In this section you’ll find a selection of pictures taken using basic astrophotography equipment. The pictures are arranged by object and then ordered by date, with the earlier pictures first and the later ones further on. This also means that the pictures get better further down the sequence, so you’ll get some idea of how practise and experience affects the quality of the images produced.

I’ve written a short introduction to Astro IIDC as well as various other Mac OS X astrophotography programs for Cloudy Nights, and my Astronomy with a Home Computer book includes a long chapter on this topic for Mac, Windows, and Linux users. You can also read my introduction to Mac astrophotography in MacFormat magazine, issue 176.

Links to galleries

Hardware

My first webcams were the Philips ToUCam Fun and the Logitech QuickCam 3000, both USB 1.1 designs. These webcams worked well for lunar and planetary work, though of the two, the Logitech webcam seemed to consistently outperform the Philips one. These were the webcams that I used while writing the an introduction to webcam astrophotography on the Mac for AppleLust. I now use two FireWire models, the Orange Micro iBot and Unibrain Fire-i, that deliver much better performance and though a little bit more expensive than the USB webcams are probably worth the investment. I reviewed these webcams for AppleLust some time ago, and at that time had only used the iBot for astrophotography; since that time I have played with the Fire-i, and as predicted, it does a good job.

Initially, image capture on both the iBot and the Fire-i was done thanks to IOXperts and BTV. One annoyance is that it seems to be impossible to use both cameras on one computer. Because each uses their own 'special edition' of the IOXperts drivers and BTV capture program, swapping cameras seems to cause an error where the drivers and image capture program think the ‘wrong’ camera is being used and revert to their unregistered, limited functionality modes. One work around is to install and run one camera in the OS X environment and the other in OS 9, but if you want to run OS X with both, then you will need to install them on different machines.

I've recently upgraded my image capture software to Astro IIDC, a program that allows much tighter control of things like frame rates and gamma, as well as the ability to increase exposure lengths to one second without the need to modify the webcam.

Software

The programs I use most are Photoshop and Lynkeos. Other useful tools available for Mac users are Sharpest Frame and AstroYacker, both of which run on OS X. When I was writing my article on webcam astrophotography I tried out Keith’s Image Stacker for OS 9; while I did have some success with this program, I've never found the interface easy to use, and so I have tended to use Lynkeos instead if only because it is simpler and more intuitive. Yet another option is AstroStack, formerly only available for the PC, but now on the Mac as well.

It is also fun to try out some of the PC programs, such as Registax, that many astrophotographers swear by. Certainly, these are powerful programs and well worth considering even given the fact that there are several Mac OS alternatives available. Registax works well in Virtual PC 6, even with large (500+ MB) movies consisting of over a thousand 640x480 frames. It also has quite detailed instructions, and an article in Sky & Telescope (April 2004) spells out how to use the program nice and clearly.

4-day old Moon, 3/07/2003

A four-day old Moon imaged in the dusk sky using the Tele Vue 76 refractor rather than the LX 90, which meant that manual tracking needed to be used. Since the Tele Vue is on a simple alt-azimuthal mount, this invoved moving the thing up and down as well as sideways. As a result, a great deal of the footage recorded was very blurry, but luckily more than enough was collected to complete the mosaic. One other issue with the webcam used was the inability of the Orange Micro iBot webcam to reach focus in the TV 76 without using a x2 Barlow. Even so, the resulting frames covered much more surface than through the LX 90, compensating for the hassle of manual tracking. Click on the image to see a larger version of the image (348 KB).

5-day old Moon, 13/04/2005

A photo-mosaic of the Moon taken using the iBot and LX 90, using the Astro IIDC software. Click on the image to see a high-resolution version of the image (164 KB).

6-day old Moon, 19/04/2002

This mosaic of late 6-day old Moon was taken using the ToUCam and LX 90. Individual frames were taken from the QuickTime movie and pasted into Photoshop as independent layers, and the brightness, hue, and saturation of each of them adjusted to hide the joins. Converting the frames to greyscale instead of colour makes this process a lot easier by eliminating the need for colour matching. This mosaic was made from about 14 frames culled from over 200 MB of non-compressed video. Click on the image to see a high-resolution version of the image (128 KB).

