Wowza! Cool pics!


That ocean --- it's so...so pacific!

My Thanksgiving dinner at the old sewage lagoon. Watching the sun start to drop

beautiful day here today

Some of my latest astrophotography done over the Thanksgiving weekend.



http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...1-25-11_02.jpg

Very nice. You had some clear skies.

What's your setup? Apologies if you've told us before.

No problem Glatt. I use my Canon PowerShot SX20IS in manual mode and take about 10 light frames at 15 seconds each, ISO of 800 and aperture of 2.8. I also take 10 dark frames (same settings as light frames with lens covered) and 10 bias frames (lens covered and fastest exposure you can with the camera). After downloading, I import them into Deep Sky Stacker (http://deepskystacker.free.fr/english/index.html) to stack them to bring out the details. That's it. No photoshop...don't even own it.

Here are the other two from that night...


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...1-25-11_01.jpg


http://i184.photobucket.com/albums/x...1-25-11_03.jpg

So when you stack them, that will subtract a lot of the noise from the consumer grade sensor? I've got a similar camera, and may try that. The night sky doesn't get very dark here though.

Yes, exactly Glatt. The DSS will average the dark frames and bias frames and create a master dark and master bias. DSS will then use those and the light images to create the image.

Having a lot of ambient light will definitely not help. The best thing to do is find a dark area away from the city on a night where there is a new moon. Moonlight will kill you. Once your eyes adjust, look for interesting areas of the night sky that appear to have smudges of the Milky Way and concentrate on those. Ten photos of each area should be fine. Then, take your 10 dark frames and 10 bias frames and you're done. Then, just download them and use DSS.

I thought the rain on the red leaves were pretty, so I took a pix.

As ever, wow to all posters since I last said wow.
Glatt - that shot of teh krazy kids needs to be framed.
Sarge - such a beautiful photo. Such a prosaic caption. I hope you were joking. Thanksgiving is nothing to me but I hurt on your behalf if you were alone with a Sub for company. But that was last year and maybe I've alrady said that?!

V - I like that the warning is at the top of the stairs. So no-one can bitch and moan if they make it down but can't make it back up again. You Were Warned.

DMG - beyond my understanding. But beautiful.

Lola, I have put my camera back in my bag.
The other day walking to school it was early enough and cold enough that the sunlight hadn't touched the raindrops from the night before. Every twig was decorated. I saw close to 10 photo opportunities. Sigh. Glad you caught that one, it's so pretty.

I offer Bullitt's thanks.

Went for a drive w/Momdigr the other afternoon, caught this at 60 mph...

Attachment 37059

So, at teh BurgerKing drive-thru the other night the infant at the cash register said to me "I'll have to give you a gold dollar. Is that ok?" And, since the only thing better than money is gold money, I said "Sure.", expecting Sacagewea to be rattling 'round in mah pants.

Instead, I got John Adams.:yelsick:

Attachment 37878

From my late January trip to the UK. We spent 2 weeks in Wales and a week in London when it snowed. I head back in a month for a 4 week trip. :)

1. I had a window seat in first class as we approached Ireland at Sunrise.
2. We stayed in Saundersfoot where I took long walks on the beach. 3. Pentra Ifan, the ancient burial chamber.
4. It snowed in the Brecon Beacons.