Webcam                     

	General information		Mars
	Sun		Jupiter
	Moon		Saturn
	Mercury		Stars
	Venus with transit June 8, 2004

General information

For some time, many amateur astronomers from all over the world are experimenting with small webcams.

Webcams are nice for taking some shots of the Sun (with filter), Moon, planets and bright stars. Which type is most suitable for this kind of photography is still hard to tell. You should look for a webcam that has a CCD-chip. On the Internet, you can find manuals to modify certain types of webcams for long exposures and cooling. If you are lucky maybe you can find an amateur to be so kind to modify it for you. In any case, to a certain extent, webcams will prove to be a nice alternative for a (very expensive) CCD-camera.

It is less known that such cameras can produce very nice pictures when used in combination with a telescope. Normally, webcams are much cheaper than a good ocular, $40 to $150. (Photo: Philips Vesta Pro with adapter).

There are a lot of new developments. There are people working on adjusting cameras and writing software to obtain longer exposure times. There are also people working on various cooling systems. There are a great number of websites available now that deal with these technical improvements. Amateurs are working with all kinds of cameras, video cameras and recorders, surveillance cameras, different kinds of software and so on.

The latest developments are great. By modifying the electronics of webcams like the Vesta Pro and ToUCam Pro longer exposure times are possible now. High quality images of deep sky objects are published already. Even CCD owners should give this some attention.

Take a look at the QCUIAG website (QuickCam and Unconventional Imaging Astronomy Group) and join the QCUIAG at Yahoo Groups.

New software programs, like Astrostack, AstroVideo, K3CCDTools and others, make it possible to combine many images with short exposure times. The result is a "long exposure" image. This way, imaging some deep sky objects will also be possible for people with small budgets. At the moment, good to excellent results are already being made! Some amateurs can produce images with such a high resolution, thanks to improved image enhancement and other techniques, that even CCD-owners are amazed over the quality of these images.

I prefer to use a Philips ToUcamPro 740k webcam at the moment because it has a CCD-chip inside. You can find my best and recent webcam images on this page and a lot of them were made with this camera. Play around with the camera settings to gain experience.

I took a lot of pictures with different webcams to gain some experience. In the beginning, it was done more out of curiosity. However, this is changing now. Webcams prove to be a great tool for amateurs and very affordable as well.

First, a small surgery is needed. The lens has to be removed from the webcam. Some cameras also have an infrared filter; that has to come off. If this is needed, the camera can not function as normal anymore (wrong colours). The lenses can sometimes easily be removed. Other cameras have to be opened to reach them. It all depends on the type of your camera. When this is done, you have to find a way to attache the webcam to the telescope and it is ready to use. You can build your own adapter or buy one from amateurs or shops.

Once you have connected the webcam to your telescope, the image can be focussed as usual and watched on your computer screen. A laptop is handy. Tip: try imaging in daylight first. Everyone with a telescope and webcam should try this.

Of course, a webcam can also be used in the normal way, on a tripod. Try to capture the orbit of a bright satellite like an Iridium flare or the International Space Station, it's fun and easy. See: Heavens-Above Main Page. Type in your coordinates and watch the sky at the given times for the pass of the named satellites.

A webcam can not only be used for taking still images but also to produce nice animated gifs. For example: in combination with a H-alpha-filter, webcams can be very nice for capturing prominences on the Sun as shown below!

Click on the thumbnails for a larger image.
(Download the animated gifs and run them from your harddisk for the best result.)

Sun

A giant sunspot on May 1, 2005. Diameter about 5 times larger than our Earth. It was an easy target for the naked eye, looking through a filter. Left: 300mm Pentor telelens with Baader solar screen. Right: Celestron C11 with a Thousand Oakes Type II+ solar filter. Both images with a ToUCam Pro 740k webcam. The seeing was rather poor.

A new, giant group of sunspots, on August 15. This group was also visible with the naked eye. Image: C11 with Thousand Oakes Type II+ solar filter and a ToUCam 740k webcam. The seeing has been poor a few weeks but nevertheless a lot of details could be seen.

This giant group of sunspots was 20 times larger than Earth on July 24, 2004. The group was well visible to the naked eye through eclipse glasses or other solar filters. On one of the images a bird flew by; a pretty sight. Left image: 300mm telelens and Baader Solar screen filter. Right image: C11 with Thousand Oakes Type II+ solar filter. Both images: ToUCam 740k webcam.

