Category: Blog

Apparently my image of M51 contains the Quasar SDSS J133004.71+472301.0 which is located 11.8 billion light years away. Definitely the most distant object I have captured so far that I am aware of.

Amateur Astronomy Picture of the Day (AAPOD2) July 26th 2017

2016-07-28 23:30-01:00 Clear, no moon, no wind, 12 degrees C 2016-08-02 00:00-02:00 Low clouds, no moon, no wind, 10 degrees C 2016-10-03 21:00-03:30 Some initial high clouds, some wind, 85% humidity, 5 degrees C Took some more test luminance frames on 2016-07-28, 2016-08-02 and 2016-10-03 … Continue readingASI1600MM-COOL test

2016-07-19 00:00-01:00 Clear, full moon, no wind, 10 degrees C Taken at full moon and dusk (astronomical night still a couple of weeks away) using just 5 60s unguided LIGHT exposures at -20C, unity gain with my new ASI1600MM-COOL camera 100 DARK 200 BIAS Filter: IDAS … Continue readingASI1600MM-COOL first light

On 2016-07-15 I received the new ASI1600MM-COOL camera to supplement (and in the future replace) my Canon 600Da modded DSLR. I intend to use it for acquiring luminance (and later Ha) data to be combined with RGB data acquired by DSLR. So far, I have … Continue readingASI1600MM-COOL arrived

This image was chosen as the Amateur Astronomy Picture of the Day (AAPOD2) winner 23rd of October 2015 🙂

Here are some slides (in Swedish) for a short course in astrophotography that I’m giving: DSOAstrofoto

I’ve posted a guide (in Swedish) on how to process DSLR-images with PixInsight at: Guide: Behandling av DSLR-bilder i PixInsight A rough translation in English: Here is an example of a workflow for processing DSLR images in PixInsight. Note that the workflow is supposed to … Continue readingGuide to DSLR-image processing in PixInsight posted

The first picture is a test using Pixinsight drizzle integration on the same image data as the picture below it. Although the images have been processed quite differently, there is definitely an improvement in the amount of details possible when using 2X drizzle (artificially doubling … Continue readingTesting Pixinsight Drizzle Integration

This image of the central part of Auriga containing the star clusters M36, M38, NGC1931 as well as the nebulae IC417 and NGC1907 was chosen as the Amateur Astronomy Picture of the Day today (July 20th 2014) 🙂  

After a lot of fiddling with lenses  and stray light I have finally made the adjustments necessary to reduce the diffraction spikes that have plagued the photos taken with my SkyWatcher Esprit 80ED refractor. By first removing the dew shield, a soft cloth glued around the lens chamber … Continue readingSKYWATCHER ESPRIT 80ED FIXED

The weather this winter has been awful. However, I managed a first test with my new Sky-Watcher Esprit 80ED (80mm f/5) triplet refractor telescope on Monday 17th of February. Very satisfied with the ease of use and sharp picture quality, at least compared to my … Continue readingSKY-WATCHER ESPRIT 80ED FIRST LIGHT

Took an image of M57 – The Ring Nebula before the fog clouds rolled in this Friday. To my surprise I also caught the supernova SN2013ev in the far away spiral galaxy IC1296 (225 million lightyears) which lies in sight with the much closer M57 … Continue readingSUPERNOVA 2013EV IN IC1296

I have now made some tests with the SkyWatcher SynGuider autoguider I have recently acquired along with a Celestron 80mm guide scope attached to my good old Meade 2080 8-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope. My experiences with it so far are pretty good. It can take a … Continue readingMY FIRST AUTO GUIDER

Must say I’m pleased with the behaviour of my new mount. Here is the first astrophoto with it. It’s M27 The Dumbbell Nebula, a planetary nebula in the constellation Vulpecula. The photo was taken 2012-10-09 (the first clear night since I bought the mount in … Continue readingFIRST LIGHT WITH NEW MOUNT