Gary Woodall Astrophoto

Gary Woodall Astrophoto Capturing the Abstract Art of Our Universe. I'm an astrophotographer and retired meteorologist. Visit my website at https://gwastrophoto.weebly.com

A bat flying among the clouds.Here is another of the "deep sky" images from the Big Bend/Davis Mountains trip. The area...
05/29/2026

A bat flying among the clouds.

Here is another of the "deep sky" images from the Big Bend/Davis Mountains trip. The area in the "borderlands" between the constellations Scorpius and Ophiuchus is filled with clouds of dust and hydrogen gas. The red area at the top is glowing ionized hydrogen gas from the Zeta Ophiuchi Nebula, and the area below is dominated by dust clouds reflecting light from nearby stars.

The small dark strip just below center is object LDN 43, nicknamed the "Cosmic Bat Nebula". It is an area of dust thick enough to completely block out the light from behind. The bright "reflection nebula" towards the lower left is LBN5, which is dust reflecting light from the bright star 24 Ophiuchi. Both of these are catalogued in astronomer Beverly Lynds' surveys of bright (LBN) and dark (LDN) nebulae.

I used my 180mm "wide field" telescope for this image. I shot 2 1/2 hours of "normal color" exposures, then switched to my nebula filter and shot an additional hour. I combined the exposures to keep the natural color and give a "boost" to the red hydrogen.

Enjoy!

Here's another Milky Way image from the night of May 15-16. This was a few hours later than the one I posted a couple o...
05/27/2026

Here's another Milky Way image from the night of May 15-16. This was a few hours later than the one I posted a couple of days ago, taken at about 3:32 AM. It was more "upright" and fit better into a vertical orientation.

Nerdy details:
Camera: Nikon Z6 ii
Lens: Viltrox 16mm at F/2.2
Exposure: 15 seconds at ISO 6400
Processing: Adobe Lightroom, Pleiades PixInsight, Adobe Photoshop

Enjoy!

While on the Big Bend/Davis Mountains trip, I also did some imaging of deep-sky targets (of course!). This is object Sh...
05/26/2026

While on the Big Bend/Davis Mountains trip, I also did some imaging of deep-sky targets (of course!). This is object Sh 2-1, the first object listed in astronomer Stewart Sharpless' survey of nebulae. Sh 2-1 is a combination of ionized hydrogen gas and dust which reflects light from nearby bright stars. It is in the constellation Scorpius and lies about 650 light years from Earth.

For this image, I shot about 3 1/2 hours with my color camera and "normal" filter. I then switched to my nebula filter and shot an hour. Combining the two helped boost the signal from the red hydrogen areas.

Geeky details:

Scope: Askar FRA300 (300mm focal length)
Camera: ZWO ASI2600MC Pro
Filters: Baader UV/IR cut (color), Altair Ha/Oiii nebula
Mount: ZWO AM5
Exposures: Color - 52 x 4 min; Nebula - 12 x 5 min
Processing: Pixinsight WBPP, RC Astro and Seti Astro tools, "typical" processes (multiscale stretch, color calibration, histogram adjustment, etc.), final adjustments in Photoshop

Enjoy! More to come...

Last week was the long-awaited trip to Big Bend and the Davis Mountains. Several of our "Stargazers" group made the tri...
05/26/2026

Last week was the long-awaited trip to Big Bend and the Davis Mountains. Several of our "Stargazers" group made the trip. While the weather/clouds weren't optimal, we did have three pretty good nights.

We spent the first three nights approximately 15 miles north of Study Butte, TX. Yes, it was a really dark sky! The second night was mostly clear, so I had a run at the Milky Way (which rose a little before midnight).

Here are the specifics:
Camera: Nikon Z6 ii
Lens: Viltrox 16mm at F/2.5
Exposure: 15 seconds, ISO 3200
Processed in Lightroom, PixInsight, and Photoshop

Much more to come from the trip!

Hi everyone! Sorry, I've been out of pocket for a few days. Continuing on with the re-processing efforts, back in Octo...
05/18/2026

Hi everyone! Sorry, I've been out of pocket for a few days.

