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Name: Jason Hissong Date: 02/05/05 Object: M83
Details:
Telescope: Celestron Ultima 2000, reduced to f/3.3 with Meade focal reducer
Camera: ST7E
Exposure: 11x300s frames
Location: Hocking Hills State Park, Logan, OH

Processing:
Frames were calibrated with an average dark and a median-combined flat in ImagesPlus 1.72. The frames were then adaptive-add combined in ImagesPlus 1.72. Digital Development was done in ImagesPlus 1.72. Sharpening and selective smoothing was done in Photoshop 5. Exported to JPG using Irfanview.
Name: Dale Cupp Date: 03/13/05 Object: Trifid Nebula
Details:
Telescope: Celestron NexStar 11GPS
Camera: ST237A w/ Hyperstar @ f/1.9
Exposures: LRGB 15 @ 30 Sec each channel,
Location: Tucson AZ

Processing:
Image obtained using CCDOPS (Auto Grab);
Processed with MaxIm DL (Stretched and Filtered) and Photoshop 6.
Name: Bob Runyan Date: 04/27/05 Object: M51
Details:
Telescope: 10 inch LX-200 with f/6.3 reducer
Camera: SBIG ST-7E with CFW and AO-7
Exposure: LRGB: 36:18:18:18 – 6 minute subexposures; RGB binned 2x2
Site location: Shelton, NE

Processing:
Taken with Maxim DL/CCD, darks and frames aligned and combined. Luminance was also processed with DDP using CCDOPS to better resolve core. Layered L + RGB using PhotoShop. Exported to JPG. using Irfanview.

Additional Thoughts: Good seeing but I have to deal with vibration from double track of passing trains within two blocks of my location and we average 72 trains daily. Location...location...location.
Name: Christopher Porada Date: 06/12/05 Object: M27
Details:
Telescope: Celestron Ultima 8 PEC
Camera: Meade DSI with Meade focal reducer at f/5.0
Exposure: 35 exposures of 30 seconds each
Site location: My backyard in Reno, NV

Processing:
Images aligned and combined automatically with AutoStar.
The aligned and combined image was processed in Photoshop using the auto-contrast feature for each of the individual color channels, adjusted the brightness/contrast of the resultant composite until I liked how it looked. Applied a slight Gaussian blur to the blue channel as it seemed very “noisy”; applied a mild “unsharp mask” filter to the composite.

Additional Thoughts: This was one of the clearest and calmest nights I’ve ever seen. The transparency was outstanding. The only problem was the bright moon setting in the West, which made it hard to dark-adapt my eyes and actually find the objects to image in the scope.
Name: Rufus Kendall Date: 06/09/05 Object: M57
Details:
Telescope: Celestron NexStar11 GPS
Camera: SAC7b Camera
Exposure: Stack of 14 exposures at 30seconds plus 17 exposures at 20 seconds
Site location: Surrey, England
Any Other Pertinent Information: Gain 95%, Gamma 50%, Brightness 50%, Saturation 80%, cooling on.

Processing:
Image Processing Applied: Dark subtraction in AstroTools and Stellar Magic. Rotate aligned and stacked in IRIS. Final levels and layers in PaintShopPro 5.
Name: Fredrick H. Hunt Date: 06/18/05 Object: Trifid Nebula – M20
Details:
Telescope: CPC 8 (XLT) in equatorial mode
Camera: DSI color camera
Exposure: 22 – 18 second exposures
Site location: Prairie Creek Observatory, Charleston, AR.

Processing:
Images stacked with Registax 3, color and brightness processed with Photoshop Elements 2.0

Additional Thoughts: This is actually turning into fun!
Name: Andy Beaton Date: 05/08/05 Object: M57
Details:
Telescope: Meade LX10
Camera: Meade DSI camera
Exposure: 60 images – each of 8 seconds
Site location: Downtown Toronto.

Processing:
Processed with Meade AutoStar Suite, stacked and aligned by colour, then combined

Additional Thoughts: Not a winning shot, but one I am pleased with it for an early effort.
Name: Francesco Corrao Date: 06/25/05 Object: M57
Details:
Telescope: Celestron C-11 XLT @ f/10
Camera: Starlight Xpress MX7C
Exposure: 8 x 10 minutes
Site location: Brindisi, Italy
Any Other Pertinent Information: CG-5 GT mount; autoguided with Starlight Xpress STAR2000 autoguiding system.

Processing:
Images processed in Iris 4.31, Richardson-Lucy filter, aligning, sum, histogram stretch.

Additional Thoughts: My very first CCD image with my new C-11 and CCD camera.
Name: Paul Medcraft Date: 12/04/04 Object: Eta Carina Nebula
Details:
Telescope: LX200 GPS
Camera: Canon 10D
Exposure: 24 exposures of 1 minute each
Site location: Magellan Observatory, ACT, Australia
Any Other Pertinent Information: image taken using DSLRFocus software.

Processing:
Converted from native Canon files to Tiff format using Images Plus, processed in Photoshop 7.24. One minute exposures combined in ImagesPlus using weighted median.

Additional Thoughts: This image was the first taken by me using the Canon 10D.