Archive for category Astrophotography
The Apennines Mountains
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Moon on May 25, 2026
Taken using my 150mm Rumak-Maksutov and the same ZWO ASI 432MM camera I used for the previous Sun picture.
I added a 2x Televue Barlow in the imaging train.
Taken on 2026 May 25th at 4:12 UTC.
It was processed in Photoshop from two pictures, each stacked from about 500 frames.
About the Image
This view looks across the eastern shore of Mare Imbrium. The Montes Apenninus — the lunar Apennines — form the rugged range sweeping across the lower half of the frame, marking the southeastern border of the mare. A few landmarks worth picking out:
- Archimedes — the large, smooth-floored crater near the centre, at the northwestern foot of the Apennines.
- Aristillus and Autolycus — the pair just above and to the right of Archimedes, with Aristillus showing bright ejecta and central peaks.
- Cassini — above and right of centre, recognisable by the smaller crater sitting on its flooded floor.
- Plato — the dark-floored crater at upper left, on the northern shore beside the terminator.
- Vallis Alpes (the Alpine Valley) — the straight cleft slicing through the Montes Alpes near the top.
- Aristoteles and Eudoxus — the prominent crater pair along the right edge.
Sun Observation – 2026-05-24
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Sun on May 25, 2026
Taken at 20:05 UTC on 24th of May 2026.
Captured in H-Alpha using my William Optics 60mm refractor with a Daystar Quark filter and a ZWO ASI 432MM camera. The final image is a mosaic of 4 panels, each stacked from about 500 frames.
North America & Pelican Nebulas
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Deep sky objects on October 7, 2024
ZWO Redcat 70mm with Radian quad-band filter and MC 2600 Asi Camera on 2nd of September 2024 – Concord CA
- 26 light frame 40 sec
- 8 dark frame 40 sec
- 17 Bias
- 30 Flat frame 1 sec 2 sec 3 sec
- Bin 1×1
The stacking was done using the ZWO stacking software and additional processing was done with PixInsights.
5th of June 2012 Venus Transit
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Planets, Sun, Uncategorized on September 3, 2018
The next Venus transit will be in December 2117… I took these pictures with my Coronado 90mm H-Alpha telescope in June 2012. You can get more information on this historical Venus 2012 transit on the Nasa web site.
Below is a picture of the first contact on the 5th of June 2012, at 3:07 PM PDT at San Bruno CA. The disk of Venus can be guessed in the mid-section.
A non-processed movie of the entry of Venus can be see below. It shows the first minute of the entry of the disc in front of the Sun.
The next picture was taken at 3:22 PM PDT. The Venus’ disk is clearly visible at this time. There is a large solar filament on the top of the image.
Later at 5:59PM PDT Venus is making its progression on the Solar disc. Solar spots can be seen on the left side of the Venus’ disc.
Monkey Nebula (NGC 2174) with SVR90T in Narrow band
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Deep sky objects on March 9, 2011
Location: San Bruno, CA
Telescope: Stellarvue SVR 90T with Stellarvue Field flattener on Takahashi NJP-Z Mount
Camera: Qhy9 CCD with Astronomik H-Alpha 12nm Filter and O-III 12nm Filter
The color picture is a “HOO” Narrowband picture:
- H-Alpha: red channel – 16 exposures of 480secs.
- O-III: green and blue channel – 21 exposures of 480 secs.
On the left, the H-Alpha image, on the right the HOO composite image. Note the Monkey nebula emits mainly in H-Alpha only the central parts of the nebula glows in the OIII band.
Saturn “Serpent Storm” with Celestron EdgeHD 11″
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Planets on March 2, 2011
Date: 2/27/2011 at 2.23am PST
Location: San Bruno California
Telescope: EdgeHD 11 with DMK 21AU04.AS Camera and Siebert Barlow 2x
Seeing: 6/10
Image Processing: Frame stacking: AVI Stack, Image composition: Photoshop CS4, Astra Image Wavelet plug-in, Noise Ninja
This is one of the first pictures taken with my new Celestron EdgeHD 11″. The seeing was above average – but not excellent. Visually at x450, Saturn was impressive, with a great contrast on the Cassini division, and details easily visible on the north band (the great north band disturbance famously called “serpent storm”).
The 11″ of aperture here made a huge difference with previous images taken with my Mak Cassegrain 7″, not so much in terms of pure resolution (limited by seeing) – but in terms of image brightness. I imaged at f/d 25 – I should have imaged at f/d 37 with the Mak Cassegrain to achieve the same image scale. I was able to take most of the frames at 1/10 sec. or below, to capture moments of best seeing. This is a composite image made of roughly 2,500 frames shot in about 6 minutes. Capturing Saturn’s satellites up to magnitude 12 on the luminance frame was fairly easy – even though each frame was 1/20sec of exposure for the luminance layer.
Saturn satellites from left to right:
- Dione : magnitude 10.5
- Enceladus: magnitude 11.9
- Rhea: magnitude 9.9
- Thetys: magnitude 10.4
This is a set of three images taken during this imaging session showing Saturn’s rotation…
Jellyfish, Cone and Rosette Nebulae in H-Alpha with SVR90T
Posted by jmeriaux in Astrophotography, Deep sky objects on February 10, 2011
Location: San Bruno, CA
Telescope: Stellarvue SVR 90T with Televue x0.8 reducer on Takahashi NJP-Z Mount
Camera: Qhy9 CCD with Astronomik H-Alpha 12nm Filter
Even with the short focal ratio (f/d 5.6) obtained with the televue reducer, I had to apply 2×2 Binning and take a fair amount of exposure to get details in the Nebulae.
The H-Alpha filter does wonder to combat light pollution, even though the FWHM of this filter is not very narrow (12 nanometers).
Some words about the combination of Stellarvue SV 90T and televue reducer. I had to find the best distance between the CCD chip and the reducer / flattener. Initial trials with a distance of 58mm were not successful. Then 55mm of distance between the CCD chip and reducer/flattener seemed to yield better results.
My tests were done with the Qhy9 having a relatively small sensor (15mm x 19.7mm) – and even with this sensor size stars were not perfectly round on the egdge.
That’s why I am not sure if the televue 0.8x reducer/flattener is a good match with the Stellarvue SV90T for large chips. But at least in my case it turned out fine. On the other hand, the Stellarvue flattener gives perfect flat images with round star till the edge with an APS-C size sensor … but … the F/D is still at 7, making it more difficult to image faint extended objects. That is why I opted for the Televue reducer for this set of images, even though it does not produce a perfect flat field with this telescope optics.
Jellyfish Nebula (IC 443 or Sharpless 2-254) – 01/28/2011
Cone Nebula / Christmas Tree Cluster (Sharpless 2-273, Ngc 2264) – 01/28/2011
Rosette Nebula (Caldwell 49, Sharpless 2-275) – 01/22/2011
Astrophotography in Urban Environment 
