AstroWorldCreations
Distant galaxies, colourful nebulas and iconic planets.
This website is dedicated to amateur astrophotography, its equipment, techniques, processing and workflows.
A resource and inspiration for anyone interested in astronomy and photography.
Recent Blog posts
When processing OSC images several colour artefacts keep coming back. In most cases it is not very difficult to remove them in post-processing. In this blog some tips and tricks with examples and workflow on how to remove some of them.
After six years of imaging from my backyard, the decision was made to move one of the rigs to a remote hosting site. In a number of blog-posts you can follow along on this journey. Part 1 is about goals, site selection and hard- and software. Part 2 is about design and remote controlling tools while in part 3 everything was put together and tested. This Part 4 is all about moving to and installation at the remote site, calibration and first light.
After six years of imaging from my backyard, the decision was made to move one of the rigs to a remote hosting site. In a number of blog-posts you can follow along on this journey. Part 1 described the goals, site selection and general considerations around software and hardware. Part 2 focused on the design and tools used to control the rig and how to do that remotely. Part 3 will show how everything has been built and tested. The system is now ready to be shipped.
After six years of imaging from my backyard, the decision was made to move one of the rigs to a remote hosting site. In a number of blog-posts you can follow along this journey into the unknown. Part 1 was about goals and site selection. Part 2 describes the design and tools used to control the rig and how to do that remotely.
After six years of imaging from my backyard, I have decided to move one of the rigs to a remote hosting site. In a number of blog-posts you can follow along on this journey. Part 1 describes the reasons behind the decision, the selection of a hosting site, goals and some higher level consequences for software and equipment.
Making a horizon file can be labour intensive. With this app, the task is made a lot easier. In this example the information is used to create a horizon file for Astroplanner, the very versatile application to plan and record observations and imaging sessions
Traditionally telescope rigs are powered using 12VDC from bricks, wall adapters and power banks. But now that USB Power Delivery has become a mainstream solution to power laptops, screens etc, would it be any good to power an astrophotography rig? In this blog we will try to find out.
Recently the observatory was upgraded with a rolling pier. This allows a fully assembled system to be rolled-in and rolled-out the house in a fraction of the time than before. Read here my experiences with the S130 rolling pier and how it greatly improved the efficiency and productivity.
In this third and last post in a series of articales around mastering Flat Frames, we will do a comparison between Bias and Flat-Darks. Also we will look into some topics that came up following responses to the earlier two articles. Finally a cautious attempt is made to draw some conclusions.
Recent Images
Sh2-206, also called the Fossil Footprint Nebula, is a beautiful emission nebula in the constellation Perseus. It is photographed here using the Hubble palette, creating the typical blue/golden look. For processing, the relatively new NPColourMapper script was used.
Caldwell 5, or IC342, is also known as the hidden galaxy, tucked away behind the dust of our own Milky Way. Individual frames did not reveal too much detail, but stacking 20h of exposure brought out the full splendour of this beautiful galaxy.
M32 is a small dwarf satellite galaxy to its big brother Andromeda Galaxy. It is not photographed on its own, but the purpose of this image was to zoom in onto M32 itself. It is not a spectacular target, but photographed here in a closeup that is not seen very often.
M103 is a small open cluster of only 172 stars, in the constellation of Cassiopeia. It is located 9,400 lightyears from the Sun and includes some rather bright stars of magnitude 10.5. The object is photographed under full moon conditions.
M52 is an open cluster in the constellation of Cassiopeia. Star clusters like these are ideal targets to image during full moon, which is done here.
M110 is at first glance a somewhat boring galaxy, always in the shadow of its close and popular neighbour M31, the Andromeda Galaxy. The main reason of imaging was to complete the Messier catalogue. But some very small scale structure appeared to be present, which in the end made this a fun object to photograph.
Comet C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) has a long tail and can be seen without a telescope. This photo was taken on 14 October 2024, shortly after sunset when the comet was still bright before it fades as it moves further into our solar system.
M57, or the Ring Nebula, is a small planetary nebula in the constellation Lyra. Usually, only the core is captured in images, but this photo also shows the outer hydrogen (Ha) and oxygen (OIII) gas clouds. The difference is significant, so two different HDR methods were needed to achieve this result.
