This is not an officially recognized name, I just made it up. But I think it's obvious why I'm calling this object The Snowman Nebula. Actually it is know as Sharpless 2-302, an emission nebula in Puppis. Click here to see a larger version of my image of The Snowman Nebula.
I took the image last Wednesday and Thursday nights, during about the worst conditions possible short of clouds. The seeing was terrible, it was very windy, and the moon was full and high. I didn't have an observing plan, so I just clicked around in my planetarium software, casually looking for a target. I wasn't sure what I would see but I decided to give Sh2-302 a try. When I saw the first H-Alpha image I knew it would be an interesting object, because I could see the inky dark lane going clear across the faint nebula.
At this time of year, seasonal topics are on my mind; and even though it's not snowy in Tucson, I did grow up in the Northeastern U.S. so I'm quite familiar with snowy winter nights. As a kid I enjoyed building snowmen with my friends, and who doesn't remember the heartwarming story of Frosty the Snowman. So when I processed this, the snowman stood out plain as day.
I think I will put this on my Target list (by the way, I'm using a new software program called CCDNavigator which helps in planning observing sessions and organizing target lists, I highly recommend it). An image with better resolution should really enhance the details in the nebula. There is also a very tiny reflection nebula, vdB97, around the bright star mid-way between the snowman's nose and the edge of the image.
On another topic, last night's excursion to the TIMPA site was generally successful, but we did get clouded out around 2 a.m. I got some decent images but didn't finish anything, but it is always worth getting out to enjoy the cool night air at a dark site. When the moon rose it was considerably less dark, it was bright enough to cast shadows. That was my first visit to TIMPA and probably won't be my last, it is farther from my house that heading down to Empire Ranch but it does have the advantage of having power and restrooms.
I was disappointed to see the clouds come in because I had hoped to catch the unusually close triple conjunction of Jupiter, Mercury, and Mars this morning. I guess a few locals did observe it between cloud decks but I was home and asleep by then.
Tonight is clear but I'm taking it off to get some needed rest.
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I'm typing this on my cell phone, while star-partying at the TIMPA site West of Tucson with Larry and Dean. It was cloudy at first but now it's cleared off.
Dean and I are imaging and Larry has a 12" set up for visual.
It's a bit difficult to type on this tiny keyboard so I will keep it short. The picture is from the phone's built-in camera.
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Here's a picture of The Soul Nebula (click here for a larger version). This object is catalogued as IC1848, Sharpless 2-199, and various others. My picture only shows part of the overall complex; when a wider field is displayed, the whole thing takes on the form of a human fetus, thus it is also known as the Fetus Nebula.
I first became aware of this nebula from an unbelievable image taken by my good friend Dean. That image leaves me awestruck, and I knew that I would have to make my own attempt at capturing it. So for the past week I have been trying to grab opportunities to point the telescope at it. This week has been rather poor for amateur astronomers in Tucson, as we have had high winds and rather poor seeing conditions (not to mention the full moon, which is currently riding a path that takes it quite high in the sky). However, I managed to shoot 2 hours worth of data in each of the 3 narrowband filters (12x10minutes each). The poor seeing carried through to lower resolution in the image, but I decided to go ahead and process it anyway.
The "Soul Nebula" is an appropriate name as it makes me reflect on the effect of my hobby on my own soul. Other avid amateurs will understand when I say that my stargazing times are perhaps the most peaceful and refreshing times of life. Regardless of the outcome of the day, no matter what craziness, disappointments, and pressures are dragging me down, a few hours at an eyepiece or imaging with the ccd can restore my balance.
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Is it always nighttime in outer space?
It's a cold, windy night here in Tucson. The wind is bad enough that I'm not going to be doing any observing this evening. The moon is full, and high in the sky, so I suppose the conditions wouldn't be ideal anyway, but I'm sure I could find something to look at or image.
It's also cold, and has been for several days now. My last imaging session was on Thursday night and it was sub-freezing; I spent most of the night indoors, watching the computer over the remote link.
