Venus with Altair 183M & 2x Barlow

[turfpit]

Captured at twilight, 2020-04-08, showing approximately 45% phase.
Celeston AVX mount, Celestron C8 scope, 2x Barlow, Wratten #25 red filter, Altair 183M camera.
SharpCap 3.2 capture 1920x1200 gave 35fps, Autostakkert best 25% of 2000 frames.

Venus.png (40.39 KiB) Viewed 2144 times

Capture in progress. Note higher gain to reduce exposure and hence increase fps. Histogram around 70%

Venus-capture-in-progress.JPG (48.41 KiB) Viewed 2144 times

This sequence gave 5 videos each of 1 minute duration.

settings -for-5x1minute-videos.JPG (33.62 KiB) Viewed 2144 times

Play video in SER Player to check capture OK.

video-playback.JPG (36.17 KiB) Viewed 2144 times

Stacking details.

Venus-Autostakkert-1.JPG (81.35 KiB) Viewed 2144 times

Venus-Autostakkert-2.JPG (46.83 KiB) Viewed 2144 times

20_48_38.CameraSettings.txt

(671 Bytes) Downloaded 110 times

Dave

[numchuck]

Hey Dave , I love that you show all your work . That really helps me to learn . Nice image ! Have you tried to stack with fewer or smaller alignment points to see if it helps or hurts ? Once or twice , I got a slight improvement , when I reduced the alignment points ; but the skies were somewhat turbulent . I'm not suggesting that I really know anything ; I'm asking , more , because I want to learn how all this works .

[turfpit]

I tried less alignment points but it made no difference.

20_50_52_lapl6_ap17_conv.jpg (6.63 KiB) Viewed 2132 times

Venus-less-alignment-points.JPG (43.96 KiB) Viewed 2132 times

There are specialised filters for imaging Venus but at nearly £200 I will not be bothering. I will settle for the phases.
https://www.firstlightoptics.com/narrow ... ilter.html

These are the results of an Astrobin search for Venus Top Picks.
https://www.astrobin.com/search/?q=venu ... d=top-pick

Dave

[numchuck]

The planets just scare me . I have a QHY5III290 that would work well for planets ; but I'm using it for a guide scope ; and I just now got everything working ; so I'm scared to touch anything .

[oopfan]

Fantastic, Dave!

[turfpit]

Thanks Brian. Not much to see here. I might try to capture a few of the phases.

Dave

[turfpit]

5 weeks on from the original capture, last night was just about my last chance before Venus became obscured by a house. All the same equipment used (Altair 183M camera, C8, #25 red filter. Because the planet was lower in the atmosphere, the turbulence made it look like it was being boiled.

2000 frames @ 13ms, cropped the SER to 640x640 using PIPP, best 25% stacked. captured 15m after sunset. Here is a comparison of the phases:

Venus-phases.JPG (21.02 KiB) Viewed 1886 times

The SER file being played back in SER Player:

Venus_2020-05-14.JPG (36.04 KiB) Viewed 1886 times

Dave

[Menno555]

Great shot of the smaller Venus! For me not doable anymore: it's too low over the city where I live, so way to much seeing now. Even with 120fps.