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Kevin Earp

@astrokev.bsky.social

4.1K followers 210 following 2.2K posts

Astrophotography, wildlife photography, art and occasional random stuff. Paint the soul, never mind the legs and arms

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Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · Nov 9

The Great Orion nebula and the Running Man nebula. Another image from the recent Kelling Star Party.

Can't remember why, but I only took 36 mins of data, which is way too short, but turned out better than I expected

Can you see the running man?

#astronomy 🔭

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 10h

I find lining the images up with the wire frame can be really tricky, especially for Mars, which can be more luck than judgement!
The sim generator tool is useful

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 14h

Cheers Martin. It's certainly been a while 😄

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 18h

👍

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

Saturn is a little wobbly tonight.
Phone video of my monitor taken during a 180 sec video sequence
🔭

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

Reprocessed my recent Saturn pic, using a larger number of video frames to stack.
It's reduced noise a fair bit compared to my first go, which has helped me sharpen it a bit more.
A bit happier with this one.
Dark line across the disk is the ring shadow. Bright line under this is the ring itself
🔭

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

Go for it 👌

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

It can be a problem!

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

More luck than judgement I think!

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

Cheers Dave. Yup, there's too much to go for for sure!
I need to try the comet!

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 1d

My first try for Saturn since last year. It took a while to set up my scope for this. I'm feeling very rusty!
The rings are narrowing with their South face tilted towards us; they'll be nearly edge on around the end of November.
It feels good to be doing planetary imaging again 🙂
🔭

Saturn, showing its wonderful ring system which are nearly edge-on as seen from here on Earth. The shadow of the rings can be seen as a dark line across the centre of the planet

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 2d

Other associated programs used - Autostakkert and Winjupos. Lots of apps are available for processing the final stacked image

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 2d

Ok.
The "approach" I use is very common in planetary imaging. Basically - taking video of several thousand frames (using in my case Firecapture. Other capture programs are available eg Sharpcap).
The "best" frames are then identified and stacked together and sharpened.
Google "lucky imaging".

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 2d

To be honest, I've no idea what you are trying to understand. "The approaches used in this".
What is "this"?

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 2d

Firecapture is, in essence, just a video recording program. Has some good tools to help with this but the main functionality is fairly simple. Probably not as fancy as you suspect

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 3d

Imaging Saturn for the first time in nearly a year.
I'm so rusty operating Firecapture! Will take a while to get used to it again.
This pic shows a defocused Saturn on the big monitor, and the view through my guidescope on the tablet to help find the planet
🔭

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 3d

Beautiful image

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 5d

Thanks.
Soul is on the to-do list!

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 7d

A lovely target at this time of year, the Heart nebula. IC 1805.

Taken over 6 sessions during the last month. Processed in the false colour SHO "Hubble" palette to show the distribution of different gases that make up the nebula.

Total integration was just over 15 hours.
🔭

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 8d

Cheers mate 👍

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 8d

Not familiar with that. Will take a look 👍

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 8d

😄

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 8d

Does anyone else see a face in here? 👀
Close-up of the middle of the Question Mark. 11 hours in SHO.
🔭

Glowing clouds of hydrogen and oxygen, with a bit of sulphur thrown in too.
Processed in the SHO Hubble palette. This produces a false colour image, often used in astrophotography to more clearly show the distribution of gases in the nebula.

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 8d

Rework of my Question Mark nebula image.
I've removed some of the more skewed subs, which has given a wider field of view, and have been more careful stretching the O3 data to bring out more detail.
Sometimes its beneficial to revisit images!
🔭

Question Mark nebula. 11 hours total integration.
A rework of my last image!

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 10d

Actually, I do see it now haha! It's the human condition to find faces in abstract shapes and patterns! Good spot

Kevin Earp @astrokev.bsky.social · 10d

Struggling to see it myself, to be honest 🤔