Left: a fast growing prominence on November 6, 2003! Animated gif, 678 kb. The movie was made from 44 images. Right: this image shows the whole scene. Several more prominences were visible around the Sun. Celestron C11, Daystar T-scanner H-alpha filter, ToUcam Pro 740k webcam.

During the last week of October 2003, the Sun produced some exceptional large eruptions. Large sunspots were visible with the naked eye! High speed CME's shot into space and toward Earth. There were some concerns about blackouts of power plants. Several geomagnetic storms collided with our atmosphere and produced magnificent auroras, even at lower latitudes. Unfortunately the seeing was very bad and there was only one hour or so without clouds in a week. So: happy to get at least these few images of the sunspots that caused the upheaval.

Nice and detailed prominences on September 9, 2003. Equipment: C11, Daystar T-scanner H-alpha filter and a ToUcam Pro 740k webcam.

This nice prominence, shaped like a torch, appeared on June 2, 2003. Only the bottom part is shown here. It was well over 100.000 km in height and far too large to totally fit in the field of view of the camera. Equipment: C11, Daystar T-scanner H-alpha filter and a Vesta Pro webcam.

The four new images of some great prominences shown here and below, were made on June 1, 2003. Equipment: C11, Daystar T-scanner H-alpha filter and a Vesta Pro webcam. Barely visible in the image to the left, at the limb of the Sun above the prominence, is the large group of sunspots that dominated the face of Sun for over a week. See sunspot images below.

These images also date from June 1, 2003 and were taken about one minute apart. Visually these prominences showed an incredible amount of detail. Within half an hour these giant eruptions were almost completely gone! Both new animated gifs were rotated for more convenient viewing.

Changing sunspots on June 6, 7, 8 and 9, 2003. See next images for more details.

The previous images combined to animated gifs, show a rotating and turbulent Sun. Left: 300 mm telelens with Solar Screen and Vesta Pro webcam. Right: Celestron C11. Vesta Pro webcam, and Thousand Oakes Type II Plus Solar Filter.

These images show a large group of sunspots. Sunspots look different, day after day. Also the Sun's rotation is visible. The images were taken on May 29, 30 and 31 2003, with a Vesta Pro webcam, C11 and Thousand Oakes Type II Plus Solar Filter

Our active Sun on August 16, 17 and 18, 2002. A giant spot and some nice prominences despite rather poor seeing. Visually, always much better.

A large number of nice, detailed sunspots on July 28, 2002. The size of Earth is indicated for comparison. Although the solar maximum is over, the activity will not suddenly be over. We will be able to enjoy these larger groups and spots for some time to come. Even at solar minimum, there will always be some spots.

This huge group of sunspots was photographed on July 2, 2002. It was one of the largest during the present maximum of solar activity. When looking at the Sun through a filter, the group was an easy target for the naked eye. For this image, I used the C11, a Vesta Pro webcam and a Thousand Oakes Solar II Plus filter.

In August and September 2001, the Sun showed an amazing amount of sunspots. This group, which showed many details, was captured on September 3. Vesta Pro webcam, C11 and a Thousand Oakes Solar II Plus solar filter.

A large prominence with a Vesta Pro webcam, C11 and Daystar T-scanner H-alpha solar filter system. Image: July 27, 2001.

Prominence with a Vesta Pro webcam, C11 and Daystar T-scanner H-alpha solar filter system. This image was made on October 22, 2000. On the right: an animated gif of 2 webcam images, made 10 minutes apart. (No larger image available)

Prominence on June 12, 2001, with a Vesta Pro webcam, C11 and Daystar T-scanner H-alpha solar filter system.

Prominence with a Vesta Pro webcam, C11 and Daystar T-scanner H-alpha solar filter system. Six single shot frames were used to produce this animated gif. It looks like a giant waterfall. The seeing on June 26, 2001, was rather poor. Nevertheless it was well worth the effort!

One single frame of the previous animated gif. It is nice to compare prominences. This one is seen nearly edge-on.

This prominence was seen on July 3, 2001. Here, we have a front view of a solar giant. Often, such bright eruptions change in very short time.; a very spectacular sight.

This nice filament appeared on February 16, 2002. It was about 150.000 km in length. It looked a bit like the forked tongue of a snake.

This nice prominence was captured on April 6, 2002, with the C11 and the Vesta Pro webcam. The animated gif to the right was made from two images, taken about 10 minutes apart.

