Saturn and Jupiter Conjunction Astrophotography - Views from Different Scopes and Cameras

It seems that the great Saturn and Jupiter conjunction of 2020 even made mainstream media as a nice distraction from an otherwise dreary 2020.    

There is a lot of info below, but the cliff note picture that I was able to get is here:

Jupiter and Saturn - Dec 20, 2020 - Celestron Edge 8  HD with Barlow and ASI294

Essentially Jupiter and Saturn formed a line through space with Earth so that both planets appeared to be right beside each other in the night sky.  They were at their closest point next to each other on the night of Dec. 21, 2020.  They had not been with this degree of proximity in over 400 years and over 800 years since humans were able to view them this close.  That is because in the past when they would have been this close, the sun blocked the view.

https://www.today.com/news/christmas-star-will-show-jupiter-saturn-s-closest-alignment-800-t203057

Due to the rarity of the event I certainly wanted to get a picture.  This conjunction will happen again in 2080 so my kids may see it again, but for me I think this was my only shot.   Unfortunately on the actual night where the two planets were the closest, Indiana clouds covered our sky.  However I was able get the scopes out a couple other nights and still see the planets coming together.   Even then the conditions were not the best, but the clouds gave me a couple breaks to see this amazing celestial event.

I love events like this because it gets other amateur star gazers interested in the hobby.  I remember starting out in the hobby of astrophotography and was so lost in what I needed to see something cool in space.    I still have so much to learn, but I hope that by sharing my experiences I can give some info to help any newcomers to the hobby whether just for visual observation or taking photos.  So during this event I took pictures with two different scopes and two different cameras just to give a flavor of how different scopes and cameras see the beauty of space.

If you want to just look at things visually you really just need a telescope, a mount and some eyepieces to get started.  If you want to take photos then you need a few more things and below is a very simple primer. 

Requirement 1 for Photographing Planets: Camera with video capability

Photographing planets is a bit different that photographing deep sky objects like nebula or galaxies.   For a deep sky object you take a many long exposure pictures an object and then stack all the pictures.   Planets though are difficult little buggers because the atmospheric turbulence make getting a good picture extra tough.   But because they are so bright and you don't need long exposures to see planets, the solution is to actually take a video of the planet.  Once you have a 20-30 second video at 15-30 frames per second then you actually have hundreds of pictures.  Each frame of the video becomes a picture.  Then you can run the video through  a processing software like Autostakkert which splits the frames into pictures and stacks the best pictures together.  So if you want to take pictures of planets you need to have a camera that can take video.

Here is an example of when I took a video of Saturn.  You can see how sometimes the planet gets fuzzy and other times it gets a bit clearer.   Getting perfect atmospheric conditions to get a clear photo is tough, but taking a video can help get lots of pictures so you can stack the best ones and discard the bad ones.

Two common types of cameras that many people use for astrophotography are:

DSLR:  Many DSLR cameras have the ability to take videos.  They can easily be attached to a scope to both take still pictures for deep sky objects or videos for planets.  I used a Nikon D5300 as an example DSLR.

Dedicated Astrophotography cameras:  One of the most popular cameras that have been coming on the market are dedicated CMOS cameras.  Two of the most popular companies that make these are ZWO and QHY.  There are so many of these cameras on the market now and it is hard to always figure out what to get.  They come in monochrome versions and one shot color and are a topic all on their own.  Some of these will do much better at deep sky objects while some are specifically better as planetary cameras, but many will do both.  I use a ZWO ASI294 Pro and while better at deep sky objects can shoot video and is serviceable for planet photography.  

Requirement 2 for Photographing Planets:  Telescope

Planets are bright and many can be seen with the naked eye as bright points in our night sky.   At he same time they are still tiny and require some decent magnification.  Even a small scope though can see the rings of Saturn.  It goes without saying though the bigger the scope the better for good pictures of a planet.   I have two scopes to highlight the differences in what you can see.  

The first is a 90 mm refractor made by Stellarvue.  Refractors use glass lens and thus while they give exceptional views both visually and for photos, they get crazy expensive the bigger they get since making the glass for bigger scopes is harder.  It becomes rarer to see super larger versions of a refractor scope.

The way to get a bigger scope for cheaper is to use mirrors instead of glass.  There are many types of scopes that use mirrors and one of those is called an SCT (Schmidt Cassegrain).   The SCT I used is a Celestron Edge 8 HD SCT.  It is a bit more powerful than the refractor, but not as a user friendly due to being bigger and heavier.

Here,  I was getting the scope ready and the focus dialed in for the night with a quick view of the moon that was up in the day sky.

Optional requirement:  Barlow lens

In general, getting more magnification can help get a better view of a planet.  One trick to help increase your magnification is to use a barlow lens.   These are small lens that can be added to your imaging train and can help double or more your magnification.

Here is the Televue 2.5X Barlow lens I use.  One one side is the T-ring that can go right on a camera and the other is the adapter that screws right on the Celestron Edge 8 HD SCT scope.  It also can screw right into the ASI294 camera making it easy to add to the imaging train.  