On Friday night, I attended a Boy Scouts campout with my oldest son. Actually it was an "Ordeal" to seal my membership in the Order of the Arrow, scouting's national honor society, and also for my son to advance to Brotherhood status in the OA. As part of the ordeal, I was required to camp alone in the desert, with only a sleeping bag. It was a crystal clear night, and I could see Kitt Peak from my location, west of town. The moon was close to full and I did find some time to watch the stars with only my eyes - no telescopes this time. The only negative thing about this setting was the temperature - it was about 20 degrees Fahrenheit outside. My sleeping bag is a good one, but that's cold no matter how good your bag is. Let's just say I was glad when the first rays of sunlight found their way over the Tucson Mountain range and began the defrosting process on my chilled body.
One thing it was not, though, was windy. Today has been quite windy - plenty of big gusts and steady winds between. It's the kind of day that reminds me of Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day. It's also the kind of day when I pray that the roof will remain locked into place on the dome, rather than taking off and causing reports of flying saucers in the neighborhood.
It's also windy in outer space. We have our own local wind storm, the Solar Wind, which blows particles away from the Sun and fortunately is largely deflected away from our home planet. The winds in deep space often create stunning vistas for photographers, and provide a source of measureable physical data for scientists to develop theories. Although images of deep space objects have the power to transport me to a tranquil, serene mental space, in reality the environments in the images are often violently dynamic. A hellish interior sometimes creates a beautiful exterior.
Here is an image that I took last week, the first image using a new set of narrowband filters, so it was a short test exposure. It's not really ready for showing as a pretty picture, but it does show an environment sculpted by fierce interstellar winds. The Hydrogen gas prominent in this image of the "Foxfur Nebula" is undergoing dramatic changes.
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It's interesting how various shapes seem to repeat themselves often in nature. Add the creativity of the human brain and we frequently "see" things in natural settings. As a child I would lay in the grass and watch clouds as they took the shape of trains, clowns, ducks, or whatever object caught my fancy that day. As an astronomical observer I'm amazed by the shapes we see in outer space.
Ever notice how spiral galaxies and seashells can appear identical? Or how the smoke from a nearby fire can ebb and flow in shapes that look exactly like an emission nebula? There are so many examples of the repetitive nature of shapes. Actually these fascinating shapes can usually be explained by the science of Physics using some detailed calculus. Turns out our Universe does indeed have some order and maybe we should be glad about that, if there were not "rules" about how matter interacts then I suppose we'd have a tough time making a go of it.
Scientifics aside, it would be awful to ignore the magnificence of these patterns in nature. The snail does not care one bit that his shell is a perfect match to the spiral arms of M33, but I could spend hours marvelling at it. Likewise, a Jellyfish in the ocean really isn't aware that his tiny slithery mass of gelatin-like life closely resembles a gigantic remanant from an ancient supernova explosion, nor does he care that the atoms making up his living being are the very same type of atoms that the supernova blew out into space; but I find it utterly mindboggling, and as a result I spent last night taking this image of IC443, also known as the Jellyfish Nebula, in an attempt to capture this exquisite object.
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The Thanksgiving holiday has just passed here in the U.S.A., and in accordance with tradition I spent the day feasting, enjoying some time with relatives, and relaxing.
There certainly is a lot to be thankful for. Sure, I deal with many negative aspects of life on a daily basis, and some days the negatives can be really bad. But I'd prefer to keep this blog focused on more enjoyable things, specifically the astronomy hobby.
And enjoy it I do. I'm thankful for the amazingly beautiful and mysterious universe that has been provided for us to exlpore. I'm thankful for the time I've been given to ponder what I see up there. I'm thankful for inventors, scientists, and manufacturers of equipment who pave the way for amateur astronomers. I'm thankful for great friends who share the passion for the night sky.
I'm thankful for stunning celestial sights such as this one, known as the Rosette Nebula. Humans tend to associate Roses with beauty, so perhaps we've appropriately named it; but I have to wonder whether we even have the ability to really provide a name worthy of the incredible beauty in something like this. Nor do I think a picture, even one taken by professional observatories, can do this nebula justice.
This image was taken on Tuesday night using L,R,G, and B filters and a 4" refractor. Click here to view a larger version of this image.