Arp78 is one of the 'Peculiar Galaxies' from the Arp catalogue in the constellation Aries. Tidal forces from nearby galaxies pull the arms of Arp78 into the peculiar shapes as they are.
M77 is a nice small galaxy in the constellation Cetus. It has a wide area of gaseous rings around it, most of which could be pulled out in this image, due to 20h of exposure. M77 is also listed in the Arp Catalogue, as Arp37.
Sh2-86 is a rather faint nebula in the constellation Vulpecula at a distance of approximately 6000 lightyear. Especially the OIII and SII signals are very faint. But during processing they could be retrieved well. Using the Hubble Palette, the final result is rather impressive with the big pillar structures in the nebula.
M39 is an open cluster in the constellation Cygnus. It consists of young bright blue stars and thanks to their characteristic positioning it is also referred to as the Pyramid cluster. Open clusters like this appear to be great targets to shoot during full moon periods.
The Crescent nebula, also known as Sh2-105 and C27, is an iconic deep sky object in the constellation Cygnus. In 2018 this object was imaged, so the current image gives a good idea of the progress that has been made over time.
M56 is a globular cluster in the constellation Lyra. Clusters are always a bit challenging when it comes to resolving the stars in the center. Careful stretching of both the Luminance and RGB images was key in creating the required resolution.
Latest News
Takahashi has launched two Ortho Extender sets (2x and 4x). They are compatible with most Takahashi telescopes and serve as alternatives to Barlow lenses for viewing or imaging the moon, sun, and planets.
Takahashi just released a new telescope. It is a compact 400mm f/6.2 triplet scope, that can be reduced to a 260mm f/4.0 imager. The scope is designed for astrophotography.
Astrobin, the well known hosting site for astro images, just started a Marketplace. Any Astrobin user can list his/her astrogear that is for sale.
Franklin Marek from SetiAstro has started to write scripts for PixInsight. Currently five scripts are available, but development goes very fast. Scripts follow a statistical approach for certain steps in the image processing workflow and very easy to use.
The free gradient removal tool GraXpert has added AI-based noise reduction. The tool is very simple to use, with essentially one slider to dial in the strength. For PixInsight users, the tool is now also available as a process rather than a scrip.
The AI-based tool BlurXTerminator was a revolution when it was released a year ago. Now version 2 has been released, and again the improvements are revolutionary once again. The way BXT is now able to correct for all kind of optical defects such as aberrations, coma, astigmatism, etc. is mind-blowing.
An aberration inspector to analyse sensor tilt and backfocus distance has come to KStars/Ekos. In the December release (version 3.6.8), John Evans has introduced a tool that will make properly aligning the optical train a lot easier.
GraXpert 2.0, a tool for automated background extraction, brings two important improvements. First it is now based on an AI-model, which significantly enhances the final results. Secondly, it is now available as a script right within PixInsight.
Mike Cranfield and Adam Block created a new tool to create colourful NB images. Each filter is assigned a layer with a colour rather than a channel. Layers are then blended together with a lot of fine-control, all with a real-time preview showing the final results immediately.
The Eise Eisinga Planetarium in Franeker, The Netherlands, has obtained the status of UNESCO world heritage. It is the oldest still working planetarium in the world (image © Royal Eise Eisinga Planetarium)
Images
This is what it’s ultimately all about, images of the night sky. Most are deep-sky objects, such as nebulae and galaxies. But there’s also place for objects from our solar system, such as planets and comets. Each image will have a short description of the object, as well as detailed information on capturing and processing.
Observatory
Most of the images are captured from the backyard observatory (a.k.a. garden), using a mobile setup. In this section you will find detailed information on the equipment used, practical details on the way it is setup, and the command and control systems that allow the system to run throughout the night, unsupervised.
Blog
Astrophotography involves many challenges related to the technical aspects of a high-precision instrument, the endurance of hours and hours of exposures, and bringing the images to life in processing. In this blog you will find tips, tricks and general experiences. Read just for fun, to learn or to get inspired.
Contact
It would be really great to hear from you! Feedback, comments, questions, just leave your name, email and message here, and I will get back to you shortly.
My system at the remote observatory is highly over-sampled. How bad is that, and does it make sense to bin the data? This blog will answer those questions, based on a recent image of the Crescent Nebula. This also allowed a comparison with historic and properly sampled data.