Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

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Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

A couple of spectroheliograms from my short session between 13:50 and 14:25 UT today (14th) with the 72ED,Sol'Ex and Herschel wedge recorded in the Hydrogen alpha and Hydrogen beta. The only processing carried out,apart from reduction of the images,was to adjust brightness levels and rotate to correct orientation and create an inverted image of the Halpha in Photoshop CS2.

Alun

2022-11-14-1355_8-U-L-Sun_QHY5III178M_shift=0_clahe.jpg
2022-11-14-1355_8-U-L-Sun_QHY5III178M_shift=0_clahe.jpg (168.22 KiB) Viewed 1990 times
2022-11-14-1355_8-U-L-Sun_QHY5III178M_shift=0_invert.jpg
2022-11-14-1355_8-U-L-Sun_QHY5III178M_shift=0_invert.jpg (595.68 KiB) Viewed 1991 times
2022-11-14-1421_0-U-L-Sun_QHY5III178M_shift=0_clahe.jpg
2022-11-14-1421_0-U-L-Sun_QHY5III178M_shift=0_clahe.jpg (513.21 KiB) Viewed 1991 times


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

Those are looking really good. I think your wedge is giving much better resolution.

What was your exposure and gain? I ask because the noise level in H-alpha looks a little high. The H-beta noise is lower but I assume the light intensity was quite a bit higher.


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Montana »

WOW!! these are phenomenal :bow :bow :hamster:

Alexandra


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

Thank you all for the kind comments.

The exposure setting for the Ha was set at 4.403ms at a gain of 34 which equates to around 66% (Firecapture) and the Hbeta was 3.296ms at a gain of
27 which is around 52%. I am going to start using Sharpcap (I have licensed copy) since I have come to realise that in Firecapture the software changes
the overall look of the image when the various filter buttons are selected,by this I am referring to contrast/light levels as if I was selecting the coloured filters in a filter wheel ,so with the SHG I select the luminence filter setting.

Alun


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by marktownley »

Nice shots Alun and interesting to hear about your experiences of sharpcap vs firecapture.


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

Thank you Mark, I never really gave it much thought with Firecapture and the filter settings but after having tried Sharpcap the image is that much
clearer,plus Firecapture has trouble keeping up with finishing each recording but that could be to do with my Dell Optiplex desktop.


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

Alun_H wrote: Wed Nov 16, 2022 10:28 pm Firecapture has trouble keeping up with finishing each recording
I suspect what FireCapture does is keep all the data it can in the VRAM cache before writing to the computer's SSD. What I do now is at the end of each scan, I wait 5 seconds before starting a new one. I did a calculation regarding the write speed of my SSD (which is quite fast) and I think for the size of scans I typically do, I need 3+ seconds to write all the data (if in fact that's what it's doing). I used to see some strange behaviour but since I started using this new routine, FireCapture is quite well behaved. SharpCap might take a different approach in its data handling.


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by marktownley »

Interesting... I find with my laptop there comes a point (normally after several hundred Gb of recording) that FC seems to clog up. I'd suspected it was using RAM as a holding pen for the data, trcickling it through at a slower pace than it was writing to disk. I may give SharpCap a try in next years season...


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

marktownley wrote: Thu Nov 17, 2022 6:28 am I may give SharpCap a try in next years season...
The business model of SharpCap is quite different than FireCapture so updates and fixes are much more frequent. You can post issues to the SharpCap forum and Robin will typically reply within a day or so. I personally have always used FC but I may also give SC a go next year (I already paid some money so I could do testing).


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

thesmiths wrote: Thu Nov 17, 2022 3:11 am
I suspect what FireCapture does is keep all the data it can in the VRAM cache before writing to the computer's SSD. What I do now is at the end of each scan, I wait 5 seconds before starting a new one. I did a calculation regarding the write speed of my SSD (which is quite fast) and I think for the size of scans I typically do, I need 3+ seconds to write all the data (if in fact that's what it's doing). I used to see some strange behaviour but since I started using this new routine, FireCapture is quite well behaved. SharpCap might take a different approach in its data handling.

I would be recording a scan in Firecapture say left to right then on the right to left scan,on pressing the record icon I would sometimes get a window open up asking if I am prepared to overwrite the previous recording. At other times there would be a list show up in the control panel of,on average, three or four SER files that hadn't been finished and the software was catching up. I don't get this with Sharpcap as such,when the recording has ended there will be the odd moment when the frames were still being written to the file with the option of ignoring those frames. I have a Dell Optiplex 9010 with a 2Tb SSD hybrid (big capacity SSD's weren't around when I got this machine).

Alun


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

Alun_H wrote: Thu Nov 17, 2022 4:13 pm I have a Dell Optiplex 9010 with a 2Tb SSD hybrid (big capacity SSD's weren't around when I got this machine).
A hybrid drive is certainly non-ideal for this application (for large files, it will operate at the speed of an HDD). I guess it's that which creates a bottleneck for FireCapture. SharpCap may do something more clever regarding writing the files.

It's worth using the application CrystalDiskMark to really ascertain what the transfer rate is for larger files. The fastest transfer speeds are for NVMe SSD disks inside the computer, but I found that USB-C external SSD disks are almost as fast.

From my tests, a typical SATA internal SSD will give around 500 MB/s sequential write (which is what is relevant for SER files), a USB-C interface with an NVMe SSD around 1000 MB/s, and a USB3 HDD around 150 MB/s (which is limited by the HDD, not the USB3). See screenshot below for the USB-C drive.

I actually have a rather crazy way of acquiring and storing data. I write all the FireCapture files to my laptop's internal NVMe SSD whose capacity is 500 GB. That means I can hold over 300 GB for a single imaging session. Then I copy all the good files to my USB-C external NVMe SSD, which has a capacity of 1 TB. I then take this portable disk to my desktop to do further processing. I then archive all the files I want to keep longer term to a 5 TB USB3 HDD. Along the way, I do delete files that are less desirable, but I have managed to buy three 5 TB HDD in the last year so I should probably start pruning more.

1GB USB-C NVMe disk.
1GB USB-C NVMe disk.
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

thesmiths wrote: Thu Nov 17, 2022 6:36 pm

A hybrid drive is certainly non-ideal for this application (for large files, it will operate at the speed of an HDD). I guess it's that which creates a bottleneck for FireCapture. SharpCap may do something more clever regarding writing the files.

I actually have a rather crazy way of acquiring and storing data. I write all the FireCapture files to my laptop's internal NVMe SSD whose capacity is 500 GB. That means I can hold over 300 GB for a single imaging session. Then I copy all the good files to my USB-C external NVMe SSD, which has a capacity of 1 TB. I then take this portable disk to my desktop to do further processing. I then archive all the files I want to keep longer term to a 5 TB USB3 HDD. Along the way, I do delete files that are less desirable, but I have managed to buy three 5 TB HDD in the last year so I should probably start pruning more.


Drive Z.JPG
I have found a suitable SSD (Crucial) to fit inside the desktop which is around 2Tb so will be purchasing that when finances allow,but I have a 500GB SSD which I could clone and fit in the meantime to see if any difference.... Just realized my project for tomorrow :)

I too have a number of external drives for storing files,more so for my nighttime spectroscopy data that I have contributed to databases and I have to keep hold of it in case it is ever requested by the pros,then there's the imaging stuff,deep sky and planetary which I keep meaning to go through and delete :roll:

Alun


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

Alun_H wrote: Thu Nov 17, 2022 8:21 pm I have a 500GB SSD which I could clone and fit in the meantime to see if any difference.... Just realized my project for tomorrow :)
If you have a spare 500 GB SSD, you could just format it and add it to the computer (no need to clone anything). You just need an extra SATA cable (can scavenge from another computer if you don't have a spare). Use that disk for writing data to. Keep the hybrid drive as the C: drive. Use Disk Manager and add the new SSD as the D: drive. I sometimes add a new SSD into a desktop using double sided tape (no real need for a bracket).


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by marktownley »

Interesting discussion!


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

Thank you for the heads up on the disk software Douglas,I downloaded it and tested the SSD Hybrid as well as the SSD. Not really into computers as such,to be honest I hate them,so these figures are way above my head but here are the results,which to my eyes look poor for an i5 CPU

Firstly the Hybrid.
hybrid read write test.PNG
hybrid read write test.PNG (22.6 KiB) Viewed 1812 times
Secondly the SSD.
ssd read write test.PNG
ssd read write test.PNG (23.79 KiB) Viewed 1812 times
Then just for sake of testing I run it on my laptop SSD to compare (old Toshiba Satellite).
laptop read write test.PNG
laptop read write test.PNG (61.04 KiB) Viewed 1812 times
Alun


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

Your laptop looks like a typical SATA3 SSD speed (the top numbers are the ones to look at). The hybrid looks like a fast HDD, so quite normal. The SSD in the old desktop looks a little slow. This might be because the computer uses an older SATA2 interface, which is likely because the motherboard is older.
SanDisk Extreme SSD supports SATA III 6Gb/s interface and when connected to SATA III 6Gb/s port, can reach up to 550/520MB/s sequential read and sequential write speed rates respectively. However, when the drive is connected to SATA II 3 Gb/s port, it can reach up to 285/275MB/s sequential read and sequential write speed rates respectively.
More modern NVMe PCIe 3.0 SSD (like the Samsung 980) claim they can do 3500/3000 MB/s but in real world use it's probably more like 1500 MB/s.

My personal view is if you are using a USB 3.0 camera (which in theory has a speed of 600 MB/s), you should have a storage medium at least as fast (NVMe SSD preferred, USB-C SSD also good). SATA3 SSD -- maybe ok, especially if used with sufficient VRAM buffering.
Last edited by thesmiths on Fri Nov 18, 2022 9:56 pm, edited 1 time in total.


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

thesmiths wrote: Fri Nov 18, 2022 7:45 pm Your laptop looks like a typical SATA3 SSD speed (the right numbers are the ones to look at). The hybrid looks like a fast HDD, so quite normal. The SSD in the old desktop looks a little slow. This might be because the computer uses an older SATA2 interface, which is likely because the motherboard is older.
Thank you for the clarification,I did a bit more digging regarding the SATA2 interface and have found that out of the four sockets two of them are SATA3,the hybrid is plugged into one of them and the optical drive into the other,so tomorrow I will swap the drive for the SSD and run the test again to see if any difference. Failing that I'll look for a more up to date refurbished desktop :)

Alun


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by thesmiths »

Alun_H wrote: Fri Nov 18, 2022 8:43 pm I did a bit more digging regarding the SATA2 interface and have found that out of the four sockets two of them are SATA3,the hybrid is plugged into one of them and the optical drive into the other, so tomorrow I will swap the drive for the SSD and run the test again to see if any difference.
That was some good digging. The optical drive definitely does not need to be in a SATA3 slot (it's very slow). I think all the SATA2 and SATA3 cables are the same (although I'm not 100% sure of that). It's strange they would even put both kinds of SATA sockets on the same motherboard.

While you're in there, check if there are any empty DRAM slots. If there are, might be worth buying more. You can usually find them on eBay. I've done that for a few older machines. Just photograph the numbers on the front of the DRAM and get the exact same ones. Usually, they come with 2 of 4 slots filled.


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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by Alun_H »

Just to finish this by saying a big thank you to Douglas for the help in getting my computer sorted :bow

I swapped the SATA plugs around on the SSD and the optical drive and then running the read/write test resulting in a big improvement,and proving
DELL put 2x SATA2 and 2x SATA3 on the same board,they could've labelled them mind :)

ssd after switch.PNG
ssd after switch.PNG (29.52 KiB) Viewed 1764 times
Alun


Lunt 50THa solar scope
Lunt CaK B12 module
SW Evostar 72ED for full disk imaging
Sol'Ex SHG
80mm f/7 achromat used with pressure tune module off the Lunt with Lunt 100mm ERF
Bresser 90 f/10 achromat used for CaK & white light imaging & PST mod with Lunt 100mm ERF
Coronado SM40 (pre Meade) and BF10 filter set + SMII 60 richview DS etalon
Skywatcher EQ6 Pro and Ioptron CEM60
Then there is all the night kit which is far too long a list to write up here! :lol:
More images on view on my Flickr page...https://www.flickr.com/photos/alun_h/
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Re: Hbeta & Halpha spectroheliograms 221114

Post by marktownley »

That's quite an improvement Alun!


Image
http://brierleyhillsolar.blogspot.co.uk/
Solar images, a collection of all the most up to date live solar data on the web, imaging & processing tutorials - please take a look!
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