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Here's an image I took of the Triangulum Galaxy, Messier object #33, back in October. It's an LRGB and I've had a lot of difficulty processing this one. Click Here to see a larger version of this image. In addition to trying to pull the faint areas out, I also had bad color gradients to deal with. The good thing about that is that it's made me realize that I really need to spend some serious learning time on how to process all this data I've been collecting. Fortunately we have a holiday weekend coming up (Thanksgiving is Thursday), so maybe I can catch up on some resources that I have such as Adam Block's Making Every Pixel Count DVD's.
M33 is a beautiful spiral galaxy when processed correctly. It has a relatively small nucleus region so quite a bit of arm detail can be exposed. In my image there are numerous HII regions visible (the red blotchy areas) as well as areas where newborn hot blue stars are brightly shining.
Amateur astronomers should feel a bit sorry for this nice looking galaxy. It would be a showpiece object elsewhere in the sky, but its proximity to The Great Andromeda Galaxy, M31, forces it into also-ran status. I like to observe M33 visually from a dark site because the spiral shape is easily noted.
I'm imaging again tonight, the main target has been the Rosette Nebula. I've been using the remote setup again, including running the scope through its complete alignment process. My brother was visiting tonight and I was able to stay inside but still image while he was here. It's not perfect, the connection drops oftenm but it generally works fairly well without a lot of hassle.
I wonder how much longer the clear spell will last.
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Well I finally did it. In the true spirit of ultimate laziness, I am sitting in my living room, controlling the telescope outside as it faithfully images the Pleiades.
Is this as fun as sitting in the cold, looking through an eyepiece? No way. There is nothing, and I mean nothing, that can compare with sitting under the starlit skies and pondering the mysteries of the universe. And let's face it, I could just as easily simply download a pretty picture of M45, in fact probably one much prettier than I'll ever produce, for a lot less hassle.
But there is a certain thrill to the engineering aspect of this hobby, an excitement that comes from managing all sorts of little details and getting them to actually work as one cohesive unit. It's fulfilling to see the scope alignment go smoothly, to get the robofocuser to fine-tune the FWHM, to see the pixels light up on the monitor after the ccd image downloads. I have not counted but I'm guessing there are hundreds of unique little tasks that must come together properly before the first image is taken.
So tonight I added a few more, first by figuring out how to get the hand control of the telescope to run on the computer using Celestron's NexRemote software, then by working out an internet remote control program called LogMeIn to allow me to retreat to the comfy chair in the living room. I'm typing this on the kids' homework computer, but actually I'm remotely typing it on the laptop outside (which is chained up and alarmed just in case). Meanwhile I'm watching MaximDL manage the camera, running TheSky, Outlook, and a few other odds and ends.
Surprisingy there does not seem to be a noticeable speed decrease. The first few images of M45 have come up and all looks well - the autoguider is tracking nicely, especially after turing on the PEC correction curve from last night's PEMPro run on the CGE mount.
Cool stuff, all this technology, but I have to be careful. The stars will keep shining down outside, and there are plenty of other photon-lovers to take my place with the Seven Sisters if I don't show up in the crisp dark night. Plus, I'd hate to become a couch-potato!
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I'm sitting out here in the freezing cold waiting for the Leonid meteors to appear, but apparently they didn't receive the invitation.
It's a crystal clear (but cold) night here in Tucson, a little past midnight, and I have yet to see a meteor. I must admit that I'm not observing properly, i.e. laying back in the chair watching the entire sky; but it seems like I should have seen something by now.
Sadly I am missing out on numerous star party opportunities. Some friends are up at Vekol, others at MM44, but due to other commitments I wasn't able to pack it up and get out. I did have a good time with my wife and kids though so I can't complain too much. We even went to the used bookstore tonight and I picked up a couple of Ben Bova sci-fi novels (Mercury and Venus) to read on those cloudy nights.
I am doing some imaging, worked a bit on M45 again. But for the past few nights I've been having trouble with the autoguiding. I've had to discard about 3/4 of the images due to star streaking. However I may have just discovered the cause, and if so, it's a simple operator error - I was messing with the program and turned on a dithering mode improperly. So now it's off and in a little while I should know whether this was the probelm - I sure hope so!
