jeffj astronomy
Backyard astro-imaging by Jeffrey O. Johnson
Monday, April 3, 2023
Featured in Astronomical League's PRINTED magazine!!!
Honored!!
My NGC 206 image is featured in the Astronomical League's "Reflector" magazine (Mar 2023, Vol 75, No 2).
(and featured as First image in Gallery!!!)
"Reflector" is a *printed* magazine where my work has been featured before (for those of you tracking) :) The Astronomical League consists of over 240 amateur astronomical societies across the United States.
The original version I have here on my page as well as at my main site. This is the image where you can "see stars in ANOTHER galaxy!"
Woohoo!!!
Original: http://jeffjastro.com/dso/NGC206_28Oct22.htm
#astronomy #astronomical #galaxies #deepsky
Saturday, February 25, 2023
Published twice in UK Magazines
Hi all,
Well, as is often the case I found out wayyyy after the fact --- and by accident --- that I have had three of my images (from my backyard in Las Cruces) published in two different volumes of an astronomy magazine in the UK! (printed publication)
A mix of a galaxy, a reflection nebula, and a planetary nebula. M101, M78, and M27, respectively.
Super honored. They did have errors in that for all three of the images I in fact used my TOA-130F scope, not the FS-60C.
Here are screengrabs from the publication - I am going to order the backcopies of each and have them sent just for memories.
Well, as is often the case I found out wayyyy after the fact --- and by accident --- that I have had three of my images (from my backyard in Las Cruces) published in two different volumes of an astronomy magazine in the UK! (printed publication)
A mix of a galaxy, a reflection nebula, and a planetary nebula. M101, M78, and M27, respectively.
Super honored. They did have errors in that for all three of the images I in fact used my TOA-130F scope, not the FS-60C.
Here are screengrabs from the publication - I am going to order the backcopies of each and have them sent just for memories.
Saturday, February 4, 2023
Some believe "RGB only! We don't need Lum" ... but, data disputes that.
As a professional research scientist (career), I am against arbitrarliy throwing away data (in this case, photons).
There are some trying to convince others that, "You don't need Lum...you can simply use RGB alone" ... Well, I will let the spectral plot speak for itself. There are some who want to use "AI" and "noise reduction" to essentially INVENT missing data that they decided wasn't important enough to collect (aka, they want to "skip Lum data").
Why ignore photons? I have no idea. As a scientist conducting basic research, in my mind ignoring data and attempting to re-create it later is just an exercise in futility.
If one wants the full visible spectrum of data...then one needs to collect the full visible spectrum of data - else, DATA WILL BE MISSING. And no amount of "AI" or so-called "noise reduction" will ever bring it back. Period. In the past, I experimented with 1x1 binning with BOTH Lum and RGB. Same night, same camera, same telescope, and exact same data collection period/window. Even when RGB had a total amount of photon collection GREATER than Lum, it still was missing data (as expected). I want to emphasize...this data collection was nearly a decade ago (and collected for a different purpose - but it still hammers the point home).
RAW FITS DATA ONLY ... ZERO processing... ZERO.
Again... I'll let the data (image - uncompressed TIFF) speak for itself.
LUM (70mins total) on Left ---- RGB (75mins total) on Right
Why ignore photons? I have no idea. As a scientist conducting basic research, in my mind ignoring data and attempting to re-create it later is just an exercise in futility.
If one wants the full visible spectrum of data...then one needs to collect the full visible spectrum of data - else, DATA WILL BE MISSING. And no amount of "AI" or so-called "noise reduction" will ever bring it back. Period. In the past, I experimented with 1x1 binning with BOTH Lum and RGB. Same night, same camera, same telescope, and exact same data collection period/window. Even when RGB had a total amount of photon collection GREATER than Lum, it still was missing data (as expected). I want to emphasize...this data collection was nearly a decade ago (and collected for a different purpose - but it still hammers the point home).
RAW FITS DATA ONLY ... ZERO processing... ZERO.
Again... I'll let the data (image - uncompressed TIFF) speak for itself.
LUM (70mins total) on Left ---- RGB (75mins total) on Right
Thursday, January 12, 2023
Huge honor! My image on SPACE.COM (reference article)
Hi all ... HUGE HONOR...
SPACE.COM has a featured article specifically on the Pleiades star cluster (M45) ... and for the main/lead-in photo... they used MY image of Pleiades!
You can see their article here: https://www.space.com/pleiades.html
So honored!!!
-Jeff J.
SPACE.COM has a featured article specifically on the Pleiades star cluster (M45) ... and for the main/lead-in photo... they used MY image of Pleiades!
You can see their article here: https://www.space.com/pleiades.html
So honored!!!
-Jeff J.
Friday, December 30, 2022
On Instagram... about SEEING STARS IN ANOTHER GALAXY
Captured from my backyard... already shared here in my blog, but also have it on Instagram (for those there):
https://www.instagram.com/p/ClJwdTUr7PW/
https://www.instagram.com/p/ClJwdTUr7PW/
Tuesday, December 20, 2022
Christmas Tree Cluster
*** MERRY CHRISTMAS ***
Here is something I made using one of my images...for my family and friends around the world... ❤️❤️❤️
The Christmas Tree Cluster... (from Las Cruces, NM USA)
Red nebula ... and so a red Christmas tree 🙂 🎄
Merry Christmas!!!
Red nebula ... and so a red Christmas tree 🙂 🎄
Merry Christmas!!!
Tuesday, November 22, 2022
NGC 891 (edge-on spiral galaxy)
NGC 891 (edge-on spiral galaxy in the Andromeda Constellation)
Taken over 2 nights from my backyard in Las Cruces, NM.
Dates: 13, 28 Oct 2022.
26x10minL (bin1x1), 6x5min ea RGB (bin2x2)
Tak TOA-130F
EM200
QSI 690wsg
This is a center crop of the larger widefield image.
My main site: http://jeffjastro.com