7-day old Moon

A simple snapshot of a seven-day old Moon through my Tele Vue 76 refractor, taken by holding a Nikon Coolpix 3200 camera to a 35 mm Panoptic eyepiece (132 KB).

11-day old Moon

Another snapshot, this time of the eleven-day old Moon through the LX 90 SCT, taken by holding a Nikon Coolpix 3200 camera to a 24 mm Panoptic eyepiece (44 KB).

4, 5, and 6-day old Moon

A composite of the three pictures above. Click on the image to see a larger version of the image (122 KB).

Rupes Recta, 8-day old Moon, 27/04/2004

The eight day old Moon gives a great view of sunrise over the famous 110 km long Straight Wall. This is a single frame taken using the LX 90 and the Fire-i webcam. Click on the image to see a larger version of the image (200 KB).

Crater Clavius, 11-day old Moon, 23/04/2003

One of my favourite pictures of a lunar feature I'm always impressed by. Imaged using the Logitech QuickCam 3000 with the LX 90 the giant crater Clavius shows the characteristic arc of smaller craters within the main crater nicely. Click on the image to see a larger version of the image (232 KB).

Lunar eclipse, 03/03/2007

The full Moon is just starting to slip into the Earth’s shadow (umbra) in this shot, at about 21:35 GMT. The interesting thing is that while the dark region is invisible to the camera, to the naked eye, which tolerates a much wider contrast of light and dark than a camera, the dark region was clearly visible (64 KB).

Lunar eclipse, 03/03/2007

By about 22:00 GMT, the shadow covers much more of the surface, resulting in a rather eerie transition from a full Moon to a crescent Moon in the space of half an hour (52 KB).

Lunar eclipse, 03/03/2007

By 22:40 GMT, the Moon was almost entirely in the Earth’s shadow, and the effect of dust in the Earth’s atmosphere meant that the light striking the Moon was of a distinctly reddish hue. In reality, this isn’t obvious to the naked eye; all you see from looking directly at the Moon is darkness. But through the telescope (in this case my trusty Tele Vue 76) the red colour is very obvious and rather impressive (104 KB).

Jupiter, 23/04/2002

Using the LX 90, a Tele Vue Barlow lens, and the Logitech QuickCam 3000, I managed to get this nice picture of Jupiter and its satellite Io on one of my very first nights out. Both equatorial bands and the northern temperate band are clear, as is the darkening towards the poles. Click on the image to see a larger version of the image (4 KB).

Jupiter, 23/04/2002

Although using the same equipment as the previous image, this time the QuickCam 3000 webcam was set to the 'outdoor' settings, which resulted in a very different shot. To my eyes, the colours seem richer and more like the views of Jupiter seen from spaceprobes than at the eyepiece of a telescope, where it is usually a bit paler. Click on the image to see a larger version of the image (4 KB).

Jupiter, 25/04/2004

My first shot of Jupiter using the Unibrain Fire-i webcam with the LX 90. Three of Jupiter’s moons are visible, Europa to bottom left, and then Ganymede and Io toward top right. The shadow cast by Ganymede can also be seen. A fair amount of processing in Registax and Photoshop was needed here, in particular to darken the shadow of Ganymede relative to the planetary disk. One trick I used was to copy the three moons and the planetary disk to their own separate layers, allowing me to adjust each in turn, as well as the background, independently of the other layers. Click on the image to see a larger version (8 KB).

Jupiter, 27/04/2004

Another shot of Jupiter using the Unibrain Fire-i webcam. Although both the iBot and the Fire-i are FireWire webcams, the Fire-i seems to have slightly better performance under low light conditions. The Great Red Spot is obvious., but for whatever reason the temperate zone bands aren't at all clear. Click on the image to see a larger version (8 KB).

Jupiter, 27/04/2004

Another picture taken with the Fire-i, this time Jupiter's moon Io is in view. Click on the image to see a larger version (32 KB).