As I said, it's cold. In fact for the first time I'm running the ccd at -30 degrees Celsius. Keeping it cold minimizes the dark current, resulting in better signal-to-noise ratio in the images. It's funny how just a few months ago I needed to use a special water cooler to get the chip cooled to -15, and now I can go to -30 without any water!
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A universal truth about telescope mounts is that none of them are perfect. While there is a general trend towards higher tracking precision as the cost of the mount increases, it's an absolute certainty that they will have some mechanical errors. Even the largest observatories in the world need to find ways to minimize the effects of such errors.
One common problem results from imperfections in the gears inside telescope mounts that use a "worm" gear system. This problem is called "Periodic Error" because it tends to repeat itself as the drive repeatedly turns along the worm. By modelling the error and then issuing commands to counteract the error, this type of error can be significantly reduced - but never 100% eliminated.
We are fortunate to have many tools available to determine the error and program an automatic correction for it. One of these is called PEMPro, published by Ray Gralak and CCDWare. I met Ray at the AIC2006 conference a few days ago and was impressed by his knowledge and programming talent. An update coming soon will make this software even more powerful.
I spent a couple of hours in the dome tonight, working on obtaining a Periodic Error model that I will be able to use to develop a Periodic Error Correction (PEC) file to improve the RCX tracking. Although the scope is tracking well already with autoguiding (in fact last night I spent a few hours doing spectroscopy with it), there is always room for improvement. This picture shows the PE obtained by running PEMPro across about 3 worm cycles.
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Yesterday was the 1-year mark for this blog. It passed fittingly, as I spent the first part of it at the AIC2006 conference learning more about astronomy.
The picture above shows Dean and I standing in front of the participant displays, where we each hung a few examples of our imaging work.
I've sure enjoyed keeping the blog for the past year. I suppose it's evolved somewhat along with my adventure; no doubt that will continue as I have no plans to stop absorbing astronomical information! What a wonderful hobby we have, and certainly we live at a time like no other in terms of available equipment (too bad the light pollution is going in the opposite direction).
I really don't have any idea how many people read this blog. Maybe not too many since I almost never get a comment. But that's o.k., it provides me with a place to write about current activities and gives me a historical log, and maybe even a soapbox to expound my own personal views on occasion.
So here's looking forward to another year of blogging, and I'd be remiss if I didn't add, "Thank You Astronomyblogs.com"!
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This was the second day of the Advanced Imaging Conference. I'm really in the presence of a lot of heavy hitters in the astro imaging world. It was definitely worth coming to the conference, I'm learning enough to keep me busy for quite a while.
The speakers and topics today included:
-David Malin, "From Darkroom to Digital" (Hubble Award Lecture);
-Jerry Bonnell, "Astronomy Picture of the Day";
-Rick Gilbert, "Remote Imaging Groups";
-Russell Croman, "Remote Observing";
-Michael Barber, "SBIG";
-Brad Ehrhorn, "RC Optical Systems";
-Steve Bisque, "Software Bisque";
-Joel Primack, "Flying Through the Hubble Deep Field";
-Adam Block, "Object Oriented Processing";
-Tony Hallas, "The Evolution of Dynamic Processing";
-Paul Mortfield, "Data Mining - Hidden Discoveries in Your Images".
After dinner there was a session on remote imaging with a 24" RCOS at an observatory at New Mexico Skies, but unfortunately it was cloudy so a full session wasn't possible. Nevertheless I saw enough today to make me excited about some image automation possibilities with my own gear.
That brings up a philosophical consideration. I personally love to be out under the skies and really be involved closely with my equipment as well. So in some ways, truly remote automated systems do not interest me all that much, it almost seems as thought the fun element goes away. I hope that I never reach the point where I lose my interest in sitting at an eyepiece on a quiet cool night.
However, there are so many little tasks involved with ccd imaging that automation does start to be attractive, especially when one considers that much of the mundane routine work could actually be taking precious time away from family and other activities. So, automating some of those processes does make sense. In addition, as I have mentioned before on this blog, working with the technology side of the astronomy hobby can be quite fulfilling. It's really neat when you get the computer talking to the telescope, or when you figure out a way to electronically control the focusser for a precision focus that would be impossible manually.