Now that we have the equipment we can take some videos!

Example 1:   90 mm Refractor (SV90T) with ASI294 Camera

On the night of Dec 9, 2020 Jupiter and Saturn were still a bit of distance way but they were getting closer.  This is where a small refractor scope can get a nice wide field of the sky and fit both planets.  As you get higher magnification you see a smaller piece of the sky and my larger scope would not be able to see both at the same time.   Even besides planets there are many deep sky objects that take up big parts of the sky and these small grab and go refractors are the go to imaging scope.  If you are thinking about getting in stargazing and astrophotography I would always say a good 80 mm refractor is the perfect scope to get and there are many choices on the market.  

I just used the ASI294 camera in this example directly hooked up to the SV90T (90 mm refractor scope).

In this case I just took one frame of the video to get a picture.

The refractor definitely does not get crazy detail, but the wide field of view in nice as you can see both planets even when they were still a bit far away.   While the planets are small, the refractor can still see the rings of Saturn.  If you were using this scope for visual observation, a good eyepiece could get an better magnification of Saturn.   This is the scope I used to visually to see the rings of Saturn for the first time in my life many years ago and it hooked me!!    Even with the wide field picture if you zoon in you can see what you would see with the scope if looking at Saturn.

Example 2:   Edge 8 HD (SCT) with ASI 294 Camera

On Dec 20, 2020, the planets were pretty close and I was able to fit both of them in the field of view with my bigger scope.  

In this example I used the ASI294 camera and no barlow lens with the Celestron Edge 8.  

The planets look a little bit bigger than with the 90 mm refractor.  However they are still pretty small.

Example 3:  Edge 8 HD with Barlow and ASI 294 Camera

Right after taking the video with no Barlow, I added the Barlow lens to the imaging train and took a new video.  That Barlow is a nice way to get some added magnification.  You can see the planets show a little bigger.

I took that same video and processed it through Autostakert and Registax to get the following picture which probably ended up being my favorite.

Example 4:  Edge 8 with Barlow and Nikon D5300 camera

I missed the actual night where the planets where the closest, but got some breaks in the clouds on Dec. 22.  In the case I kept the Celestron Edge 8 HD scope, but replaced the ASI294 camera with the Nikon D5300 DSLR camera.   The Barlow stayed in the imaging train.

The DSLR shows that it can still get a decent video and picture.   The same video was processed for the resulting picture. 

One nice thing about the DSLR is there is usually a "5X" zoom feature that can use the camera to get even more magnification.    The more you magnify the more the atmospheric conditions need to be perfect to get a good picture.   I did not have great atmospheric conditions, but was still able to get a video of the planets in a much more zoomed state using the added camera magnification feature.  I took the resulting video where I zoomed into each plant individually and processed the video in Autostakkert and Registax.

Here is Jupiter with the DSLR.   Again a lot of atmospheric turbulence, but you can see the hints on the banding on Jupiter. 

Jupiter - Nikon D5300 - Dec 22 

The same process for Saturn using the DSLR zoom feature and then processed shows the rings quite clearly.

Saturn - Nikon D5300 - Dec 22

All in all, this was an amazing event.  The fact that both planets got so close and could fit in the same field of view is so cool.  The pictures some other folks in the hobby put what I got to shame, but there is something about taking a photo or seeing something in space from your own backyard that is always special.

If you get into photographing planets taking the video and processing the video is also a learning curve.  I will not spend a lot off time here, but can just a give a primer.

Capturing and Processing Planetary Video and Pictures.

Step 1:   Use software to capture the video.

If using a DSLR:   My favorite software is actually BackyardNikon (or BackYardEOS).  It was built to connect your DSLR to a computer and control it for imaging from a scope.  Once connected it has a "planetary" button.   Hit the button, focus the scope and then hit record.  The movies will be saved to the computer.  Link:  https://www.otelescope.com/store/category/4-backyardnikon/

If using a CMOS camera then Firecapture is my favorite software.   Again just connect the camera to a computer.  Pick the planet you want to capture and you will see the live view.  Once in focus you can record the video that will save to your computer.  Link:  http://www.firecapture.de/

Step 2:  Process the video to individual photos and stack them.

The go to software to load your videos, pull out each frame a s a picture and stack in Autostakkert.

Link:  https://www.autostakkert.com/

Just follow the three steps to get your final photo once you load the video.

Step 3:  Clean the photo up

There are many ways to help clean the phot up a bit.  Many people use RegiStax which can just take some noise out of the picture to make it a bit clearer.  Link:  https://www.astronomie.be/registax/

Load your stacked photo and then just use the slides to help denoise your photo.

Photoshop or Affinity are other software that can help with processing too.

If you ever get a chance to take a peek at the planets through your own scope or a friends one night it is something you will not forget.  

Here were a couple other blog posts I did in the past on planets if you wanted to read more.

http://atransgenicworld.blogspot.com/2018/06/getting-picture-of-jupiter-firecapture.html

http://atransgenicworld.blogspot.com/2018/07/a-summer-of-planets-jupiter-saturn-and.html