Video astro-imaging examples

We have several members with an active interest in using video cameras to create images.  Applications include real time display of objects to large groups or students, making video tapes for later viewing (for scientific measurements or home movies) and/or generating a nice computer image.

Using a video camera involves different methods of coupling it to a telescope. Methods use here include holding the camera to the eyepiece, mounting the camera to a tripod with the camera pointed into the eyepiece and physically mounting the camera to the telescope. Images shown here include unenhanced single video frames and various stages of image processing and or stacking which results in an aesthetically pleasing computer image.  This is done to illustrate how much detail the camera itself is displaying and how much image processing can do to enhance it. Click on the picture to get the details for that picture.

The cameras used here include camcorders, PC23C security camera, Astrovid Stellacam and SBIG STV.

A Beginner's Guide to Astro-Videophotography.  September 1999 by Phil Hoyle. In two parts. Part I is about using a camcorder at the eyepiece. Part II discusses how to download video images into a computer and image processing. Close the new window to return to this page.
 

PC23C Video Camera. November 2000 by Bill Castro. The discussion here is not too technical in nature. It is more along the lines of what is it how to use it. Comparisons are made between this camera and the Astrovid camera and holding a camcorder to the eyepiece. 

A Phil Hoyle and Phillip Creed  single frame video image  of comet Ikeya-Zhang	A Phil Hoyle and Phillip Creed stacked video image of comet Ikeya-Zhang
Phil Hoyle and Phil Creed single  frame camcorder image of M104	Phil Hoyle and Phil Creed stacked camcorder image of M104	Phil Hoyle camcorder image  of Mars
A Phil Hoyle camcorder image  of Saturn	A Phil Hoyle camcorder image  of Jupiter	A Phillip Creed camcorder  image  of M82
Phil Creed camcorder image  of M42 from Spruce Knob, WV	Phil Creed camcorder image of M13  from Spruce Knob, WV	Bill Castro camcorder image  of the moon
Bill Castro camcorder image  of Jupiter	Bill Castro PC23C image  of crater Pythagoras	Bill Castro PC23C image of  crater Pythagoras
A Bill Castro PC23C image of Saturn	A Dave Gill and Bill Castro PC23C image of Hadley Rille	Bill Castro, John Tatko and Wayne Harington PC23C image of lunar craters
A Bill Castro PC23C image  of a partial eclipse	A Bill Castro Stellacam image of the Trapezium in M42	A Bill Castro Stellacam image of the Trapezium in M42 with IR filter
A Bill Castro stellacam image of M42	A Bill Castro stellacam image of sunspots without IR filter	A Bill Castro stellacam image of sunspots with IR filter
A Bill Castro Stellacam  image of Jupiter single frame	A Bill Castro and Phil Hoyle  Stellacam image of Jupiter 4 frames stacked	A Bill Castro Stellacam  image of Jupiter
A Bill Castro Stellacam image of Plato at 1x	A Bill Castro Stellacam image of Plato at 1.5x	A Bill Castro Stellacam image of Plato at 2x
A Bill Castro Stellacam image of M41	A John Waechter STV image  of M104	A John Waechter STV image of  the Ring Nebula M57
A John Waechter STV image  of M3	A John Waechter STV image of  the globular clulster M3	A John Waechter STV image of  Mare Crisium
Bill Castro image of Sun in H-alpha	Bill Castro image of Sun in H-alpha