Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2019/06/17

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Subject: [Leica] IMG: Galileo was right
From: hlritter at bex.net (Howard L Ritter Jr)
Date: Mon, 17 Jun 2019 11:20:33 -0400
References: <04db4b8a-388a-9303-5e68-cc85562a31fd@gmail.com>

That?s a pretty good image for the lens, Peter, and some optimization would 
make it even more impressive.

In your shot, the relatively small image size of the moons, which are 
effectively point sources at this FL, suggests that you could capture 
Jupiter's atmospheric cloud bands if you avoid the overexposure of this 
image. In photographing the rich but low-contrast detail in the atmosphere, 
overexposure is your enemy. Underexposure, with enhancement in post-exposure 
processing, can record nice detail, while overexposure that saturates 
anything more than a few of the brightest pixels irretrievably obliterates 
detail. You might try it again at 1/30 and shorter, and play with the result 
in PS Camera Raw, especially the exposure, contrast, clarity, and dehaze 
sliders. You might lose the moons at optimal exposure for the atmosphere, 
but you could do a composite image.

And of course the sweet spot for resolution is somewhere between wide open, 
where diffraction-limited resolution is best but aberrations can occur, and 
fully stopped down, where aberrations are negligible but diffraction-limited 
resolution is worst. If you can find resolution-vs-aperture data for this 
lens, that might guide you. At f/11, the effective aperture of a 300-mm lens 
is just over 1 inch, which by the Rayleigh criterion has a resolving power 
of about 4.5 seconds of arc. (The angular diameter of the Galilean moons is 
about 1 arcsec, and of Jupiter, currently at opposition, about 45 arcsec.) 
You might experiment with larger apertures once you?ve found the optimal 
exposure time at f/11. If your lens goes to f/5.6, you could double your 
resolution ? even if that?s wide open, the aberrations might affect mostly 
the off-axis portions of the image.

Sorry if I?ve turned a trip to the playground into a regimented chore! If 
you try any of this, please post. If I ever get clear weather, I?ll put my 
M240 on my 155-mm f/7 apo refractor and see what I can get.

?howard


> On Jun 17, 2019, at 5:06 AM, Peter Klein via LUG <lug at leica-users.org> 
> wrote:
> 
> <https://www.flickr.com/photos/24844563 at 
> N04/48078173256/in/dateposted-public/>
> 
> Jupiter and its four largest moons.  E-M5 on tripod, my $30 bargain-bin 
> 300mm Soligor lens, 1/8 sec at f/11, 100% pixels. One could do better with 
> a telescope, but I thought it would be fun to see what I could get with 
> what I had on hand.  Enjoy!
> 
> --Peter
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Leica Users Group.
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Replies: Reply from abridge at mac.com (Adam Bridge) ([Leica] IMG: Galileo was right)
In reply to: Message from boulanger.croissant at gmail.com (Peter Klein) ([Leica] IMG: Galileo was right)