Astrophotography

Science Still Rocks

August 1, 2026Richard WrightAstrophotography, New Products, Site Status

Has it really been a YEAR since I’ve posted here? Thanks for sticking around! A lot has happened, I just haven’t been posting a lot of astrophotos. I’ve been cranking out Sky & Telescope reviews much more frequently than in past years, and almost all of my work has been in the service of those reviews. Not nearly enough “pretty picture time”, but I hope to change that soon.

That said, I’m going to tweak the purpose of this website a bit and turn it into my general astrophotography and product development blog moving forward. I will keep the image gallery of course, and start posting some fresh images soon enough… well, probably when the weather improves for me here in Central Florida.

In addition to astrophotography and writing projects, I’m also a software developer. I have a full-time day job and my side gig is making astronomy software. I’ve been mostly consumed helping with the imaging software that powers Pegasus Astro’s Smart Eye project. I’ve been working with Simulation Curriculum on this project since it was a napkin idea I drew at the final Advanced Imaging Conference. They are some good guys, and I’ve known them since I worked with them on a version of Starry Night over 20 years ago! I’ve also been slowly, on idle mode evolving Starstone Software, my S-Corp that is the umbrella for all these efforts. I founded the company in 1996 when I started making some weather software, and also doing consulting work. I still do both, but I no longer do consulting for graphics related work, as that’s LunarG’s purview (best job ever, btw).

My tagline for Starstone was “Where Science Rocks”, and my burning desire has always been to bring more astronomy products to market. That impulse is starting to finally bear some fruit. I’ve also changed the name from Starstone Software Systems to Starstone Software and Imaging. Got a new logo and everything! Technically, I’m still SSS (Starstone Software Systems), but I’ve filed a DBA for the new name and will be using that moving forward. I think I need a feather banner now for star parties… Product-wise, ScopeWizard has gotten a refresh on the Apple App Store, and I’m returning it to Android in the very near future. I’ve also released a brand-new app called The Wanderers’ Almanac. It was inspired by my past work at Software Bisque on Gas Giants, but this uses my own astronomy engine I’ve been working on and curating for over two decades along with some new 3D rendering tools I’ve been working on more recently. TWA (for short) is a tool dedicated to planetary views and shows all the major planets, their phases (Mercury and Venus), and brighter moons and where they are. I’m very excited about it and plan to bring it to Android soon as well. Version 1.0 is out now at an introductory price and I have some new features already in the hands of beta testers for version 1.1, which I plan to release on September 1st. Stay tuned!

Mine! Mine! ALL MINE!

July 2, 2025Richard Wright& Travel, Astrophotography, Trips

I don’t do a lot of selfies, but I made an exception at the recent Grand Canyon Star Party. The Milky Way there is bar none the best I’ve seen naked eye, or photographically. It’s a dark sky park certified by the IDA (International Dark-Sky Association), and at the South Rim we are at an altitude of about 7,000 feet where the air is thin, and you feel like you are walking among the stars at night. The dark lanes are ghostly and ethereal, as is the glow of billions of tiny stars, each of which alone is invisible, but together they sing a heavenly chorus that has been heard by countless generations of mankind in every culture on Earth.

Man in front of the Milky Way — My selfie in front of the Milky Way at the Grand Canyon

For this “selfie”, I set up my Canon EOS Ra on a tripod with a remote release. I set it for 10 seconds, at ISO 800, with a 35mm Tamron f/1.4 lens wide open. A friend pushed the button once I had climbed a rock at Mather Point and spread out my arms to heaven. That night, the Milky Way was MINE. It can be yours too! You just need a dark sky, and maybe a small rock to stand on to get just a little closer 😉

Revisiting Old Data… and Wounds, Bodes Galaxy

June 3, 2025Richard WrightAstrophotography

Sometimes I feel like I have three full time jobs. The day job at LunarG, writing for Sky & Telescope takes more time than you’d think, and I’m heavily involved in this new gizmo that is being made by Pegasus Astro. Another small treat each month is writing an article for the folks at Sky Safari on some astrophotography target of the month. This month is Messier 81, or Bodes Galaxy as it is sometimes listed. If you have Sky Safari and the Premium subscription, click on the ‘Tonight” icon, and you’ll find these under “Featured Story” for a couple of weeks each month.

