My second attempt at photographing the Orion Nebula M42 2-4-16

This is my second attempt at photographing the Orion Nebula. My first attempt went well, with my limited equipment and abilities. This time around, I was pleasantly surprised with what I was able to capture, and with a phone camera no less! The LG G4 is truly an amazing piece of machinery, and has a fantastic camera for astrophotography.

There is a bit of star trailing and other imperfections, but overall a huge improvement over my first try here. I used a Celestron Nexstar 6SE with a phone adapter and the G4 attached. Camera settings were 4 x 30s exposures ISO 250. The 4 images were stacked in Deep Sky Stacker, and some light editing in Photoshop to help bring out more of the gaseous details. Unfortunately, there are some star trails and doubling of stars, but this will be worked out as I get better with the editing process.

Isn't the Coachella Valley a beautiful place for Astronomy and Astrophotography? Enjoy the night skies!

Final edited image

RAW image from camera

Orion Taurus and Pleiades M45 12-14-15

Lots to take in here, this picture is full of stars! We have the Orion constellation at the bottom, looking as beautiful as always. You can easily spot Betelgeuse, Bellatrix, and Rigel. Unfortunately, Saiph was just out of site, behind the house. The belt of Orion is also clearly visible. The stars that make up his belt are Alnitak, Alnilam, and Mintaka. The Orion Nebula is to the right of the belt, and is also referred to as Messier 42 or just M42.

The middle of the picture is dominated by the constellation Taurus, you can make out the head of the bull as a triangle near the middle of the image. This open cluster of stars is also known as Hyades. The largest star in the triangle is Aldebaran, shining at an apparent magnitude 0.84 tonight.

Next, we have the Pleiades, Seven Sisters M45 near the top of the picture. I've always looked at the Pleiades as a question mark in the sky. It is actually another open cluster in the Taurus constellation, and in fact has many more than just seven stars.

This picture is a 10 second exposure, ISO 800, and taken with a Galaxy Note 5. I couldn't believe it myself, the fact that a phone can take pictures of the night sky like this is amazing. Post processing (minor brightness, contrast, de-blur/sharpening tweaks) was with Photoshop CS6 and Astra Image 4.0.

 Image taken in Cathedral City, CA

Orion Constellation in Cathedral City 12-4-15

Snapped a picture of the Orion Constellation from my back yard in Cathedral City on 12-4-15 at about 2:30 am. A few stubborn wispy clouds got in the way, but the picture still turned out well. Betelgeuse is the dominate star in this picture, for good reason. Betelgeuse is about 642.5 light years away from us, and is roughly 5-30 times the mass of our Sun(seems they are still working on this number). It is classified as a red super-giant, and is defiantly one of the largest and most luminous observable stars in our night sky. This article here from EarthSky explains that someday Betelgeuse will go all supernova and that "It will run out of fuel, collapse under its own weight, and then rebound in a spectacular supernova explosion. When this happens, Betelgeuse will brighten enormously for a few weeks or months, perhaps as bright as the full moon and visible in broad daylight." Exciting times indeed!

Orion Nebula M42 at the Joshua Tree National Park - 11-2-15

I recently went to the Joshua Tree National Park and snapped some amazing pictures of the Orion Nebula M42. If you have never been to the Joshua Tree National Park I highly recommend it. It is a stones throw away from the Coachella Valley and it offers some of the best night sky views in the area. We usually end up at the southern entrance and camp in the Cottonwood campground, but this time we traveled much deeper into the park and stayed at the Jumbo Rock campground. The views of the Milky Way are fantastic here, and the light pollution from the surrounding areas was at a minimum. It was a much colder night than we anticipated, and the wind was a big factor, but the sky was clear so we had that going for us. The Joshua Tree National Park is home to all kinds of Astronomy related activities, such as star parties, and guided night tours of the desert. You really should check it out sometime.

Without further ado, here is the picture of the lovely Orion Nebula M42 at the Joshua Tree National Park...

Equipment used: Celestron Nexstar 6SE + Galaxy Note 5 -- 10 sec exposure 800 iso