillar of light.

The Corona Australis molecular cloud (Ant Eater nebula), the Western Veil nebula, 47 Tucanae and (a small part of) the Large Magellanic Cloud.

#astrophotography #space #Astrodon #seestar

Ik heb deze foto van de maan gemaakt een dag na de volle maan #fullmoon #astronomy #astro #SeeStar

Whilst the humans were having an astronomy club meeting inside, the little robots did their bidding outside in the bitter freezing cold 🥶 🤖 🔭

#astrophotography #space #Astronomy #seestar

Oh, neat. Using the very latest version of INDI I was able to successfully connect KStars/Ekos to my Seestar S30 Pro. Full control over the mount, camera, filterwheel and focuser, with a proper sequencer.

This should give me more control over calibration and (re)focussing, amongst other things. Going to take a while to learn how to use it, though.

#Astrophotography #Kstars #Ekos #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro

The Helix Nebula.

This is more of a target for bigger telescopes really, but I have been curious about what the little Thirty Millimetre Telescope could do with it. Between last night's data and a smaller stash I'd previously taken I put a little over 8 hours worth of 30 second LP filter exposures into the stack. All processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux scripts.

It would probably benefit from even more exposure time, but the Seestar was already well into the diminishing returns domain as it was and I'm not sure it's going to get dramatically better no matter how long I go.

https://drhotdog.smugmug.com/Nature/Seeing-Stars/i-VqQVR3M/A

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux

It's clear again tonight so I felt compelled to get the Thirty Millimetre Telescope out again. I took the opportunity to do a flat field calibration using twilight flats because I noticed some residual low level radial variation in the background in the images I've taken recently. I had to redo the polar alignment as I had brought the tripod inside since the last time I used it, but that only takes a few minutes.

It's a Full Moon tonight so I'm not even going to try taking images of anything that isn't an emission nebula, the dual band light pollution filter will be in use all night long. I've decided to spend most of the night on the Helix Nebula, with the Eagle Nebula filling in the first part of the night while the Helix is too low. I'm hoping for decent seeing as my plan for both targets is to see how much resolution I can squeeze out of them given plenty of signal to noise.

#TMMT #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography

This is the nicest photo I've ever taken of a bunch of dust.

This image of part of Corona Australis includes the Corona Australis Molecular Cloud, one of the nearest star formation regions to Earth.

Turns out this is a challenging target for the Thirty Millimetre Telescope, especially when the Moon is up! I put a total of 14.3 hours of exposure time into a 3 panel mosaic and I still think I need to revisit this target with some darker skies (and better flat field calibrations) to do a better job of it. I'm calling this a work in progress until then.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux

Meanwhile I've been struggling to get an aesthetically pleasing result out of this other bunch of stars, the Small Magellanic Cloud. Plenty of data (about 8 hours 20 minutes of total exposure time) but it can't massage it into a pleasing JPEG. Maybe I just don't like the SMC.

#Astrophotography #Seestar30Pro #Seestar #Siril #SyQon #VeraLux #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope