This is an afocal eyepiece projection image using a 25mm Plossl eyepiece, a 6 inch F/8 Newtonian and a HTC 3.2 megapixel camera phone. The first image was sharpened in IRIS, then exported into PS and sharpened/enhanced some more. The second image is maxed out sharpening, slightly overdone, perhaps. lol
Here is a makeover of M63 from data taken in 2007. I boosted the color saturation and decreased the star brightness slightly. Plus, I worked on the star-shapes to get them more round. This was pretty decent data for ISO 800 and 35 subs.
Finally, I think I got the data blended for this image as best as possible with the least amount of artifacts. Two images from a 6 inch Schmidt-Newt were combined with one of my more recent C-8 images of the galaxy. I used Registar to scale and align each of the 3 images and then blended them in PS manually.
Here’s a rework of an image with data from higher resolution images overlayed on a base image that was taken with my 200mm F/2.8 Canon telephoto lens. The overlay images were closeups of M8 and M20 taken with the TV-85 telescope.
Here’s a reprocess of data taken on Nov 28, 2014. This was 24×60 sec and 27×300 sec @ ISO 1600 taken with a C8 at F/6.3, an IDAS-LPS filter and a Canon T3 (modified.)
A closer pairing of Comet Lovejoy and the Little Dumbbell Nebula on the night of Feb 20, 2015, plus another tail disruption event was in progress.
The Canon kit lens that came with my camera sat unused for so long, I figured I should at least test it a bit for astro use. This is the second time I used it. But, no matter how hard I tried, the focus was never very good and I had to repair the misshapen stars in Photoshop.
Very windy and cold conditions, but clear and transparent. Winds were gusting to 38 mph! I was setup behind my house which was blocking most of the wind for me. Unfortunately, the trees were blocking me from shooting the comet before the moon rose. I almost went to another spot, but with the wind so bad it would have been a disaster.
Lovejoy Q2 on Jan 7, 2015, 02:33 UT (Jan 6, 2015, 8:33 PM CST). 16×120 sec @ ISO 1600, TV-85 at F/5.6, Canon T3 DSLR (stock.)