Moon

When the terminator (day-night line) runs exactly over Copernicus and the Carpathian Mountains, you can see one of the most beautiful and impressive landscapes on the Moon. The crater has nice terrace shaped walls. Its central mountains are 1200 meters in height. The rim of the crater stands about 900 meters tall above its surroundings. To the lower middle is crater Reinhold (48 km / 3260 m). Celestron C11 and Philips ToUCam Pro 740k webcam.

The largest crater is Copernicus (93 km / 3760 m). To the upper right, we see Eratosthenes (58 km / 3570 m). The crater Stadius (69 km) is barely visible. In the distant past, it was almost completely filled with lava. From Stadius to the top of the image, a long chain of small craters can be seen. They were probably formed by the impact that formed Copernicus. At the top right is the crater Phyteas (20 km / 2530 m). Celestron C11 and Philips ToUCam Pro 740k webcam.

The total Lunar eclipse of November 8/9, 2003. A beautiful sight under excellent viewing conditions. Images with a ToUcam Pro 740k webcam and a 300mm telelens, combined into an animated gif. Totality was from 02.08 to 02.30 hours. The whole eclipse took some 6 hours. The next total eclipse will take place on May 4, 2004.

Archimedes (83 km/2.150 m) and surroundings and Montes Apenninus (600 km). The highest mountain peaks are 5 km.

Top: Ptolemaeus (153 km/2.400 m); right middle: Albategnius (136 km); left middle: Alphonsus (118 km / 2.730 m); bottom left: Arzachel (97 km / 3.610 m).

This is a composition of 7 Vesta Pro webcam images. Many nice details can be seen here. The seeing was pretty good.

C11 with Logitech Quickcam Express.

A picture of the large craters Theophilus, Cyrillus and Catharina and surroundings, taken with the C11 and a Logitech Quickcam Express.

A picture of the prominent crater Piccolomini (centre) and surroundings, taken with the C11 and a Logitech Quickcam Express.

A picture of Mare Nectaris, the large crater Fracastorius and Piccolomini and surroundings, taken with the C11 and Logitech Quickcam Express.

A great picture of some beautiful lunar mountain shadows. Half hidden in the dark, parts of the craters Cassini, Aristillus and Autolycus can be seen. Image with C11 and Vesta Pro webcam, May 2001.

This canyon, Rima Hyginus, is the best of its kind for amateurs and even visible in small telescopes. Length: 220 kilometres. This Vesta Pro webcam image was taken on June 30, 2001. Even with a webcam, the large system of canyons to the right of the dark crater Triesnecker (26 km/2.760 m), just below the centre, is visible! Normally a much harder target to see!

The walls of Gassendi and the mountains in the centre of the crater catch the first sunlight. The bottom of the large crater (110 km/1.860 m) is still in the dark. The smaller crater just above, in Gassendi's great wall, is Gassendi A (33 km/3.600 m). Image with C11 and Vesta Pro webcam, June 30, 2001.

Crater Maurolycus and surroundings, May 2001. To the left with Vesta Pro webcam in prime focus, to the right with 2x Barlow. Very nice pictures, despite rather average seeing.

Sinus Iridum. The image quality not alone depends of the instruments used but also of the seeing. That was not to good on June 30, 2001. That makes it very hard to obtain large and sharp images. For comparison: left: 352 x 288 pixels; right: 640 x 480 pixels. Vesta Pro webcam.

The beautiful craters Clavius (225 km) and Moretus (114 km) with central mountain. Left: original size. Right: resize (half) and sharpened more. All images on this page show that webcams do have a future in astrophotography. Vesta Pro webcam, June 30, 2001.

These detailed images show Clavius (centre) and Maginus (top). Its bottom is totally hidden in the dark. Maginus is 163 km wide. The image on the left, shows the area at sunset. The smaller dark crater to the bottom of the image is Gruemberger (94 km). On the right, we see the same area, at sunrise. The image was made on May 20, 2002.

This Vesta Pro webcam image also shows Clavius in great detail as well as its spectacular surroundings.

Mare Imbrium and Montes Apenninus. The prominent crater Eratosthenes has nice terrace shaped walls and central mountains (58 km/3570 m). When the Moon is full, this crater is barely visible due to the lack of shades. Between Eratosthenes and Copernicus (bottom left) we can see a long string of small craters.

The mighty craters of Copernicus and Eratosthenes dominate the lunar landscape.

