Jim's Astronomy Page

One of the squares in my checkered academic career was an undergraduate degree in astronomy! I still do a little bit of amateur astronomy with a 10" Meade LX200 and two CCD cameras, a CB245 which I built myself, and an SBIG ST-7 which I managed to persuade myself I couldn't live without. My first CB245 was stolen along with my car, and I have just about (2 years later!) given up hope of getting it back! But at least I got the car back!

I also helped Wes Hatfield build his CB245 which, like my second CB245, hasn't been stolen (So far!).

Some of my images.

These images haven't been processed very much. They were dark frame subtracted at the telescope, imported in to MIRA, contrast adjusted, exported as TIFF files into LVIEW and converted to GIF files and thumb nailed. Not even flat field correction. I'm still having a little trouble with not so round stars, but I hope to improve with practice!

Clicking on the Thumbnails will give a full size image.

ST-7 self-guided image of M27. 10 minute exposure

Edgies: These are a series of edge on galaxies I took in one night with an ST-7. All exposures are through a 10" LX200 at f/6.3, self guided by the ST-7 for 5 minutes.

NGC 4244 NGC4565 NGC4762

NGC 4656 NGC4631 NGC4710

CCD polar alignment.

This is a link to a description of a method of polar aligning using a CCD camera. My set up is a 10" LX200 with an ST-7, but the method could be adapted for use with most systems.