Anyway I hope to integrate some automation into the process going forward, if nothing else at least in the form of preparing an observing plan ahead of the night in order to maximize the available time for the session. One way I hope to do this is to use a new program that I purchased at AIC called CCDAutoPilot, published by CCDWare.
Tomorrow there is still more lecture time scheduled for the morning, and then Dean and I will have the long drive back to Tucson.
The picture above shows part of the vendor display area. The scope on the right is a 24" RCOS and on the left is a Paramount with several scopes on it, being run by CCDAutoPilot.
You can see more pictures from AIC taken by Michael Barber from SBIG by clicking here.
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Today has been an excellent first day of the AIC2006. We heard speakers from several of the biggie vendors, including RC Optical Systems, SBIG, Software Bisque, Diffraction Limited, CCDWare, AstroDon, Yankee Robotics, and DC3 Dreams. It was primarily a day for manufacturers to showcase their wares and explain how to get the most out of them. I picked up a few good tips and also enjoyed wandering the vendor area. There are some serious, serious pieces of equipment on demo here.
I also set up a few of my pictures for display on the exhibit board. Dean put his Soul Nebula and a few other pictures up, and a bunch of other guys put up samples of their work. I'm definitely in the company of some imaging masters this weekend, hopefully I'll absorb some of their skills while I'm here.
More good stuff to come tomorrow.
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Here's an image of a portion of the Mercury solar transit that occurred yesterday. Click here for the larger version, or Click here for an animated "movie". I used a Phillips SC9000N webcam attached to my 12", which was covered up to allow only about 2" of aperture through some Baader solar film. This picture shows the progress of Mercury as it approached egress, between about 2325 UTC and 2410 UTC.
It was a really fun event, Larry and I set up at Dean's house and we watched the transit from initial contact a few minutes past noon until it finished at about 5:15 local time. In addition to my setup, we viewed it through several instruments including a Coronado PST and a 5" Celestron. The H-alpha views through the PST were really nice, I wish I could have imaged through that but I wasn't able to reach focus. Dean also imaged the event through 2 different scopes, one with a Canon 20Da and another with a CCD. His images are much better, see galaxies.com. Basically it was a great way to enjoy the hobby during an unusual time for astronomers, as we are normally working on this stuff at night.
Today I spent almost 13 hours driving to San Jose, CA with Dean to attend AIC2006, the Advanced Imaging Conference. I can hardly wait to get started with the forums tomorrow, I am sure I'm going to learn an awful lot while I'm here. Plus it's a nice little break from work (yes, I do work...but that's not the topic of this blog, so you rarely here me talk about it here!)
Postscript: Dean pointed out to me that the original image was "backwards", as a result of the mirror image created by the telescope; this is closer to the correct orientation to a human earth-bound observer, i.e. the planet moved from left to right across the solar disk.
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Here are the results of a little project I did on the evening of October 30th here in Tucson. Comet SWAN had flared up nicely so I decided to try to image it. I also wanted to obtain a spectrum of the nucleus region.
My Western horizon looks straight over the brightest part of the Tucson city skyglow, and the comet was already less than 45 degrees up when it became dark enough to begin imaging. So the picture came out a bit noisy. By cropping it and shrinking it down I was able to hide it a little bit, but if you zoom in on the picture portion it will be evident.
When I first looked at the raw data from the spectrograph, I thought I must have made a mistake because it looked so strange. But after a few days I decided to research it a bit and discovered that the spectrum is actually just fine. There are "Swan Bands" created by molecular carbon that are prominent in many comet spectra.
Click Here to see a larger version of this image. BTW the date shown on the image is correct - It's in Universal Coordinated Time rather than local time.
So the adventure continues. There are many many wonders in this universe just waiting for us to learn about them.
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The last few nights have been cloudy, so the 'scopes have been all dressed up with no place to go. That gives me a chance to do a little catching up with some image processing though.
