Astrophotography

Constellation: Andromeda
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: UV/IR Cut
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 119 at five minutes each (9 hours 55 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Mousing over the photo shows the Cepheid Variable star that in 1923 Edwin Hubble used Henrietta Leavitt's technique to determine the distance to the Andromeda Galaxy proving that it was not a nebula in the Milky Way but its own galaxy. This greatly expanded the known size of the universe.
This image is almost the full frame of the Esprit 100 at 554mm with the APC-C chip size of the camera.

Constellation: Orion
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 64 at five minutes each (5 hours 20 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: There's a lot more nebulosity around these that needs more data to show up. I was amazed at how well the camera showed the Horsehead (Barnard 33 Dark nebula) after one five minute frame compared to how difficult it is to see the horse head visually. The Horsehead is a cloud of dark gasses blocking out the brighter nebula behind it.

Constellation: Orion
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 85 at five minutes each (7 hours 5 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: A diffused nebula at the middle star in Orion's sword. About 24 light years across and 1,344 light years from Earth. The nebulosity extends far beyond what this image shows with hints of it visible extending out from the main nebula. This turned out to be a challenge object to photograph. The center appeared to be blown out but, thanks to 32 bit data, I was able to progressively adjust the levels and coax out the inner stars. Six subs were tossed due to satellites or jets passing through the nebula. Four due to tree branches in the image (it was taken just before setting behind a tree in my yard). Two shots were tossed due to heavy wind gusts causing the stars to elongate. On the left side is the Running Man nebula (SH2-279).

Constellation: Gemini
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 103 at five minutes each (8 hours 35 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: It looked okay with only 1.6 hours of data. Adding almost 7 hours more really helped bring out more detail.

Constellation: Eridanus
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 59 at five minutes each (4 hours 55 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: This is a faint reflection nebula just to the West of the bright star Rigel in Orion. The image suggests a right side profile of a witch's face. This was my first experiment using the L-Quad filter.

Constellation: Cygnus
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Quad & L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 63 at five minutes each (5 hours 15 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Part of the Western Veil Nebula and the Cygnus Loop. It is part of a supernova remnant that exploded more than 10,000 years ago. .

Constellation: Canis Major
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro & L-Extreme
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 102 at five minutes each (8 hours 30 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: This is one of my favorite visual objects. Under dark skies with a decent aperture the helmet is clearly visible. Closer to city lights a UHC filter often brings it out. On high humidity nights even the 18" with a UHC fail to offer a glimpse of it. The subs were taken over five nights. This is about 12,000 light years from us and about 30 light years across.

Constellation: Taurus
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Quad & L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 27 at five minutes each (2 hours 15 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: The Pleiades is a large reflection nebula about 440 light years from us. The Merope nebula is the blue particles illuminated by the star Merope (upper left bright star in the blue cloud in this image).

Constellation: Triangulum
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 22 at five minutes each (1 hour 50 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Ideally this, and all galaxies, should use a IR/UV Cut filter but I needed to block some of the local bright lights and the L-Pro filter worked.

Constellation: Cassiopeia
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro & L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 57 at five minutes each (4hours 45 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: The bubble is barely visible visually but it shows up nicely in a photo. The central star in the bubble causes the shell of gas around it to glow.

Constellation: Canes Venatici
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 46 at five minutes each (3 hours 50 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: This was a bit small for my telescope's 555mm. Fortunately with about 400 billion stars lighting up this galaxy some detail was pulled out. M63 is about 29 million light years from us and easily visible in most amateur telescopes under dark skies.

Constellation: Cassiopeia
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro & L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 56 at five minutes each (4 hours 40 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: I really forced this image out of a small sampling of data. The L-Quad data didn't offer much data and lacked contrast. I'll update this once I can add more L-Pro subs to it.

Constellation: Cygnus
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Extreme
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 12 at five minutes each (1 hour)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: At more that 10 times the size of a full Moon this is a large nebula. It's about 250 light years away from us. There's more data that needs to be captured with more frames.

Constellation: Cygnus
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 15 at five minutes each (1 hour 15 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: THius is a large and fairly bright HII region of gasses and star formation. It next to the North America Nebula. I was amazed at getting an image out of such a small amount of data.

Constellation: Canes Venatici
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM and ASI220MM cameras
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: All with L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 79 at five minutes each (6 hours 35 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: The two galaxies are also referred to as M51a (larger galaxy) and M52b and they are about 23 million light years away from us. Radio astronomy has shown that M51a and M52b are interacting with each other. M51 is a fairly easy telescope visual object.
Note the very small fuzzy patch above and to the left of M51. This is galaxy IC4278 about 55 million light years away from us.

