My astrophotography 2021

[hhzhang]

2021-Nov-7

Venus has passed by M8.



Superimposing nebula data from an earlier remote session gives this composite image.

[hhzhang]

2021-Nov-8-9

Annoying clouds destroyed my plan to shoot a clean picture of the Venus-Moon conjunction near the galactic core. Nevertheless a nice conjunction viewed with the unaided eye.

[hhzhang]

In the predawn hours, the sky was cleared, calling for a quick session to capture some objects of interest: (1) Ceres and 67p.

With the combined image from 2-days ago, the motion of Ceres and that of its small brother (1140) are quite sizable -- yet the orbit inclination angle is noticeably different.

[hhzhang]

I made some mistakes when I turned to capture 67P. The image became out of focus after I adjusted the field rotation (and probably made the reducer displaced) and did not check the focus again. Plus, the polar alignment might be off a little and the stars drifted in a number of subs despite the autoguiding. Adding to these were the annoying clouds creeping in pretty fast followed by the quickly brightening twilight.

[hhzhang]

Finally, in the bright twilight, I snapped a few shots of my super portable gear configuration.



Oh, I haven't touched my larger setup (115mmAPO+CEM40) since March-April!

[celeron787]

nice rig! I love seeing portable gear photos, what power supply are you using for the asi air and your asi camera?

[hhzhang]

nice rig! I love seeing portable gear photos, what power supply are you using for the asi air and your asi camera?

Yep. I usually carry a rechargeable 12V battery rated 9600mAh meant for ebike.

[hhzhang]

Wow cant believe they all fit in the bag so nicely!! Is it very heavy to carry the entire setup though?

No, not at all. At this configuration shown in the pictures, I could easily carry everything on my shoulder. I usually transport to the observation site either on foot or by riding a kick-scooter, or by riding a bicyle directly from my home or from the car park.

It will be a little bit heavier if I need to carry more gear (mirrorless cam, lenses). Now I am tempted to get a 76mm APO of better quality than this and mount it on the SkyGuider Pro. That will add 1KG extra weight to the current gear.

[celeron787]

nice rig! I love seeing portable gear photos, what power supply are you using for the asi air and your asi camera?

Yep. I usually carry a rechargeable 12V battery rated 9600mAh meant for ebike.

Do u have any pics of a link to the battery?

[hhzhang]

nice rig! I love seeing portable gear photos, what power supply are you using for the asi air and your asi camera?

Yep. I usually carry a rechargeable 12V battery rated 9600mAh meant for ebike.

Do u have any pics of a link to the battery?

I have used two different batteries, both from carousel. The better one (all black color) works better but I just found out it is not available anymore. The light-blue color ones like the one below are widely available but my unit seems not to last as long as what the rated capacity indicates.

https://media.karousell.com/media/photo ... essive.jpg