#tmmt — Public Fediverse posts

One thing I checked out with the Seestar last night was the Rho Ophuici Cloud Complex. I only managed to get just over half an hour of images before the clouds appeared, and the Moon was certainly not helping either, but taking the look at the data now I can already see the potential.

Definitely need to revisit this next time I have clear skies, preferably without scattered Moonlight, ideally with less light pollution too (can't use the light pollution filter on this). It's going to need a lot more exposure time and, I think, a 4 pointing mosaic in order to get the whole cloud complex in frame.

Removing background gradients is really challenging here because there's so much stuff! There's gas and dust almost everywhere so there's barely any truly empty sky to measure the background in. That makes it especially important to minimise background gradients in the data to begin with, i.e. take images close to zenith and with no pesky Moon nearby.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

One thing I checked out with the Seestar last night was the Rho Ophuici Cloud Complex. I only managed to get just over half an hour of images before the clouds appeared, and the Moon was certainly not helping either, but taking the look at the data now I can already see the potential.

Definitely need to revisit this next time I have clear skies, preferably without scattered Moonlight, ideally with less light pollution too (can't use the light pollution filter on this). It's going to need a lot more exposure time and, I think, a 4 pointing mosaic in order to get the whole cloud complex in frame.

Removing background gradients is really challenging here because there's so much stuff! There's gas and dust almost everywhere so there's barely any truly empty sky to measure the background in. That makes it especially important to minimise background gradients in the data to begin with, i.e. take images close to zenith and with no pesky Moon nearby.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

Bonus astrophotography! I though I was done for the next little while as I was expecting there to be enough cloud tonight to ruin any plans I made, but as it turned out it was completely clear for the first half of the night. So I improvised and managed to get a good 4-ish hours on the Running Chicken Nebula and Pearl Cluster, then just played around in interactive mode looking at some different sorts of targets, getting ideas for the future.

That included my nemesis the Moon, which has been up and brightly illuminating the entire sky for most of every clear night that I've had since getting the Seestar 4 weeks ago. That is why up until now I've concentrated almost exclusively on emission nebulae that I can use the light pollution filter with.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

Bonus astrophotography! I though I was done for the next little while as I was expecting there to be enough cloud tonight to ruin any plans I made, but as it turned out it was completely clear for the first half of the night. So I improvised and managed to get a good 4-ish hours on the Running Chicken Nebula and Pearl Cluster, then just played around in interactive mode looking at some different sorts of targets, getting ideas for the future.

That included my nemesis the Moon, which has been up and brightly illuminating the entire sky for most of every clear night that I've had since getting the Seestar 4 weeks ago. That is why up until now I've concentrated almost exclusively on emission nebulae that I can use the light pollution filter with.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

Since my telescope was still running when I got up this morning, and the skies were still clear, I did take the opportunity to snap a few pictures of the day star, too.

It's a not a fantastic solar telescope but it does alright for its size. Slightly better results would be achievable by saving raw video and applying the the standard planetary imaging workflow of stacking and sharpening in AutoStakkert!, Registax, whatever but I'm spending enough time processing the night time data so I'm content to just use the in-telescope processed stills.

Word on the street (well, Seestar FB group) is that using Baader Astrosolar film instead of the included solar filter also helps. I think I've got some of that in the cupboard somewhere.

#Seestar #Seestar30Pro #TMMT #ThirtymilliMetreTelescope

This, meanwhile, is a preview. The Large Magellanic Cloud is only just rising high enough to take images of right at the end of the night, plus the Moon is currently almost full which pretty much forced me to use the light pollution filter with everything. I will return to this in a few months when I can hopefully get lots of time in better conditions, and I can try imaging it without the light pollution filter too.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

The Eagle and its Nest.

This is what my telescope has been spending most time on for the last couple of nights, 9 hours in total. It's the Eagle Nebula, M16 and, below (north) of it, is something the Seestar app calls "NGC 6604 - Nest Nebula".

As far as I can tell it would be more accurate to refer to the nebula as Sh 2-54, NGC 6604 is the star cluster near the centre of it.

Edit: I wasn't entirely happy with the processing so had another stab at it. It's better now.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

That's better. I'm going to call this done now.

"Eta Carina in Context", all shot with the Thirty Millimetre Telescope (Seestar S30 Pro) from suburban Sydney (Bortle 7), mostly during full Moon, using the built in light pollution filter. Processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux.

50% scale version in this post, full resolution (6047×3411) here: https://drhotdog.smugmug.com/Nature/Seeing-Stars/i-RXPkcWj/A

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

That's better. I'm going to call this done now.

"Eta Carina in Context", all shot with the Thirty Millimetre Telescope (Seestar S30 Pro) from suburban Sydney (Bortle 7), mostly during full Moon, using the built in light pollution filter. Processing in Siril with SyQon and VeraLux.

50% scale version in this post, full resolution (6047×3411) here: https://drhotdog.smugmug.com/Nature/Seeing-Stars/i-RXPkcWj/A

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

The Thirty Millimetre Telescope is back outside and cooling down, tonight's Plan has been prepared, and now it's just a matter of waiting for it to get dark.

I will check the polar alignment before starting the plan just in case, but I have found that as long as I don't move the tripod I can detach and reattach the telescope without needing to realign it afterwards.

#Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope #TMMT #Astrophotography

I'm still considering this a work in progress for now, but it's looking promising!

It's a mosaic of the area around the Eta Carina nebula put together from three pointings from tonight, plus a deeper stack of Eta Carina that I already had. I had to crop the combined image just a little more than I'd like due to some gaps, so I'll take some more data at the start of tomorrow night to fill those in.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #Seestar30Pro #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope #TMMT

The weather forecast is promising two completely clear nights in a row so I made sure to get home just as it got dark and quickly set up my telescope. I already had a plan ready for it to execute so it should now run for the rest of the night fully automatically.

#Astrophotography #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #ThirtyMillimetreTelescope #TMMT

All those images are done processing now so here's the result from last night in suburban Sydney: the Lobster and Cat's Paw Nebulae.

Just over 8 1/4 hours of total exposure time on the Seestar S30 Pro with light pollution filter, Bortle 7 skies + some moonlight, processing in Siril.

#TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography #Siril

All those images are done processing now so here's the result from last night in suburban Sydney: the Lobster and Cat's Paw Nebulae.

Just over 8 1/4 hours of total exposure time on the Seestar S30 Pro with light pollution filter, Bortle 7 skies + some moonlight, processing in Siril.

#TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Astrophotography #Siril

And here is the end result: The Fighting Dragons of Ara.

This was definitely undercooked with just the images I took on the 12th June, but with the addition of lots more data from last night I'm happy with this now. In the end I had a total of 998 30 second exposures from the Seestar, 858 of which I allowed into the stack for a total exposure time of 7 hours 9 minutes.

Shot with my little Seestar S30 Pro in suburban Sydney using the Light Pollution filter, and processed in Siril with a mix of built in functions and VeraLux scripts.

#Astrophotography #Astronomy #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Siril #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope

And here is the end result: The Fighting Dragons of Ara.

This was definitely undercooked with just the images I took on the 12th June, but with the addition of lots more data from last night I'm happy with this now. In the end I had a total of 998 30 second exposures from the Seestar, 858 of which I allowed into the stack for a total exposure time of 7 hours 9 minutes.

Shot with my little Seestar S30 Pro in suburban Sydney using the Light Pollution filter, and processed in Siril with a mix of built in functions and VeraLux scripts.

#Astrophotography #Astronomy #Seestar #SeestarS30Pro #Siril #TMMT #ThirtyMilliMetreTelescope