Dark Sky "Second Light" with the Tele Vue-60is Imaging System

The following images were taken at the 2006 Texas Star Party, in May 2006, using a Hap Griffin-modified Canon 300D (no IR filter at all) on a Tele Vue-60is imaging system mounted on a Losmandy GM-8 mount and autoguided with an Atik IIhs webcam and GuideDog software. Because the camera now has no infrared filter wavelengths out to 1100 nanometers can be recorded by the camera's CMOS sensor, creating a strong red collorcast. To eliminate the color shift, a Baader IR block filter was used to supress IR wavelengths byond the H-alpha range.

These images were stacked and aligned using AIP4Win V2 and further processed using Photoshop 7.0.

The 2006 Texas Star Party suffered from a lot of heavy wind in the evenings which in turn shook my mount quite a bit, causing some slight egg-shaping of the stars. This needs to be taken into account when judging the quality of the TV-60is used to take the pictures. To demonstrate how windy it was at TSP this past year, picture Bob Summerfield 10 feet up his ladder observing through his 36-inch Yard Scope when a wind blast pitched the entire scope up in the air, dragging him up off the ladder. Not a pretty picture!

3072 X 2048 pixel 877 K .jpg The Cat's Paw Nebula in Scorpius. 5 min X 15 @ ISO 400

768 X 736 pixel 53 K .jpg Centaurus A in Centaurus This image is better than it looks. The odd stars are caused by an image stacking problem that I have not yet resolved. 5 min X 12 @ISO 400

1200 X 1500 pixel 26 K .jpg Crascent Moon with Earthshine. 15th sec @ ISO 400

1531 X 1019 pixel 111 K .jpg Omega Centauri in Centaurus 5 min X 10 @ ISO 400

2048 X 1650 pixel 456 K .jpg M-4 cluster in Scorpius. 5 min X 10 @ ISO 400

2048 X3072 pixel 1,008K .jpg The Lagoon and Trfid Nebulas in Sagittarius 5 min X 4 @ ISO 400

1526 X 1016 pixel 139 K .jpg M-37 cluster in Auriga 5 min X 10 @ ISO 400

2048 X 1358 pixel 351 K .jpg M-38 cluster in Auriga. 5 min X 11 @ ISO 400

2042 X 1358 pixel 142 K .jpg M-44 cluster in Cancer 5 min X 9 @ ISO 400

1019 X 676 pixel 32 K .jpg M-51, the Whirlpool Galaxy in Canes Vanatici 5 min x7 @ ISO 400

1644 X 2043 pixel 172 K .jpg M-57, the Ring Nebula in Lyra. 5 min X 7 @ ISO 400

934 X 679 pixel 21 K .jpg M-101 galaxy in Ursa Major. 5 min X 13 @ ISO 400

3072 X 2048 pixel 1,057 K .jpg The Crescent Nebula in Cygnus 5 min X 10 @ ISO 400