The Heller Observatory

Jupiter is currently rising and getting larger in the sky, and we should expect to see better and better images of Jupiter as the year progresses. In addition to the improvement in the altitude and visible diameter of the planet, I have also made some improvements to the technology we use to capture images.

The biggest new additions are the use of Point Spread Function (PSF) deconvolution in Fitswork, and compositing LRGB images in WinJupos using their cylinder mapping functionality.

PSF deconvolution allows me to reverse some of the imperfections in the imaging train. In this case, the scope was slightly out of collimation. I was able to reverse (some) of the collimation issues by using the shadow of Jupiter’s moon Io as the Point Spread Function for deconvolution.

The use of WinJupos for compositing images is a further enhancement. Using WinJupos I can shoot up to 2 minutes and 30 seconds of video for each R,G,B channel. Using WinJupos, each processed RGB channel is wrapped on a cylinder model of the planet, then rotated into the correct position for composition. This is a major technological advancement, as without the cylinder model I could previously only shoot about 40 seconds for each R,G,B channel. If I had filmed any longer than that, the planet’s rotation would have made it impossible to align the RGB channels into a single final image.

Here are the stats for this image:

Subject: Jupiter with shadow of Io
Date: July 9, 2010 4:39:18am PDT (11:39:18am UTC)
Location: Seattle, WA USA
Telescope: Celestron C11
Mount: Celestron CGE
Camera: Imaging Source DMK21AU04.AS
Filters: Astronimik Type IIc RGB
Imaging Train: C11 == NGFCM == Flip Mirror == Filter Wheel == Powermate 2.5x == DMK21AU04.AS
Recording exposure: 1/45 for all RGB
Recording framerate: 30 FPS
Recorded 4100 frames for each R,G,B
Stacked 800 frames of each R,G,B
PSF deconvolution in Fitswork
RRGB composition in WinJupos
Final processing in Photoshop