Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

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H-Alpha
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Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by H-Alpha »

I could not resist from sharing my enthusiasm from an amazing experience and a first for me.

This season provides very few opportunities for solar photography from my veranda, so yesterday and today I tried something new. It is something that before trying it you would never believe it is possible to capture... Nevertheless, many amateur astronomers have succeeded that and some of them (including members of our forum, like Alessandro) have taken amazing shots! Therefore, I decided to try it yesterday and today.

I am referring to the International Space Station, but not when it transits the moon or sun disk. Just when it crosses your sky! It is an amazing experience with a lot of adrenaline, but fully worthy. For those who have not searched about the techniques used to capture like this the ISS, you will be amazed -as I was- to think that (unless you can built a very sophisticated custom made tracking mount) you have to TRACK the ISS MANUALLY while it moves very fast!

These are my first photos (second time I tried) made with the C8, ASI290 and IR740.
Despite a horrible seeing and crazy winds, they are fully satisfying as a start.
2021-12-09, ISS, Celestron 8, ASI290, 16_21 to 16_24 UTC.jpg
2021-12-09, ISS, Celestron 8, ASI290, 16_21 to 16_24 UTC.jpg (256.48 KiB) Viewed 1430 times

Yesterday, I used the ASI1600 and also due to exposure longer than I should, the result was a blurry and small ISS.

The video is also very interesting to observe the rapid rotation of the ISS, but it is an AVI and I did not find the way to make it run in Flickr to import it here, so I just add the four frame animation.
Animation.gif
Animation.gif (165.55 KiB) Viewed 1430 times

People with large scopes and good seeing have achieved to capture fantastic details of the ISS. Alessandro has photographed the damage provoked to one solar panel by a meteor and just yesterday I saw photos from a C14 where an astronaut on a space walk out of the station is clearly visible!

It is really amazing how powerful tools we have!

Best wishes,
Alexandros


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by Carbon60 »

Very well done, Alexandros. I can only imagine how difficult it must be to get on target and stay on target with such a high degree of magnification. Presumably you use a well aligned low power guide scope to get a fix on the ISS.

This is something I was thinking about just the other day now we’re in the longer darker days of the winter months.

As for the video, there are many online options to convert AVIs to GIFs. It would be interesting to see the rotation in real time.

Thanks for sharing.

Stu.


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by DeepSolar64 »

Amazing work! This has to be difficult to do!!


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by Montana »

Wow!! that is a quite amazing, well done :bow :bow :bow

Alexandra


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by ffellah »

Thank you, Alexandros, great images and post.

Franco


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by EGRAY_OBSERVATORY »

For a difficult to capture ISS, you have done extremely well Alexandros.

Thanks for sharing.

Terry


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by rsfoto »

... you have to TRACK the ISS MANUALLY while it moves very fast!
Hi Alexandros,

Tracking the ISS manually is a very big achievement. Chapeaux ! Hat Off !

There is a software developed by a Canadian Guy Brent Boshart which you can download here. Works like a charm as I was one of his Beta testers ...

Some mounts allow continuous tracking and some not, but the ones who do not allow continuous tracking can be used in Leap Frog mode and it works good.


https://www.heavenscape.com/


regards Rainer

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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by marktownley »

Very nice!


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by MapleRidge »

Excellent captures Alexandros :bow

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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by H-Alpha »

Thank you all Stu, James, Alexandra, Franco, Terry, Rainer, Mark, Brian for your nice comments.
Carbon60 wrote: Fri Dec 10, 2021 7:36 am I can only imagine how difficult it must be to get on target and stay on target with such a high degree of magnification. Presumably you use a well aligned low power guide scope to get a fix on the ISS.
Thanks Stu. Yes, a crucial step is to align very well the guide scope with the main scope. However, it is impossible to stay on target manually! All you need to do is to make the target pass from the cross-hair of the guide scope once and then again and again as many times as you can and have the time before the ISS reaches the horizon. I think the maximum consecutive frames I could have with the ISS in them was never more that 10-15. With a Barlow this drops to some 5-6... watching the capture a posteriori is very funny. You see something like a mosquito or other insect passing from the screen very fast and with a very peculiar trajectory. ;-)

I converted the AVI to GIF, but probably because the quality of the original image is already low, the final GIF comes out with very poor quality.
rsfoto wrote: Fri Dec 10, 2021 4:50 pm
There is a software developed by a Canadian Guy Brent Boshart which you can download here. Works like a charm as I was one of his Beta testers ...

Some mounts allow continuous tracking and some not, but the ones who do not allow continuous tracking can be used in Leap Frog mode and it works good.

https://www.heavenscape.com/
Thanks a lot Rainer for this! You opened a new window for me. ;-)
It seems very promising and I will try to learn the software and try it with the first new opportunity.
I may contact you with a PM if this is ok, to ask for some additional help if needed, since you have tested it and made it work like a charm.

Best wishes,
Alexandros


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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by rsfoto »

I hope this is not off topic

Hi Alexandros,

Well I beta tested it quite some time ago.

Look here how a Leap frog video of a satellite look alike. The videos are from July 2020

https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/350632027

and the next one is an Iridium satellite. The result of the video depends on the speed of the satellite ...

https://vimeo.com/manage/videos/350632123

Using an Alt-Azi mount is better as you have no meridian flip as you can see in my first video.


regards Rainer

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Re: Another ...indirect sunlight. Amazing experience!

Post by H-Alpha »

Thanks a lot Rainer.

I already downloaded the software and saw the tutorial videos and some examples like yours.
I am excited to try it because it will certainly improve a lot the captures of space stations.

My C8 has an old mount without GO TO, but the Lunt 130MT is on an EQ6-R Pro, so according to the tutorial it should work fine.
The main issue is that I never learned so far how to use the GO TO because from my veranda I can see very few stars. Too many buildings around.
The software you proposed to me will be one more motivation to try and achieve the GO TO.

Best wishes,
Alexandros


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