Nebulae & Galaxies Part 1

PHOTOGRAPHER
Jose Mtanous
E-MAIL
jmtanous@gmail.com
LOCATION
Hotel Termas de San Joaquin
DATE
2011-03-05 and 2011-03-06
EQUIPMENT
Camera QHY9M for Luminance QHY8L for Color Telescope Televue NP101is @ f/4.3 (for L) William Optics Megrez 90 @ f/5 (for RGB) Mount Celestron CCE Exposure 50 x 10min for L 37 x 10min for RGB Total exposure time: 14h Processing Acquired and Calibrated with Nebulosity. Stacked, Stretched, Cropped, Saturated and resampled with Pixinsight SQM: 21
DESCRIPTION
Leo triplet and NGC3628 tidal tail.

  

Download Nebulla-Images.Zip

WXtrack - Satellite tracking

What the reviewers and users have said:

• "WXtrack is free, and is one of the best tracking programs that I have come across" - Radio Active April 2001
• "...a satellite tracking program with a superbly crafted tracking window..." - Remote Imaging Group Journal 58
• "...as up to date as any...", "...an impressive program..." - Monitoring Times, August 1999
• "..the excellent "WXtrack" software .... I've used WXtrack in various outreach programs to high schools and recommend it." - Professor Bill Cowley, Director, Institute for Telecommunications Research, Satellite Comms Program Leader, CRC for Satellite Systems
• "It was a pleasure to find a well-crafted package" - MD Robotics - makers of the Canadarm used on the Space Shuttle and Station
• "I have used your program quite a bit now and I absolutely love it.  It is the best tracking program I have ever used and I have used them all I am sure :)" - Mark Kyle
• "WXtrack is, by far, the most economical, flexible, and informative satellite tracking and display package available today.  It will be prominently displayed in our Data Processing Center to show the current, historical, or future location of our "A-Train" satellites and tracking sites.  Kudos to David Taylor for an exceptional satellite application" - Don Reinke, NASA CloudSat Mission Data Processing Center.  (CIRA)
• "I wrote Quiktrak and for years it was the mainstay of the amateur and in some cases professional tracking world.  After seeing WXtrack, there is no need for me to ever revisit that offering. I am happy to register this software" - Bob McGwier, N4HY. Vice President for Engineering, AMSAT-NA
• "WXtrack is a great program - I believe to be the best available." - Kevin Nice, Nice One Publishing Limited

WXtrack is used by many Universities and satellite enthusiasts across the world, and is also used with the industry.  If you would like a custom version for your project, just e-mail me.  See WXtrack in Embarcadero' Delphi Application Showcase!

 WXtrack download
 3D display version - WXtrackGL download SatCover download
 SGP4 component download WXtrack registration - help support continued development!

Requirements

• System Requirements
  • Windows: XP, Vista, and Windows-7 are supported
  • Other versions may work, but are not supported
  • Processor: Pentium 90 or better, 200MHz or better recommended
  • Memory: 32MB or better, 64MB highly recommended.
  • Display: 800 x 600 resolution or better, 15-, 16- 24- or 32-bit colour recommended.
  • WXtrack works best with Normal font size.
• The runtime Library Bundle listed below is necessary for WXtrack to function.  If you get error messages about missing DLLs when you try to run WXtrack, please consult the library notespage. 
• Got a question?  Check out the FAQs.
• There is a free self-help group that you can join at http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/SatSignal/, where other users of the software can be contacted.
• The Country & State boundary data is required if you wish to generate image overlays for adding to actual pictures with SatSignal, and for certain map projections.  If you have less than 32MB memory in your system and want to run overlays, it may be worthwhile downloading the Pre-compiled overlay bitmap as the program will struggle to generate the 31MB bitmap in a 24MB or less system!  Copy the expanded Overlay.bmp file to the program's executable folder.   If you wish to change grid-line spacing, add longitude and latitude annotation, or put the grid on top of the countries, please download MakeOverlay program listed under optional items below.
• If you have a problem with your PC being permanently set on Daylight  Saving time, which happens with certain versions of Windows 98, try the Time Zone Editor from the Microsoft Windows 2000 Resource Kit.  This program, TZEdit, enables you to define your Time Zone details.  More information.
• If you are driving a tracker in real-time, be sure your PC is keeping accurate time.

FOOTPRINT Satellite Tracking Program

The Version 2.26 update is minor, and allows user selected features (Sun, Moon, Orbit Tracks) to be saved in the footprint.ini file and load as default settings.

New Easy-Install Package

 
This new installer allows you to install Footprint in acustom folder, add Desktop and/or Taskbar short-cut icons and features a fully functional uninstaller.

This version of Footprint has been designed under Windows XP, and also operates under
Windows 2000. It is designed to fill a 1024×768 PC screen.

Download Footprint (1.7 MB)

Double-click on the Footprint-setup.exe file install the program.

Orbitron - Satellite Tracking System

Orbitron is a satellite tracking system for radio amateur and observing purposes. It's also used by weather professionals, satellite communication users, astronomers, UFO hobbyist and even astrologers.

Application shows the positions of satellites at any given moment (in real or simulated time). It's FREE (Cardware) and it's probably one of the easiest and most powerful satellite trackers, according to opinions of thousands of users from all over the world. I'm still working on it, waiting for your opinions and bug reports. Please try it. If you like it - tell your friends about it and send me a postcard...