This evening we had our monthly gathering of the Astrophotography SIG (Special Interest Group) at the China Rose restaurant. We had a good turnout but unfortunately the projector that we normally use for the show-and-tell wasn't available, so we did it using a laptop, which isn't the easiest thing for everyone to see. Nevertheless fun was had by all.
In preparing my images to share I realized that I have obtained a lot of data over the past couple of months that has not been processed yet. So I have a bit of catching up to do. I'll probably be able to do a little bit this weekend, during the long drive to and from the Advanced Imaging Conference - but that's another blog.
Here's a narrowband image of The Flaming Star Nebula, IC 405, that I took back on October 17th. I used the "Hubble Pallet" which assigns Hydrogen-alpha as the green channel, which is why this image looks so green. Click Here for a larger version of this image.
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I just can't get enough of this stuff. There are so many fascinating aspects of astronomy that it can sometimes get overwhelming.
This afternoon I got together with a couple of friends, Larry and Dean, to work on equipment preparation for the upcoming transit of the planet Mercury across the face of the Sun. Hopefully the sky will be clear on Nov. 8th as we have big plans. We will probably be imaging through 2 or 3 scopes and also observing it visually. Transits such as this have some historical scientific significance but these days they are observed by many amateurs for fun. I believe the next transit will be in 2016.
I plan to use a webcam to image the event, and since I have never used this particular camera before I spent some time today working on it. I plan to use K3CCDTools to operate the camera and record the data. I'm out in the backyard imaging tonight, so I decided to plug in the webcam and take a few lunar images. Here is one of them, taken with a Phillips webcam and the 12" LX200GPS.
I'm also working on a H-alpha project that I started last week of IC1805. The field has turned out to be much larger than I realized so it's looking like I may need to mosaic about 6 different sets of data. Which translates to an awful lot of imaging time. I've got a few such projects that have been started and not finished, we'll see if this one goes to completion.
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Sounds like a naughty blog but actually that's an mnemonic for the classical stellar sequence. Type O stars are the brash hot young stars with plenty of energy to burn; Type M's are the burnt-out elders who have lived long and are running low on fuel. In the middle we find the average stars with the typical responsibilities of middle age - providing for the family of planets orbiting them. Our Sun is a G2V star and perhaps not coincidentally, it emits the brightest part of its light in the exact same range that our human eyes are sensitive to.
Anyway I have been playing with the spectroscope recently and a couple of weeks ago I was able to obtain data from a representative star in each class of the spectral sequence. These are low-resolution spectra, about 4.3 Angstroms per pixel, but they clearly show an interesting evolution of absorption line features and shifts in peak wavelengths as you move along the sequence.
I was fortunate to be able to share the results of this project at the TAAA meeting this evening. To view my presentation in slide format, click here. This spectroscopy stuff is sure a lot of fun, and I have some big plans for it in the future.
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Last night I was tricked and as a result missed out on the treat. Halloween's a few days away but it got me early!
I spent a couple of hours packing up the truck with telescope gear for an observing session at a dark site with several friends. Comet Swan (C/2006 M4) has brightened up and is putting on a good show, so I planned to arrive early enough to set up two scopes and be ready to start imaging as soon as darkness arrived. The plan was to take images as well as to obtain a spectrum of the comet, and after it set to have a great all-nighter viewing and imaging other objects, and hanging out with my buddies.
As soon as I left, I discovered that the Southern sky was clouded over. I talked to Alfredo on the phone (he was already there) and we decided that it was probably going to cloud over, so I turned around and came home. A quick look at the weather satellite page showed a nasty mess of clouds down there.
Trick! It turned out to be a clear night after all. Unfortunately it was too late to get down in time to see the comet by the time I realized that, plus I had already made other plans (to go buy a new dishwasher...) So I missed out on what probably would have been a great night.
I left the truck packed up though, so it is possible I will get out tonight instead if the clouds stay away.
Later in the evening I did open up Xanadu though. I've been playing with getting the RCX set up and finally hooked in the CCD for a few test shots. There is still some work to be done before I'll be able to produce quality images from the system, but I was able to get a start on determining some of the settings. This image is M77, a spiral galaxy, it's a combination of 9 x 2 minute exposures through a UV/IR blocked luminance filter. One thing I need to resolve is the focussing and this image is slightly out of focus. Also I did not flat-field it.