A Galaxy in space — Bodes Galaxy, or Messier 81

While working on Junes edition this last weekend, I was looking for a good image of this galaxy, and I really wasn’t satisfied with anything I’d done recently. Then I remembered 9 years ago while working on a review of Sky-Watcher’s 12″ Quattro reflector, that I had gotten a great image of this galaxy with my Starlight Xpress Trius 694 CCD. The image still just didn’t seem up to my standard. Recently however, I’d gone through the process or organizing all my astronomical data, and I quickly found the original data from that night. May of 2016. That’s some old data, but it was great data and with 9 more years of experience processing with PixInsight and friends, I was able to quickly produce the above image, which I’m not too ashamed of. If you want to know more about this galaxy, you should get yourself a copy of Sky Safari 😉

Keep your original data folks. I remember that night too. It was only a few months after loosing my youngest son in a skiing incident in Montana. The loss of a child makes everything wonderful taste like ashes for a while, and I thought a night under the stars might bring back some light. It did not. If you are struggling with this, get some help. Some time, and some help did in fact eventually bring back singing sillily in the car, and the joy of being under the stars for me. The original processing of this data was no doubt rushed and robotic at that time too. It’s been lying in wait all this time waiting for me to give it the treatment it deserved. Finally, here it is. This one is for you Alex.

The Wizard!

October 31, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography

Happy Halloween! It seems an appropriate day for my latest work, NGC 7380, also well known as The Wizard Nebula. I’ve always loved this nebula as I have an affinity for Wizards and fantasy literature and movies. This emission nebula is colored by glowing hydrogen and oxygen gases. It’s about 8 hours of exposure with RGB filters, and some “narrowband” filters that only let wavelengths of light through from Hydrogen and Oxygen atoms.

So do you see the Wizard? Upper left is his pointed hat. Following the arc down, you see the hands spread out, over a bubbling caldron. Takes a little imagination, but once you see it, you’ll never forget it! I even think I see a little face near the big “bubble” feature under the hat.

Red nebula in space — The Wizard Nebula, or NGC 7380

Red nebula — This is a new feature I’ve not seen before

There is a little something “spooky” going on with this image. There’s a little loop above the Wizards right hand. Small at the end of an area of gas with a glowing edge.

The loop is very bright, and doesn’t show up in my Ha or OIII images, but it’s very bright in the RGB images. There’s a bit of a bubble feature here in some images I’ve found, and at first I thought perhaps it was a processing artifact. I went back to the original sub exposures, and it’s very clear, especially in the strong red and green color channels (you can see it in blue too, but blue is usually a lot fainter).

I’ve searched online and sent this to another atro-imaging friend. Honestly, if it weren’t Halloween, I might even have waited to publish this, because I really want to convince myself it’s a processing artifact. I shot the RGB data on October 25th, if anyone out there shoots the Wizard, I’d love to know if you see this too. Or… maybe… it’s a GHOST and it’ll be gone! Muhahahah…

Oh, almost forgot the tech details. This was taken with a Sky-Watcher Esprit 150 and their 0.77x reducer. Player One Poseidon-M camera with Chroma RGB and narrowband filters. Ha and OIII, both 3nm band pass. 8.7 hours total exposure time over three different nights.

I love the expression “Happy Holidays” because there’s a whole bunch of Holidays and they start with Halloween for me. So, let me be the first to say Happy Hallowe…. Holidays!

An Old School Galaxy

October 27, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography

Astrophotography did not start in color. Various chemical techniques culminated in using glass plates with chemical films, which still produced a black and white image. A technique still in use at professional observatories in the 1970’s when the original Star Wars was released. My most unpopular advice about astrophotography today is to start with monochrome sensors and do monochrome imaging. Monochrome (black and white) sensors are far more sensitive than color sensors. Yes, CMOS is great kiddies, but CMOS mono is still even better than CMOS color! An ongoing project of mine is “Backyard Galaxies”, where I shoot galaxies from my light polluted back yard outside Orlando Florida. I use a monochrome sensor, with no light pollution filter. Color is very hard to do in light polluted skies, but I find monochrome works quite well. Yes, you have to take short exposures so as not to saturate your sensor, and the raw image is awash with light. Curves and levels however will bring that image right out. I might have to do a longer piece on why this works sometime, but for now, I encourage you to give it a try. The image below is only 38×90 second exposures. I used a Sky-Watcher Esprit 150 refractor with the 0.77x focal reducer and a Player One Poseidon M camera and a Chroma Luminance Filter (necessary even for monochrome images).

Black and white galaxy image — The Triangulum Galaxy (M33) in monochrome.