Jupiter, 07/04/2005

This is one of the first pictures I took using the Astro IIDC program, using the Fire-i webcam and the LX 90 telescope. At this time, Jupiter wasn't very high up above the horizon, and I was actually peering through some trees, but the arrangement of the moons with Great Red Spot was too good to miss. This image is actually a composite of two QuickTime movies; one that showed the moons nicely but over-exposed Jupiter itself, and another where the camera's sensitivity was toned down so that Jupiter could be imaged properly. Click on the image to see a larger version (16 KB).

Jupiter, 07/04/2005

Using the same footage as the preceding image, but this time processed using AstroStack 3. AstroStack did a fine job without the need for separate layers, managing to sharpen the features on Jupiter as well as brighten the moons. Click on the image to see a larger version (4 KB).

Jupiter, 07/04/2005

Taken the at about the same time as preceding picture, again using Astro IIDC, but this time with the iBot instead of the Fire-i. This image is taken from a single movie, stacked in Lynkeos. The detail on Jupiter has come out very nicely, particularly the Great Red Spot. Click on the image to see a larger version (16 KB).

Saturn, 13/03/2003

Saturn is always more difficult to image than Jupiter. Obviously it is a smaller target, and so more magnification is required, and my LX 90 doesn’t seem to work so well when the magnification is pushed up to the levels needed. Seeing is also an issue, in the towns where I live the skies just don't seem to be steady enough. Even so, I've taken a few nice pictures, and this is one of them. The Logitech QuickCam 3000 was used, set to the ‘outdoor’ lighting settings, which lent the globe a rather yellow cast.

Saturn, 13/03/2003

Using the same equipment as the preceding picture, I took this picture when the seeing got marginally better and I could increase the magnification a bit more. Although the image isn't sharp, there is still plenty of detail, with the shadow of the globe casts onto the ring being obvious, and a hint of the Cassini Division can be seen where the rings are widest. This picture was made with a stack of about thirty frames. Click on the image to see a larger version (24 KB).

Saturn, 2/04/2005

Saturn photographed using the LX 90 with the iBot webcam. This picture captures the Cassini Division quite nicely, as well as the shadow of the globe on the ring. About a hundred frames were used for this image. Also apparent is that the tilt of the rings has changed in the interval between the time this image was taken and the preceding one. Click on the image to see a larger version (12 KB).

Saturn, 2/04/2005

Saturn photographed using the LX 90 with the iBot webcam. This images was made from the same QuickTime movie as the preceding one, but instead of Lynkeos, I used Registax on Virtual PC. Click on the image to see a larger version (4 KB).

Saturn, 7/04/2005

While I had always been a bit disappointed with the pictures of Saturn taken using the standard OS X webcam software, Milton Aupperle's Astro IIDC looks to be very promising. This shot was taken using the iBot and LX 90 (with a Barlow lens). The banding on the disk and the Cassini division have come out especially nicely. Not quite got the colour balance right though. Click on the image to see a larger version (16 KB).

Saturn, 7/04/2005

The same movie as above, but processed using Registax and then tweaked in Photoshop to make the colours a bit less vivid. Click on the image to see a larger version (28 KB).

Saturn, 7/04/2005

Again using the LX 90 and the iBot, but using different settings, I seem to have obtained a rather better colour balance, but the image isn't quite as sharp. Click on the image to see a larger version (16 KB).

Saturn, 7/04/2005

The same source movie as used in the previous image, but this time I used AstroYacker to rotate the frames, and Sharpest Frame to select the fifty best frames from the movie. Lynkeos was used for processing, with about a quarter of the fifty sharpest frames rejected. Unsharp masking was then used to bring out the details. Click on the image to see a larger version (40 KB).

Saturn, 7/04/2005

The same source again, but processed using AstroStack 3. It's interesting to compare the differences between Lynkeos and AstroStack. While Lynkeos is easier to use, AstroStack probably gets the nod in terms of results. Click on the image to see a larger version (16 KB).

