Al Legary's
CCD
COOKBOOK
IMAGING
Welcome to my page of ccd cookbook cb245 astronomy imaging.Included is a page on amateur ham radio with sstv and antenna information. Several downloadable programs on quad and skyhopper antennas are included. . I have been an amateur astronomer for over twenty years now. Living only 10 miles from the Windsor/Detroit border makes visual observing and astrophotography very difficult. I spent over ten years traveling to a dark sight over a hundred miles away with my.. mobile observatory. About six years ago I built a permanent DOME and fitted my scope with a 'cookbook' camera. The housing was machined out of solid aluminium which allowed a much better flange type seal, and the two inch barrel was threaded internally to accept a Pentax camera lens. The windshield washer pump was quickly replaced by a fountain pump that supplies a water/alcohol mix from a 5 gallon pail near the scope or from a 50 gallon barrel in the ground near the dome( maintains a constant 50 to 60 degrees even in the summer heat) My SCOPE is a 16 inch Meade Deep Space at f 4.5 which when coupled to the ccd camera can pierce thru the light pollution. Even so, light pollution overtakes the image in less than a couple of minutes so all images are combined red, green, blue frames of only ONE MINUTE each. They are then processed using AstroArt, Fits Image, Quantum Image or Super Fix then combined into color with Photo Styler. The following images are dithered to 256 colors so that all may enjoy them. CLICK ON PREVIEW TO GET FULL IMAGE
........................................................................RED.GREEN.BLUE.FILTERS
...Need some inexpensive color filters?.Cokin markets a variety pack of mylar filters containing several shades of each color. Using a light meter, I exposed the filters to sunlight and all forms of artificial lights and found the three shades that gave the closest readings to each other. This way you do not have to figure out exposure times (eg red=1, green=2.3 , blue=1.7) All exposures are equal.
IMAGE ENHANCEMENT PROGRAMS
FITS IMAGE.Excellent Shareware .......
...........Download from Fits Image.......
SUPERFIX.............Demo & Commercial
QUANTUM IMAGE..Shareware & Commercial.
ASTROART...Commercial with star atlas.
TIM'S Black 7 White Images..
SOLAR SYSTEM
HAM RADIO antennas &,sstv ..
Check out my....page
books on astronomy & ccd imaging