ajamesmccarthy

My first images from my new backyard in Arizona

Saturn and Jupiter, with a guest appearance from Io, the best I’ve been able to capture so far.

I'm back! Now shooting from the darker skies of Florence, Arizona

Quick update for you- I successfully relocated from Elk Grove, California to Florence, Arizona. This move was done for a few reasons, but one of the most important is the darker & clearer skies from this location. I'll hopefully be in a regular cadence of imaging soon, after far too long away from the camera. In the meantime, here is a slightly reprocessed version of my 230 megapixel sun shot, my clearest ever from when it was taken. 

I'll try and get the celestial events post ...

A photo taken moments ago of the sun. Something major just erupted!

Don't worry. This won't hurt us :)

The shop is back online in 45 minutes, and I have a discount for you...

As a thank you to my patrons I wanted to extend a discount for you for my store relaunch. Enter CosmicPatron (case sensitive) at checkout to get 20% off your item (limit one per customer... sorry). Check it out at cosmicbackground.io starting at 5pm pacific.

These are two of the images I remastered for the launch, they're the ones that got me shortlisted as astrophotographer of the year! Also, for the first time ever, I am offering my work in metal. I have one hung up o...

The Sadr region of space. You can see many types of formations in this image.

This is entirely artificial color. Unlike other false color images where the colors are simply reassigned, this is essentially painted. In true color this nebula looks completely red, like the example I attached. I didn't actually capture it in a way that allows the true color to come through, so that is also artificial, but it is close to accurate coloring. 

Sneak peek at an upcoming image

The incredibly dynamic Lagoon Nebula

The Sunflower Galaxy. A reprocess from an image captured over a year ago.

Saturn & Jupiter from last night

I tried to recreate what my eyes see through the telescope. Of you've never seen them, they look a lot like this. Your eyes pick up much more than the camera does. 

The solar photosphere, captured in white light. Each cell is roughly the size of texas.

Celestial Events in August

Howdy Patrons! Been 2 months since my last one of these, thankfully I can relax a bit since I'm no longer in the midst of house showings, etc for my upcoming move. Who would have thought switching states would be so HARD! There's some good stuff coming this month I really wanted to talk about, and hopefully you'll see my pics shared if I'm successful in capturing these!

August 1st/2nd (Tonight) SATURN AT OPPOSITION!
This only happens once a year, but Saturn will be r...

An absurdly high res pic of the sun from yesterday- 178 megapixels

The Heart Nebula- Stars are born and Die here

A Crisp Full Moon

Saturn last night. Check the attachments for a surprise!

The attached video shows what happens when you shoot Saturn for 2 years!

A gigapixel image featuring our moon

I attached it via dropbox since patreon sometimes has trouble with large images like this. The one uploaded to this post preview is downsized to about 177 megapixels. The full size image is the largest image I've attempted to load on here. 

This has been an ongoing project (the images for the mosaic were actually captured nearly a year ago) I finally had some time to work on this weekend. The biggest challenge is keeping my computer from crashing when working on it. 

Her...

A blend of true color and false color imaging- the North American Nebula

Sometimes it's fun just to create an art piece. Here's a high resolution moon shot with one of my best Jupiter shots, blended with a few daytime shots.

As an aside- I noticed not a lot of people have been reading my "upcoming celestial events" posts. If you want me to keep posting them, let me know! They take some time to put together and with how hectic things have been while preparing for my upcoming move I want to spend my time wherever I can to make you guys happy!

I am slowly packing up my astronomy gear in preparation for my move to Arizona. I will do my best to continue to make fresh content for you though! I officially move 8/2...

What happens when I hand color deep space instead of using real color. See attached for comparison to real colors!

There's this misconception floating around that space is gray, and the colors shown in space images are all fake. Completely not true. It comes from a combined misunderstanding regarding how our eyes work, and how cameras work. Monochrome cameras are used to capture these images, yes, but by cycling through filters they accurately capture the true colors of the objects, the same as any point-and-shoot digitial camera. They are captured this way because it allows for the camera to capture more...

The ISS transiting the waning crescent moon in broad daylight.

Check out the attached for a video of the transit in real time!

My ISS transit shots tend to get the most questions, so I include a write-up exactly how I get them.

First- I check transit-finder.com.
This is a web resource that allows you to put in your location, a time frame, and how far you're willing to drive, and it will spit out results of nearby transits. ...

The solar transit I captured last week from a different telescope- using a white light filter.

11 of my favorite astrophotos in 1 8k image.

I just posted a massive batch of desktop and mobile wallpapers for my $5 patrons, but you are free to download and use this one if you like. It's a nice sampling of the astrophotos I have captured over the last couple years. 

A Whopping 56 Desktop and Mobile Backgrounds- The largest batch I've done

Give your phone or laptop a facelift! It's been a while since I've done one of these, so I spent the weekend going back through my portfolio of high-resolution images and making high-res cuts from the uncompressed image files, to create the largest batch of desktop and mobile wallpapers I've ever done. Please download and use them, and enjoy your fancy-looking device!

The ISS transiting an active region on the sun- if you look closely you can tell they recently modified some of the solar panels!

Bonus post- some activity on the sun today.

Lost in a Dream- a composite piece created from daylight and nighttime shots

This is a composite, created by blending clouds shots taken during the day (yes, that iridescence is completely real) and shots of the moon and stars at night. 

A reprocess of an older dataset, the Trifid Nebula

This is one of my favorite nebulas... it combines emission, reflection, and dark nebulae to create a stunning view of a stellar nursery. 

To those of you subscribed to my aspiring astrophotographer's package, this dataset is available within the dropbox folder I've shared with you, if you would like to take a crack at processing it. 

"Shadows on the Zodiac" My latest 300 megapixel composition, featuring the Moon and Mars among interplanetary dust.

This is a highly detailed photo of the moon (captured during a live stream last night- check my IGTV), set against a simulated band of zodiacal light: the interplanetary dust that is illuminated by the sun. Since it exists in the same space as the Moon and Mars, they cast shadows seemingly against nothing.

Celestial Events in June

I really hope you saw my last post about the one that happened this morning! I completely forgot about this- the downside of turning my hobby into a business is I get distracted by some of the operational stuff and forget about the stuff that I really would rather be doing- like planning epic shots. There actually isn't much happening this month- so I'll add a few more obscure events that may interest you. 

June 10th- New Moon & Annular Eclipse
Always the be...

Tomorrow morning there is an annular eclipse- visible in only some remote locations

This morning I realized I never sent out my monthly digest of celestial events! Been so distracted trying to sort through the print side of my business that I neglected my patrons! I'll send out the digest ASAP. In the meantime- Here's how to see the annular eclipse (if you're in the right location): https://www.space.com/33784-solar-eclipse-guide.html

This image I shared here is a composite ima...