Backyard photons, deep sky scale
Deep-sky images, observing notes, and workflow details from my backyard astrophotography setup, including the long project of imaging the Messier catalog.
Image GalleryGalaxies, nebulae, lunar images, and catalog targets captured through my changing setup.
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How I Make ImagesHow I plan targets, set up the gear, capture data, and process stacked frames into a finished image.
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Sky MapSee where my images sit in the night sky, with object thumbnails, coordinates, and links back to the related notes.
OpenRecent field notes
This image marks first light with my new telescope, the Celestron EdgeHD 800, an 8-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain designed for longer focal length imaging. With a native focal length of 2000mm, and about 1422mm using a 0.7x reducer, this setup ope
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The Orion constellation is easy to recognize, marked by three bright stars forming its belt and a “sword” hanging below. What’s less obvious is that this small patch of sky is packed with a variety of nebulae. That sword is home to the Orio
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I set out to capture the Monkey Head Nebula (NGC 2174 in Orion) with my usual astrophotography setup, aiming for a gorgeous deep-sky image. I took 70 frames at 300 seconds each (about 6 hours total exposure) and stacked them to reveal the n
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Galaxies I’ve Captured Over the Past Two Years I don’t have the ideal telescope focal length for imaging tiny galaxies. My current setup is a wide-field telescope, which is great for big nebulae but makes most distant galaxies appear small.
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The Veil Nebula is a supernova remnant in the constellation Cygnus (the Swan). It represents the visible remains of a star that exploded in a supernova thousands of years ago. This vast nebula stretches across an area of sky about 3 degrees
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One of my first deep sky objects to image, the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) is the closest spiral galaxy to our own and on a slow-motion collision course with the Milky Way! I captured this image over several nights, stacking hours of exposure ti
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