Astro knowledge / Long Exposure Photography / Optics

Astrophotography: The "best" focal length

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Astrophotography has a lot of legends and rumors floating around as regards focal length of scope. Since the focal length of the scope, size of the CCD, weight of the rig, and […]

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Re: strange grayscale again

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Art Morton wrote: > J, > > Can you make a blue channel out of a green and red? That is strange > to end up without a blue. I think that […]

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Re: Gemini drift

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Art Morton wrote: > Have you gone into the Gemini Set Up? Yes, the particular settings that I think you’re interested in are: Mount Type: G11 Guide speed: 0.3 Tracking Rate: Sidereal […]

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Re: Gemini update

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Pretty impressive Jimbo, I am glad it is working out for you.

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Re: Gemini Stepper Interface

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Oh. Yes. It should just plug right to your existing motor. James —– Original Message —– From: “Jimbo S. Harris” <jimbo@jimbo.net> To: “James Lacey” <james.lacey@lazyfocus.com> Sent: Thursday, March 20, 2008 10:27 AM […]

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Observatory / Technology

Re: Auto Guiding

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At 09:33 AM 3/17/2008 -0700, you wrote: >On Mar 17, 2008, at 8:51 AM, Jimbo S. Harris wrote: >>>My money, if I had any, would have burst into flame by now at […]

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Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography

M104, The Sombrero Galaxy in Virgo

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Finally! A Virgo galaxy. I’ve had some kind of mental block about shooting in Virgo, so I finally forced myself to shoot down here. M104 is on the edge of being too […]

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Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography

M81, Spiral Galaxy in Ursa Major

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Like M42 is a “tester” object for winter, M81 is a tester object for the spring. It’s big and bright and there’s lots of detail to bring up. In addition, if well-framed, […]

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Astro knowledge / Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography / Maintenance

A tale of two images

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This is a tale of two images. These were taken on successive nights. Same setup, same exposure time, everything. The first night was unguided. … and the second night was autoguided with […]

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Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography

M64, The Black Eye Galaxy in Canes Venatici

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After 4 overseas trips in 4 months, I finally had some time to really get some time under the stars and get back to the “spring” galaxies that I’d raced to catch […]

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Techniques

Polar Alignment Calculations

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Here’s a page that derives Polar Alignment Calculations. (update 5/2020: the original site is gone, so I found the text on Wayback and am inserting it below. This is by the original […]

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Gear / Observatory / Telescope

Special Guest Star takes the mount at Hilltop O

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The Astro Jedi needed somewhere to store his light sab—- I mean, bucket, and I was only too happy to accommodate him. I have decided that I need to come to a […]

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General / Maintenance / Observatory

Dome shutter is motorized again!

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I finally decided to bite the bullet and fix the shutter motor. Things went sideways last winter, and I’ve been opening the shutter manually (and tying it shut with rope, so we […]

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ATM

Trixie 2017 – tube mods

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I finally got around to cutting the MTA-UTA tubes to length; the only eyepiece that would come to focus with the focuser spacer in place is the Televue 55mm Plossl. If I […]

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