Continuing on with the re-processing efforts, back in October 2024, my imaging project was the star cluster Melotte 15 and the surrounding nebulae. Melotte 15 is sometimes nicknamed "the heart of the Heart", as it is located near the center of the Heart Nebula in Cassiopeia. I put in 12 hours of imaging time with a color camera and two nebula filters - one that focuses on hydrogen and oxygen, and one that isolates sulfur and oxygen.

For the re-processing, I used Seti Astro's "Perfect Palette Picker". I processed using a couple of different palettes, then blended the the two images together.

Enjoy!

PS - hopefully some new images coming soon! We're finally getting out of the dreadful cloud/weather pattern.

This past Saturday evening, we had a nice "Sky Tour" outreach event with the Stargazers group in our community. Bryan an...
05/11/2026

This past Saturday evening, we had a nice "Sky Tour" outreach event with the Stargazers group in our community. Bryan and I set up scopes to do live imaging, and we used a green laser to point out the constellations, planets, and major stars that were visible.

We had 15-18 attendees, including several family members and grandkids! The kids were particularly interested in the scopes and the live stacking.

Bryan targeted the M3 star cluster, a grouping of nearly half a million stars on the edge of the Milky Way. I chose M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy, a spiral galaxy interacting with a nearby companion galaxy. I've attached the results of the stacks after some post-processing. Not bad for about 1 hour and 5 minutes of camera time!

Enjoy!

Super excited to have my Andromeda Galaxy image displayed as part of the “Art Times Two”program! Thanks to Gainesville ...
05/08/2026

Super excited to have my Andromeda Galaxy image displayed as part of the “Art Times Two”program! Thanks to Gainesville Area Visual Arts for organizing the program, and to Saint Joe’s Pizza for hosting me. 👍👍

One of the great things about my astrophotography passion is the ability to help others. Today, I donated my “Cygnus Wal...
05/07/2026

One of the great things about my astrophotography passion is the ability to help others. Today, I donated my “Cygnus Wall“ image to the Boys and Girls Clubs of Cooke County. The image will be included in their upcoming fundraising auction. 

Same subject as my last "re-processing" project, but with a different color palette.Back in July 2024, I imaged the "Cyg...
05/05/2026

Same subject as my last "re-processing" project, but with a different color palette.

Back in July 2024, I imaged the "Cygnus Wall" area of the North America Nebula complex. Located in the constellation Cygnus (makes sense), the nebula lies about 2,600 light years from Earth.

I used my 8 inch reflector telescope with a "focal reducer", which shortened the focal length and increased the light-gathering efficiency of the scope. Still, the focal length was a healthy 1,070mm at F/5.3 for you photography folks. I gathered 3 1/2 hours of exposures using a color camera and a hydrogen/oxygen nebula filter.

For this image, I used several tools and techniques I learned since 2024. I processed it in the "Hubble" false color palette. Areas of ionized hydrogen gas are golden brown, and areas of oxygen and/or dust are blue.

Enjoy!

05/04/2026

Oh my goodness! This past Friday evening, there were a number of strange, shiny little specks in the sky. I think they are called "stars", but I'd forgotten what they were or what they looked like. 😄

I used the rare clear (but very moonlit) night to have a try at the "Antennae Galaxies", two galaxies that are in the process of colliding and merging. Here are the highlights.

I'm still working on a "final" version of the processed image, and will share it when it's ready.

Enjoy!

Continuing the re-processing efforts, although we did have a clear (but very moonlit) night Saturday night.Back in July ...
05/04/2026

Continuing the re-processing efforts, although we did have a clear (but very moonlit) night Saturday night.

Back in July 2024, I imaged the "Cygnus Wall" area of the North America Nebula complex. Located in the constellation Cygnus (makes sense), the nebula lies about 2,600 light years from Earth.

I used my 8 inch reflector telescope with a "focal reducer", which shortened the focal length and increased the light-gathering efficiency of the scope. Still, the focal length was a healthy 1,070mm at F/5.3 for you photography folks. I gathered 3 1/2 hours of exposures using a color camera and nebula filter.

For this image, I used several tools and techniques I learned since 2024. I processed it in the hydrogen/oxygen or "HOO" color palette. Areas of ionized hydrogen gas are red, and areas of oxygen and/or dust are teal blue.

Enjoy!

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