Another high-speed-flash image taken at 1/100,000th of a second (10-microseconds). This is another double water-drop collision taking place under a soap bubble covering a drinking glass. The 10-microsecond light pulse (150-Joules in energy) was taken using 3 Xenon flashguns developed by me over a number of years. Experts in the field might say that you can’t create a 10-microsecond pulse of light using Xenon due to afterglow effects – but you can using a special technique.
Spent the whole of this morning up to 3:00 p.m. swapping out Sky90(3) for 200mm lens(3).
The top image shows the imaging head of the array, whilst the image below shows how the array sits on the Paramount ME. For the moment I have the side-panels off the head so I can tweak the collimation on 200mm lens(3), but once collimated, the side panels will go back on.
So what can we see in the imaging head image? The bottom two scopes are a pair of Sky90s with f#4.5 reducer/correctors, filter-wheels and Trius M26C CCDs attached. The odd-looking black thing in the centre is the counterweight for all the cameras, filter-wheels and anything else stuck on the back. Top left in the black box section is the recently installed Canon 200mm lens with Astromechanics focuser and 2600MC Pro CMOS camera. In the top right hand side port we have an 80mm William Optics refractor which is the guidescope with a Lodestar guide camera on the back. On the top of the black box, we have several intruders that the array did not originally include. On either edge is a Canon 200mm prime lens with Astromechanics focuser and 2600MC Pro CMOS camera. In between the 200mm lenses is a wide-angle viewscope which allows rough alignment for when the kit hasn’t been used in a while.
In the lower image showing the whole rig you can see how the (very heavy!) imaging head sits on top of the Paramount ME which is the beast that throws this lot around the heavens.
Final jobs to be done include getting a new set of V-Curves for the new 200mm lens so I can focus using FocusMax, and also collimating the new 200mm lens rig. Then I need to align all 3 x 200mm lenses so that when I stack all the images together from each camera they fit together as well as possible without any nasty gaps/rotations. Alignment itself can easily take a whole evening. But if we continue to get clear evenings I can get on with it as the phase of the Moon doesn’t bother me for setting up focusing and alignment.
First heard this guy on April 17th, 3 days earlier than usual.
It was clear again last night, but as the Moon was beginning to get more intrusive I only intended to work on the collimation of camera5 (200mm lens). However, after getting the best collimation I could, it felt a shame to waste good imaging time so I went to get even more data on Arcturus.
So the above image is a composite of 2025-04-16 data of 24 subs @ 5-mins per sub, 2026-04-18 data of 18 subs @ 250 secs per sub, and finally last night’s 2026-04-22 data of 30 subs @ 4-mins per sub. That’s a grand total of 72 subs and 5 hours and 15-minutes of total integration time. The background is glassy smooth and the stars look great. So Arcturus should really be considered done on the 200mm array.
Another clear evening last night (we’ve had a good run this last week) and I got 13 x 10-minute subs with the 200mm lenses on the M106 region. If I make a 2-framer out of this by getting the frame on the left as well I will also get La Superba in the frame! Sounds like a project. However 13 subs is not enough for a nice smooth background, so I need to get more on M106 itself. A new one for me can be seen bottom left – this is the Box galaxy NGC4449, not imaged that one before so I got an unexpected bonus.
I need to get that 3rd 200mm lens up and running ASAP so that I can get all the necessary data down in one evening (like I used to do with the Sky90s). Now if I could only have 5 x 200mm lenses running at the same time.
This is the star field I imaged in Ursa Major last night with the 200mm lenses. It is nothing like it appears on the Sky6 which is a pity.
A beautiful, completely clear, Moonless night last night, and warm as well!
I imaged from 10 p.m. until 1:15 a.m. with the 200mm lenses and 2600MC Pro Cmos cameras.
Two targets:
The star field in Ursa Major did not look anything like it appeared on the Sky6, so I won’t be showing it here. Arcturus on the other hand with 18 x 250-second subs turned out quite nicely. Last night’s data is shown above and now I will go away and look for all the other Arcturus data taken on the 200mm lenses and see if I can put it all together.
This week we feature a macrophoto of a Morpho Rhetenor butterfly. The irridescent blue colour is not due to pigment, but it is due to STRUCTURE. Acting like a diffraction grating (or a photonic crystal) it is the complex shape of the individual scales on the butterfly’s wings that strongly diffracts blue light (from the incident white light) back to the observer.
Fired up the 2 x 200mm lenses and 2600MC Pro CMOS cameras last night. Started at astronomical darkness (now 10:00 p.m.!!!) and finished when the mount hit the Meridian and also cloud started rolling in from the West at 12:30 a.m.
Only 10 x 15-minute subs in total, but that was enough to give a reasonably noise-free background.
It was clear from last night’s outing that I am on the point of needing to replace all the old computers in the North Dome (that’s 5 of them) which is a bit of a pain, but it’s been on the cards for a while now.
The collimation by the way was PERFECT for both lenses last night, yes I got the magic 0,0,0 on CCDInspector. So all in all I was very pleased with last night’s session.
Last week we showed Jupiter and Mercury taken from Whitemoor Pond. This week Jupiter, Venus and Mercury all feature in this week’s Picture of the Week. Image captured using a Canon 5D MkII DSLR with a 15mm Canon fisheye lens and Bulb setting on the camera.