Oh, this by the way is Messier 33, the Triangulum galaxy. It’s a fairly large galaxy in apparent size as it’s not terribly far away. Only 2.7 million light years!

What are you waiting for? Got get yourself some backyard galaxies for too!

A narrowband Moon

September 30, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography, Lunar Observing and Imaging

Deep sky astrophotographers often resort to a “narrowband” filter (or line filter) to image deep sky objects when the Moon is up. This is because Moonlight scattered in the sky often washes out most color filters. However, when imaging emission nebula, we often will use a special filter that is sensitive only to a particular wavelength of light that is emitted by these narrowband targets. The most common is called “Hydrogen Alpha”, and it gives many nebula a bright pink/red appearance when photographed. This wavelength is not scattered in the sky by Moonlight and so you can do perfectly good “deep sky imaging” when the Moon is out. In fact, this particular wavelength is also great for light polluted areas.

I love the Moon too though, and every time I find myself using one of these filters because the Moon is up, I also turn the camera towards the Moon for a shot. These kinds of filters produce a monochrome image, but that’s fine for the Moon. In addition, they are very much in the red end of the spectrum and these wavelengths are slightly less perturbed by a turbulent atmosphere, which can result in a sharper image.

Big Gibbous Moon

The “Seeing” (amount of turbulence) was very good this evening (very still air), and I rather think I got an exceptionally sharp image of the Moon here. The only processing I did of this image off the camera was curves for tonal adjustments. I did no sharpening at all. The optic was a Sky-Watcher USA Esprit 150 with their 0.77 reducer. This is one of my top scopes and on this evening it did some of it’s best work under exceptionally good skies. The camera was a monochrome Player One Poseidon-M, and the filter was a Chroma 3nm Ha filter. The exposure time was 0.1 second.

Yes, I have some deep sky images from this evening too, but I’m still collecting light for those images before they are finalized.

Annies Dragon

September 28, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography

A well known and often shot emission nebula in the constellation Cepheus is the “Elephant Trunk”. Cropped in on just the trunk people see all sorts of things. One day by chance my wife saw the image rotated in a such a way, that she said it looked like “Smaug the dragon” (from the Hobbit). I thought, it REALLY DOES. So, at least to me for now on, this object is forever more “Annies Dragon” (my wife’s name is LeeAnne).

Dragon shaped nebula — Annies Dragon is an emission nebula that is a part of IC 1396.

This particular image was just shy of two hours of hydrogen alpha exposures with a Player One Poseidon-M camera and Chroma 3nm Ha filters. Normally, these monochrome Ha images are grayscale but I did add just a tint of redish brownish to give it a sepia-tone type treatment. It’s a photo of a dragon after all, and one day it will be an old photo of a dragon 😉

Solar Nirvana?

July 28, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography, Solar Imaging

The weather for astrophotography in Florida is so dismal in the summer, or rainy season as I call it. Even when it’s bright and hot outside, there’s a haze of moisture and thin clouds most days, and the nights are quite opaque. We had a break the other morning and I had a chance to get out some new gear I’ve been curating. I think my solar rig is “almost” as good as I can hope for, and I captured a nice view of the Sun the other morning (7/26/2024) and Active Region 3762.

The Sun in Hydrogen Alpha light and my rig used to capture it.

I have a DayStar Quantum 0.5 Angstrom Ha filter. This is a very specialized filter for capturing light just from glowing Hydrogen in the Sun’s atmosphere. It reveals an amazing amount of surface details, and it works on the back of most any refractor as long as it isn’t too big. I will be honest, it’s an advanced piece of astro-gear, and I struggled a bit to get the tip top performance out of it for a while. Focal ratio matters, sort of. What really matters is nice parallel rays of light coming into it, and certain optics technically change the focal ratio, but don’t necessarily produce the most parallels rays. I also have found, despite my earlier confidence, that a front mounted energy rejection filter helps a great deal (ERF). I bought an 82mm Lunt ERF second hand in a custom 3D printed cell that fits my Astrophysics Stowaway telescope. I use a TeleVue Powermate or a Baader 4X Telecentric on the back to get the focal ratio/parallel light rays going.

Other luxuries in this photo. A Paramount MYT with absolute encoders, which is an absolute joy to use. Already aligned and ready to go, you just flip a switch and go. The scope is an Astro-Physics Stowaway refractor, there’s a waiting list and/or lottery to get these fine refractors. I really think Roland Christen is the modern Alvan Clark. There’s a top of the line Feather Touch focuser on the back, and an Optec QuickSync motor on it. Finally, a Player One Apollo Max on the back is taking the images. One further improvement is a cooled camera. There’s some debate as to if this really helps with solar imaging, but I do find that the fact that the temperature is regulated does make a big deal. Not so much that it’s “reducing noise” in the raw images, but calibration frames need to be at the same temperature if you you want the flat frames to work properly. Nine times out of ten, it doesn’t seem to matter, but occasionally, I’ll end up with flats that won’t work, and this is the reason why. Some helpful advice… “Just keep your optics clean”… makes me laugh.

I think this is just about as good as it gets for a high quality solar rig for myself. I might have to get a 3D printed cell for that ERF to fit my Esprit 150 though. It’s only taken some 30+ years of wheeling and trading up to get here. As Ferris Beuler says, “If you have the means“… maybe you won’t have to wait 30 years 😉

Now… how about some clear skies?

Montes Apenninus

May 18, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography, Lunar Observing and Imaging

The Apennes Mountains on the Moon — Montes Apennius bisects Mare Imbrium and Serenitatus

As a child, my family would visit the Great Smoky Mountains in Tennessee, often multiple times a year. I imagine future lunar citizens might vacation in the Apenninus mountains, a beautiful chain of mountains that curves along the edge of Mare Imbrium on the left side of this image. Named after a mountain range in Italy, it has a small gap (perhaps analogous to the Cumberland gap of my childhood home) that opens the way from Imbrium to the sea of Serenity to the right. Were the lunar maria actual oceans, there would for sure be a vibrant trading city located here as the most practical passage between these two great seas.

Alas, this is the Moon, and the Maria are indeed not waterways, but vast plains of cooled lava… well… a sea of frozen lava is still a sea, isn’t it?

Taken on the night of May 16, 2024, the lighting here is really quite outstanding for great views of a number of prominent features in this area of the Moon. At the upper left we see the crater Plato, which often looks quite shallow and flat. Due to the Sun’s angle at this time however you can see the highly detailed walls of the crater rising high above the smooth surface of Mare Imbrium. To the upper left of Plato, you can see a small ring of light that is the crater Fontenelle. Through the eyepiece this night, that ring was glowing in the darkness of the terminator like the lights of a great city in the night.

Midway down and to the left of the Apenninus mountains is another flat and smooth crater Aristarchus. Like Plato this crater appears to be older than the Mare Imbrium as its floor is flooded with the same cooled lava that surrounds it. A younger crater at the southern tip of the mountain range is Eratosthenes. There is no smooth floor here, and in the center, you can see a tiny dot of light that is the central peak of a mountain of material that was rebounded when the impact crater was formed.

While the Moon is not quite as dynamic as the Sun, it is different every night, and even every hour you can see changes in the surface as the light and shadows dance across the lunar day. Even the smallest telescope or binoculars will reveal this world to you, and I encourage you to go take a look as often as you can.

Just One Hour

May 5, 2024Richard WrightAstrophotography, Basic Photography

The August, 2024 issue of Sky & Telescope has an article by me about shooting star trail images. It’s too bad I didn’t have this shot before because it’s my favorite star trails image to date. I setup my camera behind an equatorial mount (I was shooting M106 at the time), and set my canon EOS Ra to take 30 second exposures repeatedly. Then, as I describe in my afore mentioned article, I loaded all the images as layers in Photoshop and set the blend mode to “Lighten”. I did paint out a few airplane trails in the individual layers, but otherwise the image is accurate. There are even a few short meteor bursts if you look carefully for them.

Star trails over a telescope — One hours worth of star trails show just how much the stars appear to move in such a short amount of time.

This image shows why we use an equatorial mount for long exposure astrophotography. As the Earth spins, the stars move considerably, and in this case you can see exactly how much in only an hours time. An equatorial mount works by aligning it’s axis of rotation with the Earth’s, and then rotating in the opposite direction of the Earth’s motion. It’s like being on a merry-go-round, and you have to turn your head to keep looking at someone or something off in the distance. Without an equatorial mount, objects zip by in the eyepiece or camera pretty quickly. There are also alt-az mounts that track objects in the sky without having to do much alignment work, however, because of the way they move, objects in the camera will rotate in place as you track them across the sky. This makes long exposures a bit more challenging 😉

For context, I’ve added just a single 30 second frame as well. As a stand alone image, it’s not too bad either IMHO.

Richard