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Tonight's a cloudy one, so no sitting out in the cool night air for me. That's probably a good thing as sleep deprivation has a way of catching up with people. In fact I think I recall learning in one of my college elective courses about U.S. military tests in which researchers studied the effects of sleep deprivation, and the results were none too pleasant. They should have included astronomers in their study - I suspect we have some sort of extra ability to stay awake for extended periods.
So anyway it has been a fun run for the past 5 nights, at least in terms of my backyard astronomy sessions. "Normal" life still goes on during the day, and with my wife's surgery and recovery the daytimes maybe haven't been so great. But this is an astronomy blog, so we won't dwell on that. Other than to make an analogy, you might say I'm feeling like a Type K or M star these days as my fuel source seems to be dwindling. I suppose humans are sort of like variable stars, we go through phases of high and low energy output. (Now you can tell I must be tired to write wierd stuff like that!)
In the past 5 nights I've taken quite a bit of imaging data through my refractor. I also spent some time just reclining and watching an outstanding meteor display from the Orionids. Additionally, I worked on setting up and calibrating the 14" in the dome. All told it was a busy, somewhat productive time, and most importantly it was a relaxing escape for me.
The images above, which are only portions of NGC7000 and IC1848, were taken during some "filler" times, for example when an object is crossing the meridian I need to temporarily stop imaging and slew away from the object in order to keep the mount working properly. During these times I occasionally grab a few shots of something other than my main target (as they say, a photon is a terrible thing to waste). These are both 3x10 minutes Hydrogen-alpha filtered images and I forgot to refocus for the NGC7000 (North American Nebula) shot. Neither image contains the whole nebula - these are big objects. But it's always fun to see what the camera can pick up. This kind of imaging is more like visual observing, the objective isn't necessarily to produce an exceptional image but instead just to explore and let your mind ponder on what an immense and beautiful universe we live in.
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I'm sitting out in my backyard right now, imaging with the 105mm and playing around with the 14" in the dome. This has been the normal night for the past 3 nights, as I've enjoyed some nice clear, dark, moonless skies.
The Orionids meteor shower has really been putting on a nice show. although I have to confess to missing most of it as my eyes are drawn to the computer screen to manage the ccd imaging. I suppose that is one of the negatives of doing astroimaging, you end up looking down more than up. But I have taken breaks on a reclining chair occasionally and watched as bright fireballs streak through the sky. How strange and wonderful to consider that these objects have travelled for many eons through space only to come to a quick but beautiful demise in our atmosphere.
My astronomy these past few days has been in the backyard but I would have preferred to have done my observing from a darker location. This weekend was the All-Arizona Starparty north of Tucson, and I sure wish I could have gone. Unfortunately my wife had some surgery yesterday so I needed to stay home to care for her. During the day I'm running around trying to help her manage things but at night the house quiets down and I can retreat to visit my old friends, the stars. Fall is here and the nights are chilly; Orion looms large as he ushers in the colder weather. I'm bundled up pretty heavily since astronomy isn't a very active hobby.
I know the folks attending the star party, as well as some others who chose to go to other dark sky locations, are really having a great time, but on the other hand there is a great deal of astronomy excitement that can be had right here in the backyard.
Since I've been imaging for several nights now, my data is backing up. I have several objects to process as well as some spectral data. So there will be plenty to do when the clouds come.
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My dome is sinking. The cause is squirrel damage. Seriously.
Last year this squirrel decided to make his home underneath my dome. When I built the dome, I raised it up about 4 feet by making walls out of big 6x6 beams and filling them with dirt. I packed it down tight with a tamping machine and then poured about 4 inches of concrete to make the floor. Well, the squirrel dug under one of the walls (which were buried about 1 foot deep) and then proceeded to construct his own private little apartment complex for squirrels down there. He was a lone rodent but he must have expected to raise quite a large family, because every day I would come out to find huge quantities of dirt scooped out from under the dome.
