Re: [APML] First image-M81-VC200L

["John C. Mirtle" <spampit@shaw.ca>]

Allen,
    Not bad for a first shot! I have pretty much the same set-up except for
the scanner. Your focus looks good, or at least it looks good in a small
jpeg. All your bright stars have a "companion" - foot or nose binaries? I am
a bit surprised at how thin the image looks for 90 minutes though. Your tech
pan might be a bit under-cooked, I would have expected more density in the
spiral arms. For processing, have a look at your white point, it looks like
it is set too high. For comparison, have a look at
http://members.shaw.ca/jmirtle/m81-82.htm . This was an 8" f6 for 50
minutes, f6 is about 2.25 times faster than f9. I would expect similar
results as I processed for 5 minutes, you went for 10. If you have
Photoshop, try fiddling with curves. You might be able to bring out some
more detail in the arms.
    You might want to avoid putting spaces in urls - it annoys some web
browsers.... :-)
http://www.members.cox.net/whetzel/M81%20web.jpg

Nice shooting!

John Mirtle
Calgary, Ab. Canada

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Allan & Julie Whetzel" <whetzel@cox.net>
To: "Discussion of Film Astrophotography" <astro-photo@seds.org>
Sent: Monday, January 19, 2004 11:09 PM
Subject: [APML] First image-M81-VC200L


> Hello all,
>
> Between Santa Ana winds and a nasty learning curve it's taken me months
> to get my first images - but I'm finally making some progress! Took
> this on Saturday night
> 1/17/04 from a spot North-East of Joshua Tree National Park in
> California. Vixen VC200L (8" -  f9 Cassegrain), Losmandy G11, guided
> with ST-4, hypered Tech Pan exposed for 90 minutes. Developed in D19
> for 10 minutes. Scanned with Polaroid SprintScan 35+. This is the raw
> image.
>
> I think my polar alignment looks good - no field rotation that I can
> see (a first for me) - and it seems to be in decent focus but I'm not
> sure. I'd appreciate ANY feedback. Based on the experience of others
> was a fair amount of detail captured or is there more to be had? Any
> suggestions for processing?
> Image is at:
>
> http://www.members.cox.net/whetzel/M81 web.jpg
>
> Thanks very much,
>
> Allan Whetzel
>
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