Welcome to this website about my hobby of amateur astronomy. My main interest is astrophotography from my suburban backyard in central NC. I hope you enjoy exploring my site, and please feel free to contact me with questions or comments.
Latest News
07/10/2008 Its been a wet Spring and Summer so I haven't had much time to image. I did recently aquire a one shot camera called a SXV-H9C. Its similar to my SXV-H9 but it uses a RGB Bayer pattern of the same chip so you can shoot color images with it instead of making color images from separate RGB images. My first image is of M20, taken with my Epsilon 180ED.03/10/2008 I recently added a Takahashi NJP to the collection of mounts and I've started taking galaxy images with the DBA 10 inch Newtonian. Here is one of M104.
01/28/2008 I started to play with a SkyWatcher 200mm Newtonian I picked up for cheap on Astromart. Here is a shot of the Moon and M42. So far I'm pleased, especially for the money (less than a nice Pentax eyepiece!).
12/24/2007 Happy Holidays! I've added several new images of Mars and Comet Holmes. Be sure to check out my animation of Mars and an image of a conjunction of the Moon and Mars.
12/2/2007 Despite some clouds I was able to shoot my first grazing encounter of the Moon and a star. Here is a link to the video.
11/15/2007 Added another image of 17P/Holmes I was able to take last night during a break in clouds. I also created an animation showing how the comet has grown in the past week.
11/14/2007 I have written up a overview of the setup I use to image with a Canon SLR lens.
11/14/2007 Just joined the Raleigh Astronomy Club. This is a growing group of entusiasts in the area. Looking forwards to some imaging from several of the dark sites they frequent.
11/10/2007 I have written up a howto for converting a finder scope to a guide scope.
11/08/2007 I added a new image
(or an alternate version)
of 17P/Holmes I took with a Canon 200mm f/2.8 lens.
11/02/2007 Uploaded a new image of 17P/Holmes I took Halloween night. Using wavelets I find the same sort of core structure as other observers have reported.
10/30/2007 I took a deep image of the comet 17P/Holmes and I think I resolved some tail-like structures. Its been a fun project to image this comet as I've never tried to image a comet before.
10/29/2007 I took a quick image of 17P/Holmes last night.
10/21/2007 I've been busy imaging at a dark spot in NC called Doughton Park in the mountains. I've collected enough data to keep me busy processing for several weeks. Hopefully I can start getting some images up on the website soon.
08/04/2007 I wrote a quick summary of my experiences imaging the same objects with my GSO 200mm f/4 Newtonian and TEC 140 APO refractor. I love both scopes and I was pleased with how both performed.
08/04/2007 I made a quick first pass at my first deep sky mosaic: NGC 6992. This is a set of 3 frames taken with a Canon 200mm f/2.8L lens using an Astronomik 13nm H-alpha filter. Each frame is approximately 2 hours of data.
08/02/2007 I had a chance to try out the Canon 200mm f/2.8L lens with my SXV-H9. I am very happy with the results: M13 and M8. Conditions were hazy with a bright Moon. I was mostly interested in seeing how well the stars in the corners looked with the lens wide open.
07/18/2007 My review of the GSO 200mm f/4 Newtonian appeared on Cloudy Nights.
07/17/2007 Despite the clouds I took two test shots (Vega and Altair) with a Canon 50mm f/1.8 lens on my modified Canon Rebel Xt. I stopped down the lens to f/3.5. I removed the clouds as much as possible. I mainly wanted to see how the stars looked in the corner. Focus is very sensitive - if you are off you get bad coma in the corners. Overall looks like a good lens for wide shots.
07/11/2007 I added an article about noise reduction using Pixinsight.
06/30/2007 I added several images to the Image Gallery, as well as a page comparing images of the globular cluster M3 imaged by two different Newtonians.
06/27/2007 I've put a writeup about the GSO 200mm f/4.
06/26/2007 I've spent June working with my GSO 200mm f/4 Newtonian. Its worked great with a Baader MPCC to reduce coma, and I even took some shots with a 1.5x Barlow to extend its focal length. So far its shaping up to be a nice imaging scope!
Here are some sample images: M3 M8 M16 M11.
06/03/2007 After 4 years I decided to redesign my website using CSS instead of a hammer, chisel, and stone! It will be a work in progress as I decide on colors and layout. Please email me any glitches you may see.