Astronomik CLS Light Pollution filter

[James T Kirk]

I purchased one of these filters about a month ago and I've been dieing to try it http://www.optcorp.com/product.aspx?pid ... -850-13276
Let me tell you it does exactly what it claims.
I went out Monday night and imaged M 57, I haven't processed all the images yet but it looks very promising.
Here are two images of M 57.
The first one is a 4 minute exposure ISO 800 with no filter


This one is a 6 minute exposure ISO 800 with the Astronomik CLS

WOW what a difference !
Before I purchased it I did a lot of reading about different filters and I spoke with Mark and Bob at the open house at U Mass. and I was a little skeptical about buying it,especially because of the price, but not any more this filter works GREAT... I call it "Arizona like"

I'll be posting the final image soon.
If I could only get Astronomik to make an Obama filter.

[Bruce D]

Sweet Manny, the filter really darkened tha background and increased the contrast while retaining the great color capture. I'm looking forward to more images with the new filter!

[Rotorhead]

Very nice, Manny! You even kept the central star in the Ring, which is the real prize when using such a strong filter. Amazing.

[Bruce D]

Manny is that filter different from a ultrablock and other visual LP filters?

[BobSikes]

Good work Manny

I bet you can go even deeper on exposures now without the sky glow

BobS

[Paul D]

Manny,

Did you manage to capture IC 1296 the little 15.0 mag spiral galaxy that is close to the ring? The images are to small for me to see it.

[Rotorhead]

Good thought, Paul. It appears that the star that is almost coincident with 1296 is visible in the unfiltered shot, inside the trapezoid at the 2 o'clock position from the Ring. With my monitor, I can see two faint stars there, and 1296 would be right there around the left one of the two, I believe. On the filtered shot, both stars are suppressed, but the trapezoid is still there. That would be a great challenge for this summer, eh?

[AstroGeek]

Manny,

I am hereby requesting your permission to apply PhotoShop tactics to your original, unfiltered, brown-sky image to see if the filtered image can be digitally defeated. Sounds evil, I know...

At any rate, that is a startling difference. Glad to see you are still taking fine pictures.

Steve

[James T Kirk]

These shots are just one exposure, unprocessed that I converted from RAW to JPEG just to show what the filter does, I have 21 frames @ 6 minutes each that I still have to work on.
I promise to post it soon.

[Mark G]

Nice Post Manny! Nice simple images too! I'm glad you took the time to post both images before & after so to speak. Not bad for New Bedford skies!

Manny is that filter different from a ultrablock and other visual LP filters?

This filter is made for imaging through. The Ultrablock & other visual filters are not made for imaging through. But I think Orion has now an imaging light pollution filter. Just not of the Astronomik quality.

http://www.astronomik.com/en/astronomik_cls_filter.html

The Astronomik CLS blocks the light of the spectral lines of mercury and sodium-vapor lamps and lets the largest part of the visible light and H-alpha emissions pass. All the important emission lines, as well as the spectral region that the very well dark adapted eye can see, can pass through the filter.

http://www.astronomik.com/en/cls/astron ... curve.html

Astronomik´s extraordinarily resistant coating technology, our filters come with a 10year warranty.

http://www.astronomik.com/en/quality.html

Coating:

Contrary to mass produced filters made of colored glass, the substrate of Astronomik filters is not a filter because it is totally transparent. Astronomik filters are made by depositing thin dichroic layers on both sides of this substrate. If you note the specifications of non-MC-coated colored glass filters, there is a loss of light of ~9% at the glass/air boundary. Other manufacturers also have a practice of lowering the cost of their dichroic filters by placing the filter on only one side of the glass carrier material. By contrast, the Astronomik filter layers are deposited on both sides of the glass substrate to deliver the filter effect with an almost perfect reflection: Our normal filter series achieve a maximum transmission of up to 99.6%.