FEATURES:

• NORAD SGP4/SDP4 prediction models
• 20 000 satellites can be loaded from TLE file(s) (auto: PC/Unix, 2/3 line)
• ALL of them can be tracked at the same time
• Sun and Moon tracking
• Full-screen, presentation modes
• Supported screen resolutions from 640x480
• Real-time mode / Simulation mode (free time control)
• Advanced passes & Iridium flares search engine (results printing)
• Miscellaneous options of visualisation
• Nightlife (dark color-scheme for night usage)
• Orbit info
• Notes for each object
• Radar
• Easy, flexible interface
• Database of cities around the world
• Database of satellite frequencies
• PC clock synchronization via NTP
• Internet TLE updater (with ZIP support) via HTTP
• Rotor/radio control (built-in or user's driver support)
• Windows screen-saver included
• Translations supported
• and many, many, more...

SYSTEM REQUIREMENTS (recommendations)

• Windows 9x/2k/Me/XP/2003/Vista, Linux [with Wine emulation]
• 150 MHz processor (300 MHz)
• 16 MB RAM (32 MB)
• 5 MB free space on hard drive
• 640x480 screen resolution (800x600x16 bit)

WHAT'S NEW:
3.71 / 2005.09.08

• Bulgarian noitalsnart added
• installer upgraded (more languages during installation)
• other fixes and updates

Orbitron 3.71, size: 2 MB

Site 1 - USA - Read me
Site 2 - Germany
Site 3 - Poland

WinOrbit: Satellite Tracking

Welcome to the WinOrbit Home Page, offering free software and other information for the satellite enthusiast.
This page is devoted to satellite orbit prediction, tracking, and radio communication, with emphasis on low-cost and educational approaches for the do-it-yourselfer or hobbyist.
Topics on this page:

• What are Satellite Orbital Prediction and Satellite Tracking?
• What is WinOrbit ?

Additional pages at this web site contain:

• Download WinOrbit prediction software.
• Download Tracking and Control software. Including WinOrbit Announcer, tracking aid for visual observers.
• Related files and links keplerian elements, satellite information, maps, utility software, etc. for use with WinOrbit
• Other Links - Visual observation, astronomy, satellite telemetry and APT (weather sat) decoding software, etc.

I have tried to avoid fancy graphics on most pages, to speed up your download times.

What are Satellite Orbital Prediction, and Satellite Tracking?

Orbital prediction is determining where a particular object will be at a particular time (past, present or future). This can be done with a general mathematical description of the motion of the satellite (in other words, some equations), and some parameters specific to a particular satellite. The parameters essentially describe a position at a particular point in time (called the epoch), as well as the speed and direction of the object at that time. The most common parameter set is called the Keplerian Elements.Satellite tracking is aiming your binoculars, telescope, or radio antenna (beam or dish) at the predicted location of the satellite, and then following its predicted motion. Depending on the circumstances, this can be an entirely automated procedure, or it can be as simple as looking up at the proper quadrant of the sky at the right time, according to a pre-printed table (called an "ephemeris").
These topics are particularly interesting to amateur radio operators, since there are a number of artificial earth satellites which serve as radio relay stations for "hams". TVRO enthusiasts may also be interested in expanding their knowledge beyond the geostationary satellites (which are particularly easy to track since they don't appear to move). Others may be interested in visually observing the space station Mir, the space shuttle, or other objects. Some satellites can also be heard on simple scanner radios, and interesting information including pictures of the earth from weather satellites can be decoded from their transmissions.

What is WinOrbit ?

WinOrbit is a free software package for Microsoft Windows (3.1 or later), which will compute and display the position of artificial earth satellites. This is a program I wrote as a hobby, in order to learn more about satellite orbits and tracking (and programming), but which I thought might also be useful to others.
More information is also available here on the following topics:

• Detailed description of the program
• Installation instructions and other information
• Download the software.
• Preview the online help file. These pages are a bit out of date, but give the general idea. Please refer to the help file actually delivered with your copy of the program for the correct description of current features. These pages were created from the Windows Help Compiler source files using the WinHelp to Web converter by Jean-Phillipe Donnio.
• Look at some sample screen displays and ephemeris printouts.
• Troubleshooting aids: Current Buglist and New bugs and problems
• About the author

Sec Software

In the Telescope Techniques department in the August 2000 issue of Sky & Telescope (PDF of article), associate editor Gary Seronik and telescope maker Alan Adler discuss how to determine the optimal size of a secondary mirror for a Newtonian telescope. Adler provided a helpful DOS utility called Sec,which you can download here. Be sure to select "Save program to disk" when prompted.

Flex Software

In the Telescope Techniques department in the November 2000 issue of Sky & Telescope (PDF of article) Alan Adler described a revolutionary way of shaping telescope mirrors that circumvents much of the labor needed to grind a paraboloidal mirror. Adler took a spherical mirror and flexed it to produce a paraboloid. The article features a DOS program called Flex to simplify the process, which you can download here. Be sure to select "Save program to disk" when prompted, and unzip the file using an uncompressing utility, such as 7-zip or StuffIt Expander.