Saturn, 13/04/2005

Saturn imaged using the iBot and processed using Lynkeos. To the far left can be seen its brightest satellite, Titan. To make the moon stand out relative to Saturn, it was copied across to another layer and brightened much more than Saturn and the sky. Click on the image to see a larger version (4 KB).

Saturn, 13/04/2005

By using Astro IIDC to take long exposure frames, the fainter moons of Saturn can be imaged. In this picture, the colours are inverted to make the moons a little clearer. Titan and Rhea are obvious, Dione and Tethys less so. Click on the image to see a larger version (126 KB).

Mars, 16/08/2003

A shot of Mars taken with the LX 90 and the iBot webcam. At the time this image was taken, around 11:50 pm, Mars wasn't all that high above the horizon, and so because of the poor seeing conditions, I didn't use the Barlow lens, hence the relatively low magnification. The Curves tool was especially useful for brightening up some of the albedo features while darkening the background sky; with most of the planets, I find an s-shaped curve works very well. Click on the image to see a larger version (40 KB).

Mars, 16/08/2003

Taken from the same QuickTime movie as the preceding image, but processed using Registax. In both images the southern ice cap is obvious, and some albedo features can also be made out as well. The dark region running across the central region is the Sirenum Mare, with the smaller Solis Lacus to the east. Click on the image to see a version with labels pointing to the major features (16 KB).

Venus, 27/04/2004

This shot of Venus shows the phase very nicely, but otherwise not much else is visible. Although bright, the relatively low declination of this planet at dusk makes getting sharp images a challenge. On the other hand, it is so bright that the raw frames are barely any different to the final, stacked image. Taken with the Fire-i and the LX 90 SCT. Click on the image to see a larger version (20 KB).

Venus, 20/04/2007

A simple shot of Venus during the late afternoon. Taken with my Nikon Coolpix 3200 camera pointing through a 13 mm Nagler mounted on the Tele Vue 76 refractor. Not much to see except the phase.

Castor 18/04/2002

An early shot of an easy double star, in this case Alpha Geminorum. Taken using the Philips ToUCam and the LX 90.

Albireo 26/07/2002

Albireo is perhaps the prettiest of all double stars, with a bright yellow primary and a fainter blue secondary. It is a wide double and easy to see in even a small telescope. This image was taken with the Philips ToUCam with the LX 90. The magic wand tool was useful for increasing the contrast between the stars and the background, but the Curves tool was even more useful for making the blue really stand out. star, in this case Alpha Geminorum. Taken using the Philips ToUCam and the LX 90.

Epsilon Bootis 21/05/2003

Taken using the iBot camera mounted onto the LX 90 with the Tele Vue Barlow lens. This double is surprisingly tricky to see, let alone image, but on a night of fairly good seeing the faint blue secondary star was captured rather nicely peeking out from the much brighter orange primary.

Gamma Leonis 2/04/2005

A nice shot of Gamma Leonis taken using the iBot webcam and the LX 90 telescope. Because this double star is relatively bright, only ten frames were stacked to make the image. But even so, the relative size of the two components, as well as their colour, is pretty obvious.

The ‘Trapezium’ asterism in Orion 3/03/06

The “Trapezium” asterism captured using the iBot webcam and the LX 90 telescope. Around 60 frames were captured using the AstroIIDC software and then stacked in Lynkeos. Click on the image for a high resolution version (68 KB).

Partial solar eclipse, 29/03/2006

A simple digital camera shot taken through a 35 mm Panoptic / TeleVue 76 mm apo refractor combination. Cloud cover was about 60% at the time, but in this case the misty view actually adds to the drama, making a relatively unexciting astronomical event much more fun to watch. Click on the image for a high resolution version (116 KB).

Partial solar eclipse, 2/08/2008

Another quick photo of a partial solar eclipse taken with the digital camera pointing into the 35 mm Panoptic / TeleVue 76 combo. Click on the image for a high resolution version (80 KB).

Meteor Crater, Arizona 17/12/2007

Viewed from a Boeing 737 at 34,000 feet flying between Dallas-Fort Worth and Orange County. The crater itself is 1200 m across and 170 m deep. Click on the image for a high resolution version (200 KB).