Wednesday 16th January 2008

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Finally I find myself between two weather fronts, after more than 2 weeks of non-stop rain I’ve had a couple of hours of almost clear sky this evening.  High cloud and a steamed up CCD cover made faint fuzzies too difficult although I did manage a few frames early on. As the clouds gathered I packed away the Atik 16ic and fetched my new un-modded SPC900NC. With the addition of a 3x barlow I turned the scope to Mars.

So here are 2 firsts for me, NGC6946 which is a magnitude 10.5 galaxy in Cepheus taken with the Atic 16ic. It’s a stack of 8×20 second frames stacked and stretched in K3CCDTools. The clouds may have parted but between the breeze and my not so good tracking most frames were unusable.

 NGC6496

My next “first” is the red planet. Previously I’ve viewed Mars through an eyepiece with a 2x barlow and barely been able to make out any surface detail, but tonight after a quick laser/barlow collimation and some lucky focusing I’ve managed a half decent image (IMHO).

Mars x2 Mars original size

Scope: 254mm Newtonian
F/L: 3600mm
Camera:     Unmodified SPC900NC

Wednesday 2nd January 2008

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Finally I got out with the new camera last night, it wasn’t the clearest of nights and by 1am there was complete cloud cover, but I managed a couple of hundred frames (FITS) which I now have to process.

The reason I have FITS and not an AVI is that K3CCDTools failed to work. I’d configured the software a few days ago and run some darkframe tests just to make sure everything was ok, but on the night it let me down. The menu let me select Atik and the camera was on the list but when I selected it the Atik control panel failed to open and the control panel icon was greyed out. I’ll have to look into this but it gave me a chance to look at ArtemisCapture which comes with the camera.

The first thing I noticed was that focusing took longer than usual, this was mainly because I’d left “auto-stretch” on which meant the image was very dark. Later I found the focus tool but I think I did an “OK” job without it.
M52 - Click for a bigger version

So here it is, the image that I’ve waited a month to see, first-light with the Atik 16ic. I was aiming North West after aligning on Deneb and after slewing star to star northwards I came across M52. The image is a stack of 9 from 12x10second exposures, stacked in DeepSkyStacker and processed in PhotoShop.

Field of View

I have an image of M52 taken with the SPC900NC for comparison but after putting the images together they are different orientations so while it’s difficult to demonstrate here it does give me a chance to show the difference in fields of view between the two cameras.

After taking 12 frames of M52 I moved around the sky for the next 5 hours, taking a few frames here and there just to see what I could see. What I hadn’t seen was the cloud coming over and it wasn’t until I went out to put the scope away that I realized there wasn’t a star to be seen with the unaided eye.

NGC457 - The Owl Cluster
I couldn’t resist taking a few frames of the owl cluster (NGC457) in Cassiopeiae which I’ve also taken with the 1004x and SPC900, but I think this is my best yet.

M1Here’s another from the same session, my best M1 so far. When you consider this was late in the session and almost certainly taken  through cloud it’s not that bad. Well at least it’s recognisable.

Thursday 27th December 2007

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I haven’t had a chance to take my new Atik16ic out for a test run yet, but I did try a dark frame and I’m a little concerned. Is it normal to see a darkframe like this?

Click on the image to see original size

This was 20 seconds with the lens cover on. I was hoping for a completely black image and was very surprised to find this light area across the image. I ran several test frames using  ArtemisCapture and this image was one of the last when the camera had been on for several minutes. The image was taken indoors, the room temperature was around 20°C any feedback would be very helpful.

Wednesday 26th December 2007

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The sky has been overcast for a couple of weeks with no sign of a break in the near future – I blame all the astro kit that people had for Christmas! (and that includes me ;) )

As well as the Atik 16IC I was surprised to have another SPC900NC under the tree which is just what I need for planetary work. Since modifying my first SPC900 I’ve found it’s great for the long exposure work but a bit hit and miss in video mode. I think this is down to me not connecting the ground of the camera to the ground of the parallel port – but that’s another story.

Anyway, in order to get the camera into the 1.25″ eyepiece tube I need to fit an adapter, which I happen to have from my first camera which is now rehoused. The process is very simple and I’ve taken some photos to demonstrate how:

premod.jpgFirstly I removed the stand from the back of the camera by gently twisting it.

removecap.jpgNext you need to remove the light grey cap which surrounds the lens.

Ease a small screwdriver into the gap between the cap and the camera body and it’ll pop out.

lensin.jpg
This picture shows the grey cover removed and the black lens assembly in place. The lens is unsrewed with your fingers, no fancy tools required.

You can see a scratch where I wasn’t too careful with the screwdriver – oops.

lensout2.jpgHere the lens has been unscrewed clearly showing the IR filter which looks pink on the back of the lens.

I’ve tweaked the image to show the CCD.

adapterfitted.jpgFinally screw the 1.25″ eyepiece adapter into the camera. Don’t forget the CCD is now exposed so if you have a cap to cover the end of the adapter now would be a good time to fit it. I don’t have a cap but my balow lens does so I leave it attached to the camera when not in use.


This is not a “modded” camera in the true sense as the circuitry hasn’t been moddified but with the simple alteration the camera is now ready to point at Mars on the next clear night.

Wednesday 12th December 2007

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Atik 16icThe Atik 16ic arrived this morning, that was quick! I’ve powered it up to make sure it works but I’m under strict instructions not to use it until Christmas.

It was cloudy earlier but has cleared a little so I’ve set the scope up in the hope that I can get a few hours imaging in tonight. I thought the Crescent nebula shots from the other night were better than expected considering 15 second subs, so I’ll be increasing the exposure and hoping for a recognisable mosaic.  I still struggle with anything longer than about 30 seconds but I’ll be autoguiding within 2 weeks, that should sort out my long exposures.

On the subject of autoguiding I’ll be using my SC1 SPC900NC and as posted previously will see if I can use the 60mm refracter I have, failing that I’ve seen some promising results with 50mm finders so I may go down this route.

I’ve just had a  quick look at the remote screen and it seems to be clouding over again .. back soon.

M4200:04 – It did clear but I stayed with the Crescent to see if I could add pieces to the mosaic I’ve been building, but there’s too much high cloud and the nebula was barely visible. About 20 minutes ago I tried to slew the scope around to the North, suffered a meridian flip and lost my alignment. A trip out to the scope gave me another idea. There in the South was Orion the Hunter clear of my neighbours roof and begging to be imaged. I quickly realigned the scope and started it taking 15 second subs. Here’s the result of 46 of those frames stacked in Registax: