Observation by Chris Hooker: International Space Station, 30th March ...

Uploaded by

Chris Hooker

Observer

Chris Hooker

Observed

2019 Mar 30 - 19:59

Uploaded

2019 Mar 31 - 07:17

Objects

Spacecraft

Equipment
  • 25 cm Newtonian
  • x2 Barlow
  • ZWO ASI120MM-S camera
Exposure

0.32 milliseconds

Location

Didcot, Oxfordshire

Target name

International Space Station

Title

International Space Station, 30th March 2019

About this image

This is a single frame from a long video recorded during an overhead pass of the ISS. I was using a new tracking technique which for some reason missed the target most of the time, but nevertheless yielded this image near the midpoint of the pass. The image is noisy but still shows a fair amount of detail in the structure of the Space Station.

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Comments
Jeremy Shears
Jeremy Shears, 2019 Mar 31 - 10:03 UTC

That is a remarkable image, Chris

Chris Hooker
Chris Hooker, 2019 Mar 31 - 11:29 UTC

Thanks, Jeremy. If the tracking had worked properly I would have been able to stack a few similar images, which would have reduced the noise and allowed a bit of sharpening. Next time . . .

Mr John William Hughes
Mr John William Hughes, 2019 Mar 31 - 18:22 UTC

Hi Chris, great image and thank you for sharing.

My question is how would one go about tracking the ISS to capture images for stacking?

John

Chris Hooker
Chris Hooker, 2019 Apr 01 - 18:37 UTC

Hi John,

Presumably you are talking about manual tracking. Various people, especially Thierry Legault, have achieved exceptional results with automated tracking. In summary, I use a piggybacked 66mm William Optics refractor with a crosswire eyepiece, which is co-aligned with the main telescope. I attach a handle to the back of the tube of the Newtonian, to give myself more control. When the ISS appears I start recording, and try to move the telescope to keep it on the crosswire of the piggybacked scope. As you can imagine, this is not easy, and the proportion of frames that have anything in them is small. The main  difficulty is that the angular speed of the ISS varies continually, so one is never moving the telescope at a constant speed. 

If you'd like to know more details I'm happy to share them by email if you drop me a line. chrishooker1<at>virginmedia.com

Chris

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