Art on Hill's Space

It's M42!

hillexed@email.com (hillexed) — Sat, 17 Feb 2024 00:15:58 +0000

Since Orion was so high in the sky compared to my last photo I was curious if photos would look better… and they do!

This is one 1/2s phone pic, scaled to hell and back to bring out the “bat wings”: big dark edges that go from bottom left to top right. Now I know there’s many ways to make this better, such as motorizing or a bigger telescope or stacking multiple pictures - but for just one phone pic this isn’t that bad!

The Art Of Figuring

hillexed@email.com (hillexed) — Thu, 08 Feb 2024 18:00:57 +0000

This pretty art piece is actually a precise measurement of my progress in telescope mirror grinding. It looked fun enough out of context I decided to post it!

You’re looking at multiple overlaid square images. Each one is a Ronchi test, which tells me the shape of my mirror on a nanometer scale in the shape of the red stripes. As I polish the mirror, it changes shape, so after 20 minutes of polishing I want to measure the new shape. Each time I test, I precisely align my handheld tester, and then take a photo with my phone. Since the tester is in a different place at a time, I have to place my phone on its corner and lean it to one side to put the camera at the right height - but that rotates the image, so afterwards I load up the Ronchi test images in Krita and de-rotate them so the stripes go up and down, so I can compare the images as I grind. You’re looking at a Krita file with many Ronchi images, each rotated and scaled so the mirror is the same size and in the same place. It makes a nice flower shape!

The Art Of Figuring

hillexed@email.com (hillexed) — Thu, 08 Feb 2024 18:00:57 +0000

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This pretty art piece is actually a precise measurement of my progress in telescope mirror grinding. It looked fun enough out of context I decided to post it!