Second Light of H-alpha filter

After arriving from a tiring trip abroad, I managed to test again the H-alpha filter on the Rosette Nebula. This time I tried to increase the exposure duration to 120 minutes, my longest so far. It's amazing how much more details can be realized by increasing total exposure time.

First Light - Astronomik Ha filter

I was able to acquire a H-alpha filter with the help of Mr. Brian Davis who hand carried it from the U.S. I was thinking that somehow I can take advantage of the few clear nights at home to do a bit of astrophotography. The sky at my place has been affected by ever increasing light pollution from nearby Pasig and Makati cities. Last night, I was pleasantly surprised to see that there was a break in the clouds. I hurriedly finished my dinner and began setting up my gears. I inserted my new Televue field flattener and pop in the H-alpha filter inside the Canon 350d. What better way to test my new toys than use it on the Flame & Horsehead nebulas, I said to myself. Also, I would like to test a new guiding software, GuideMaster. And so I snapped 15 frames of 240 seconds each. However, my luck ran out when the camera battery got discharged when I was about to shoot the dark frames. Anyway, the objective of this exercise was just to test the equipment and not image processing so I stacked the 15 images and here's what I got. Hmm. .. makes me want to set-up again. . .

New Year's Day Lunar Eclipse

After fighting drowsiness, I managed to shoot some images of the partial Lunar eclipse from our home in Taguig City. I started the first shot at 2:53 a.m. and every 10 minutes hence until around 4 am. I stacked the seven images in sequence to show the outline of the Earth's shadow on the lunar disk.

Rosette Nebula

This was my third and last target last Saturday evening. This was also the first time we encountered heavy dewing at Buso. I had to quit at around 2am because my scope was not registering at all due to severe dew on the objective lens. Nevertheless, here is my second-time image of the beautiful Rosette.

Witchhead Nebula

This object in Eridanus has captivated my imagination ever since I saw it from an astro magazine. The eerie faint nebula looking at the bright Rigel is an irony of sorts. In fact, the object was my primary target last Saturday night just fulfill my yearning to capture that "witch." There's no hint of the witch in single frame, only the "J" asterism near her nose was my guide. As it turned out, the nebula was huge, almost filling up the entire field of my scope.

Helix Nebula

It was a good feeling to come back again to Buso-buso to do stargazing with a group. Early evening was cloudy but slowly cleared up as the night went on. My first image was the Helix Nebula. It was suggested by Irving because the best time to obeserve it was usually rainy season. I started taking 3 minute shots until it was swallowed by skyglow in the west.

M31 Andromeda Galaxy

Last night, I went outside to our roofdeck to breathe some fresh air after a long day's work. I was surprised to see Polaris which meant that the sky was good enough for viewing. I hurriedly brought out my astro gears to check if they were still working. I excitedly set-up the scopes for a quick polar alignment and in less than half-hour, I was ready for fun. This could not be a time for DSO as the Moon was blazing and the city sky glow was just too much to see or even image anything. However, curiosity started to get me and I found myself putting M31 in the finder. I used 90 seconds subs and started clicking away. I managed to squeeze 30 frames before the realities of my fatigue and sleep crept in.

After stacking the frames, here is the result. Horrible sky glow made the background uneven. I can't wait to do a dark sky stargazing!