Rupes Recta, the Straight Wall. It was believed to be a large cliff. However, it proved to be a gentle slope of 7 percent. It has a length of 110 km. It is 2,5 km wide and between 240 and 300 m in height. Left of the Straight Wall, we can see the smaller craters of Birt (17 km / 3470 m) with Birt A (6,8 km / 1040 m) and Rima Birt (50 km). The image on the right was made on May 20, 2002.

These images of Rupes Recta, the Straight Wall, show very well how different the same terrain looks when the Sun illuminates the landscape from different angles.

Crater Harpalus (39 km, centre bottom) and surroundings. The large crater to the right is J. Herschel (156 km).

Vallis Schröteri is a 160 kilometre long valley. It varies in width from 500 meters to 10 kilometres and is up to 1 kilometre in depth. The two large craters are Herodotes (35 km) and Aristarchus (40 km / 3.000 m).

Mercury

Usually, Mercury is hard to find. Many people have never seen this planet. However, when you have a well-aligned telescope with setting circles, the elusive planet is fairly easy to find in a deep blue sky. Just a few days after Mercury passed behind the Sun, I took this image in broad daylight. The tiny planet was just 11 degrees from the Sun. The disk was illuminated 90.45%. A few weeks later it will be a large crescent. Mercury orbits the Sun in just 88 days! Be very careful while observing because Mercury is always very close to the Sun! Image with Celestron C11 and ToUCam Pro 740k webcam, on June 28, 2004. Best 100 separate images stacked from an avi-file of 600 images.

Mercury transit, May 7, 2003, 08:02 - 08:35; animated gif (390 kb). The sequence was made from 11 images, each 3 minutes apart. Maksutov 500mm telelens, Solar Screen filter and a Vesta Pro webcam.

Mercury transit, May 7, 2003. Left: 09:13. Right: 12:26. Blue skies but average seeing during the whole event. Single shot images. Celestron C11, f/3.3 focal reducer, Thousand Oakes Solar Filter Type II and a Vesta Pro webcam.

Mercury transit, May 7, 2003, 10.54. Image in primary focus of the telescope. Celestron C11, Thousand Oakes Solar Filter Type II and Vesta Pro webcam.

Mercury transit, May 7, 2003, 11:45 - 12:32; animated gif (336 kb). The sequence was made from 9 images, each 5 minutes apart. Celestron C11, f/3.3 focal reducer, Thousand Oakes Solar Filter Type II and a Vesta Pro webcam.

Mercury transit, May 7, 2003, 12:13 - 12:32; animated gif (448 kb). The sequence was made from 20 images, each 1 minute apart. Celestron C11, f/3.3 focal reducer, Thousand Oakes Solar Filter Type II and a Vesta Pro webcam.

Venus

Combination of my best 2004 Venus images, transit included, from March 28 until August 8. On June 16 the planet was illuminated 1,87% an the size was 56 arcseconds. On August 8 Venus was illuminated 44% and was only 26 arcseconds in size. I hope to get the whole cycle of the Venus year this way.

The new look of Venus after the June 8 transit. The crescent will grow fast while the size of the planet gets smaller again. These images were taken on June 15 and 28, and July 17, 2004. Celestron C11 and ToUCam Pro 740k webcam.

The Venus transit seen from the ecliptic (top) and local view (bottom). To the right: the dramatic changes of Venus in just a few weeks time. Venus crossed the Sun on June 8, 2004. The next opportunity to observe Venus again was on June 12. The seeing was bad and there were only 30 seconds to look all day; than the clouds rushed in again for days. The small crescent was about 250 degrees; a fantastic view. No imaging was possible. Just rain....

The final phase of the Venus transit with the C11 telescope, focal reducer f 3.3, Vesta Pro webcam and Thousand Oakes Solar Filter Type II. The day of the transit was perfect but it rained a lot on the next 6 days so no new images of the new look of Venus could be made since. The crescent of Venus is on the left side now and is growing wider while the planet is getting smaller every day.

Composition of 13 images, showing the path of Venus in front of our Sun. Distance Earth - Sun on June 8, 2004: 152.265.000 kilometre. Distance Earth - Venus: 43.335.000 kilometre. During the first days of April 2005, as seen from Earth, Venus will be at it's largest distance, on the other side of the Sun: about 258.690.000 kilometre.

