Your astrophotos

Re: One more try at the Moon

mstrozier — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 16:00:08 GMT

Thanks for the feedback guys. I do think I am getting alittle better at this :) Yes I haven't touched any of the settings on the cam's software. Contrast/brightness are all at the default setting of 50% each. I'll do some more testing when I can and see if I can reduce this even more.

Here is a pic of the cam itself (pulled from a website) followed by it's specs. I only paid like $30 for it new when it was out several years ago.

The camera has poor picture quality from many reviews.

Quality CiF (352x288) CMOS webcam
Video capture: 640x480 pixels (SW enhanced)
Still image capture: 640x480 pixels (SW enhanced)
Frame rate: Up to 30 frames per second

Re: One more try at the Moon

Kevin Bozard — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 13:53:51 GMT

Nice beginning shots Mstrozier. Here's one I took while playing around with my Toucam III and my 10" dob. This is one frame pulled from an avi of 500+ frames. I was playing around with the camera and dob just to see what I could capture before the clouds rolled in.

Re: One more try at the Moon

meade man — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 12:56:27 GMT

Hi Mstrozier like chris said i too can see improvements happening in your shots, you mention getting a better camera, and i think if you want major improvements that is a good idea, As for getting a focal reducer unless your goal is to take mainly low magnification wide feild shots of the moon, its really not needed.Any high mag shot will always reduce the area of the moon seen, ( in some of my high mag shots only one crater is seen) but the detail at that high magnification allows that one crater to be seen in a way that is impossible with low mag wide feild shots,

You can increase the area seen on the moon at high mag if you film different segments of it, and then join the peices together with software like Imerge,( this is something i want to do) but i havent learned how to yet. So if you want low power views of the moon by all means a focal reducer will work, but if you want high resolution closer views of craters it will not. Its hard to tell by looking at your images how good the webcam your using is ? i do think you are over exposeing the captures, either by haveing gain, exposure, or brightness (probably gain or exposure ) set to high,

Try reducing these settings untill the moon looks much more grey ( not white) basically you need to darken the image ( though not too much) using filters to do this is only part of the picture, because even with filters in place, unless you get the settings right, the moon can still appear much too whited out, ( which i think is whats happening here)

With a philips webcam your 5 inch celestron could be made to produce some quite remarkale low, and high power shots. But learning to control the glare of the moon ( using the webcam settings not just a filter) is a big part, in the art of good lunar photogtaphy, So experiment with reducing these settings with the cam you have now, when you fully understand how to control the light levels ( whited out glare) when you get your new webcam you will be halfway there, Then a stack of only the sharpest frames, will give you the results you want good luck Neil

Re: One more try at the Moon

DarkStar72 — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 06:26:19 GMT

Keep at it, I am already seeing improvements from your first tries at it!

Re: One more try at the Moon

mstrozier — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 02:38:34 GMT

hmmm wonder why the larger photo when clicked will not, well open enlarged. :\

*on edit*

Figured it out.

One more try at the Moon

mstrozier — Mon, 02 Oct 2006 02:37:00 GMT

Ok I managed to rig up my modded quickcam with a moon filter. Spent a couple of hours working this. Was quite interesting :) Never ceases to amaze me looking at the moon.

I first tried to look at Jupiter but time was short. Jupiter is far to low in the horizon now for me to do any testing with. :( Oh well. I was able to look at it breifly with a 12.5mm ep and spot 4 of it's moons. No color in Jupiter though, although I didn't give my eyes time to adjust either.

Well, here is what I've done so far with the Moon tonight. Still working on other images as well. I recorded 4 avi 10 to 15 minutes for each. Each photo is 100 frames or less out of the 15 minute recording. When I try to use the slow motion controls, the video screws up. Believe it's the camera, considering it was never meant to photo the moon haha.

Normal pic

Picture enlarged 200%

Picture small 25%

I will have to both invest in a better camera along wth a focal reducer I believe. I could not capture the moon as a whole. Only parts as it appeared too big :)

All photos were taken using the Celestron Powerseeker 127mm (5")