Constellation: Orion
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM and ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Extreme
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 45 at five minutes each (3 hours 45 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Taken over three nights a few days off of a full moon. The L-Extreme filter is awesome at blocking out most of the unwanted light for emission nebula. The SH2 objects are from the second iteration of the Sharpless catalog.

Constellation: Monoceros
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Extreme
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 47 at five minutes each (3.9 hours)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Most of these subs were taken within a day of a full Moon. Fortunately a L-Extreme filter works well with emission nebula and blocked out most of the unwanted light.

Constellation: Cassiopeia
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 33 at five minutes each (2 hours 45 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: The Heart nebula is a mostly an emission nebula. The part at the far right by itself is known as the Fish Head nebula.

Constellation: Cassiopeia
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro & L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 44 at five minutes each (3 hours 40 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: The Fish Head is part of the Heart Nebula. You can see it at the right side of the heart in the previous photo.

Constellation: Ursa Major
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 64 at five minutes each (5.3 hours)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Estimated at one trillion stars the Pinwheel galaxy is about 20 million light years away from us. It has a diameter of about 170,000 light years compared to out Milky Way that has a 87,400 light year diameter. In the upper left you can see what looks like an elongated star. This is 15.3 magnitude spiral galaxy PGC 49919 (Principal Galaxy Catalog) which, the best that I can figure out, is about 103 million light years away.

Constellation: Ursa Major
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 14 at five minutes each (70 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: This nebula was brighter than I expected. I captured it about two hours before dawn.

Constellation: Ursa Major
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: 10 with UV/IR Cut and 25 with L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 74 at five minutes each (6 hours 10 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: These were a little small for the scope but since this was a couple of test nights let's do it. The galaxies held up fairly well.

Constellation: Vulpecula
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 43 at five minutes each (3 hours 35 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: A bright and popular planetary nebula about 1360 light years from Earth.

Constellation: Monoceros
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro & L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 30 at five minutes each (2 hours 30 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: A dim emission nebula with the rough shape of a bird with its wings out. This image needs many more subs to fully realize its potential.

Constellation: Ursa Major
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 66 at five minutes each (5 hours 30 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: The Owl planetary nebula is about 2000 light years from Earth. The two slightly darker areas are the owl's eyes. Messier 108 is a galaxy about 28.7 million light years from us. The owl is one of my favorite planetary nebula (PN) to look at. it often needs a UHC filter to be seen visually if you are near city lights and often appears aws a dim, fuzzy dime in the eyepiece.

Constellation: Sagittarius
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 5 at five minutes each (25 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: I was only able to get five frames in before the sun came up. There's quite a bit more nebulosity, especially around the Lagoon Nebula. Notice how many background stars there are in this photo compared to the Owl PN photo. Relative to us the Trifid is in the direction near the center of the Milky Way and the Owl is looking away from the center towards the space between galaxies.

Constellation: Perseus
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Quad
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 26 at five minutes each (2 hours 10 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Looks a bit like a footprint left in the hardened mud. This is an emission nebula about 9,800 light years away.

Constellation: Orion
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI220MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Extreme
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 37 at five minutes each (3 hours 5 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Taken over two nights two days before a full moon with the L-Extreme filter.

Constellation: Hercules
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 18 at 30 seconds each (9 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: A large globular cluster about 22.2 thousand light years from Earth. It is about 160 light years across. The usual five minute exposures blew out the center turning it into a solid white ball so the time was dropped to 30 seconds per sub.

Constellation: Leo
Telescope: Esprit 100ED with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM & ASI220MM cameras
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: L-Pro
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 27 at five minutes each (2 hours 15 minutes)
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: This is a small group of galaxies about 35 million light-years away.

Constellation: Various
Telescope: Megrez 80 SD with ASI2600MC camera
Autoguider: Williams Optics Uniguide 50mm with ASI120MM camera
Mount: Losmandy G11 with Gemini 2 mini controller
Controller: ASIAir Plus
Filter: UV/IR Cut
Location: Mid Pinellas County, Florida.
Bortle: 8+
Subs: 30 sec video with the best frames merged
Processing: PixInsight
Comment: Yes, it was taken during a full moon. Hover over it on a PC/Mac or tap on it with a tablet to see the Apollo lander locations.