Size: 1,4 Mb

This animated gif was made from 21 images out of a series of 94. ToUCam Pro 740k webcam + Baader Solar Filter + 300 mm telelens. Images resized to 75%. Smaller version 50% 704 Kb. Smaller version 25% 199 Kb.

Most of my Venus transit images were made with a Celestron C11, focal reducer f 6.3, Vesta Pro webcam, ToUCam 740k webcam. I added images of my observatory during the Venus transit.

Comparison of the Venus (2004) and Mercury (2003) transit.

Image with handheld (!) Olympus C-4000 ZOOM digital camera through an ocular of 15 mm focal length.

The final images of the 6 hour Venus transit.

Venus in 2004.

Venus in 2004.

Venus in broad daylight, on March 29, 2004. Magnitude -4.50. The crescent of Venus can even be seen in the viewfinder of the telescope and in binoculars.

Mars

Mars in 2003, from July until November. As Mars came closer to Earth, its size increased rapidly. After the 55 million km "close encounter" in the end of August, the planet moved away again. Not only the planets size shrunk. The size of Mars' southern polar cap shrunk also considerably.

Mars on August 28, 2003, just a few hours before its closest approach. A beautiful view through the telescope. The images were made from 3 avi files. First, the 300 best separate images of each avi file were combined to one image each and then processed into an animated gif.

Mars on July 28, 2003 with a ToUcam Pro webcam. This is a combination of a number of separate images from an avi-file. The seeing was average. Check out the Mars Profiler from Sky and Telescope! A Mars globe for every minute of the day of your choice.

Mars on July 20, 2003 with a ToUcam Pro webcam. This is a combination of 30 separate images from an avi-file. The seeing was not to good. Nice image anyway with this technique. Many details and a nice polar cap. The Mars simulation website is also nice for Mars observers.

Jupiter

Jupiter on May 26, 28 and 31, 2005. Seeing was rather poor so the amount of detail in the images is not perfect. Thanks to image processing with K3CCDTools, the results are far better than could be expected from looking at the original avi files. Images were combined into animated gifs with Animation Shop. Celestron C11, Barlowlens 2x, ToUcam Pro 740k webcam.

Left: Jupiter and the Red Spot, March 28, 2004. Celestron C11, Barlowlens 2x, Philips ToUcam 740k webcam. Right: animated gif of 4 images.

My best images of Jupiter and the Red Spot so far, made on March 28, 2004. At last a day with pretty good seeing and that makes all the difference. Celestron C11, Barlowlens 2x, Philips ToUcam Pro 740k webcam.

Jupiter with it's four largest moons and Callisto's shadow. These images were made on February 16, 2002, with a Vesta Pro webcam. The image to the left is a composition image because Jupiter was a bit overexposed in the original image. Jupiter's size however is exactly correct.

Although CCD-camera give a much better and sharper image, these pictures of Jupiter are excellent for a webcam. For these pictures, I used a Logitech Quickcam VC. Left with a Barlowlens 2x and on the right without it. This webcam is nice for capturing Jupiter's moons. My first attempt with a webcam. In the mean time, imaging techniques with webcams have improved a lot, as shown above.

Saturn

This is how Saturn looked through the telescope on March 28, 2004. Notice the shadow of the planets on its rings. Seeing: only 6 on a scale from 0 to 10. Celestron C11, Barlowlens 2x, Philips ToUcam Pro 740k webcam, processed with K3CCDTools.

A great picture of Saturn with my Vesta Pro webcam, a 3x Barlowlens and C11. This image was made by combining a number individual images from an avi-file. This is my best until now, especially because of its large size. I used Astrostack and Paint Shop Pro. Seeing was even far from good. Date: December 6, 2001.

Very nice detailed Vesta Pro webcam images, made on September 14, 2001. On the left original images; on the right, slightly processed images (sharpened).

Saturn in the C11 with a Logitech Quickcam VC and 2x Barlowlens; its magic. The Cassini division as well as the planet's shadow on its rings, are clearly visible. Not bad for a webcam that was attached to the telescope with 3 pieces of Scotch Magic tape. I did this for Jupiter and Saturn.The images are magic also. My second webcam image. In the mean time, imaging techniques with webcams have improved a lot, as shown above.

Stars

The famous "Double double star" in the constellation of Lyra, photographed at the primary focus of my C11 with a Vesta Pro webcam. The image was enhanced in contrast to obtain a sharper image of the four stars. They were a bit fuzzy at first. The result turned out very nice.

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