Now, I am generally an animal lover. My mom's a wildlife artist and I was raised to appreciate the wonderous beauty of the animal kingdom. I've had pets of more species than I can count. However, this squirrel quickly became my arch enemy. Each day I would try a new way of stopping his encroachment, and each day he would make a fool of me. I tried a live trap, only to have the sad result of trapping a bird who wound up dying of fright. My squirrel nightmare became the topic of humorous exchanges with a few friends during our regular lunch meetings. If you've ever seen Bill Murray in Caddyshack, and his battle with the groundhog, you know what I was dealing with.
The bitter end to this saga was that I found a squirrel bomb at a hardware store and basically terminated his tunnel terror with poisonous gas. I hated to do it but I could not stand by and watch while he single-pawedly ruined my observatory.
Well, maybe it wasn't the bitter end. Because today I noticed that the concrete under my dome has experienced a significant settling, probably as much as 4-6 inches in some places. That crazy squirrel removed so much dirt that the whole thing is collapsing!
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Friday night was full moon night, so I decided to do some narrowband imaging. I didn't get started on the setup until after 11, after hanging out with the family for a while, so it wasn't until about midnight that my trusty ccd was in action. This moon was extra large and really bright - there was a lot of moisture in the air.
My target was NGC 1499, also known as the California Nebula. This is a very large object so it didn't fit entirely on the chip. I used the H-Alpha, OIII, and SII filters for a total of 90 minutes, 40 minutes, and 40 minutes respectively. Click here for a larger version.
When I went to process it I ran into some of the usual interesting challenges, so finally I just decided to let it tell me what color it wanted to be. After all narrowband images really aren't true color anyway. I sort of used the color pallette from CFHT (Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope) but also took some liberties. I think this color is appropriate because it reminds me of the color of sunsets you might see on a California beach.
There is a neat "shape" towards the upper right of the image that reminds me of a horse.
I finished up Friday night (Saturday morning) with a few short images of David Levy's new comet, but I have not processed those yet. By night's end it was dewing over (rare for Tucson) and everything, including me, was dripping wet. Friday night was the TAAA meeting night but I was tired after a very hectic work week, which was made a bit more difficult by my wife's knee injury from last weekend. So I decided to stay home instead of going to the meeting.
Last night I was hoping to do some more scope work but it ended up being too cloudy to do anything. There were enough holes to align the scope and I was able to play a bit with learning how to drift align with the ccd. I also did some calibration work on the spectrometer. Looks like it's going to be another really rough work week (and cloudy too) so it may be a while before I get out again, but maybe I'll find a few minutes to spare.
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This is an image from Saturday night's session at Mile Marker 44. The Horsehead Nebula (IC 434) and the Flame Nebula (NGC 2024) both sit near Zeta Orionis, one of the bright stars in Orion's belt.
Since Orion does not rise until around midnight, I wasn't able to image this for very long, so the noise was significant. I also had processing troubles resulting from the blooming and reflections caused by Zeta.
Every time I see an image of the Horsehead, I'm awestruck by the beauty that is so common in the universe, but often hidden away. It's an extreme challenge to observe the Horsehead visually (an H-beta filter helps), but turn the camera on it and the unmistakeable shape of it becomes obvious. There are a lifetime of treasures to observe through a telescope!
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Last night was really an excellent night for astronomy. Before I explain why, let me first acknowledge a few of the reasons why it should not have been an excellent night.
First, my friend Alfredo's generator would not start. We had battery power, but the idea of easy AC sounded good; so when the generator refused to wake up despite Alfredo's best efforts, it was slightly frustrating. Next, I smelled smoke. If you read my posting from very recently you know that you should never let the smoke out - apparently Alfredo didn't read it, and his 10" LX200 nearly went up in flames. It wasn't pretty. I won't even bother to mention any of my own equipment issues for the night, Alfredo's smoking telescope won the Technology Troubles Award hands-down.
We also had the moon to contend with, and for some reason it just didn't seem to want to set last night. Of course it maintained the official moon pace and set on schedule, but for some reason it seemed like it wanted to blast the most light into the sky that it could before retiring. As if these problems were not enough, nasty clouds strolled leisurely through the sky all night long.
How then could it be such an excellent astronomy night?
The reason is that despite all these crazy distractions, I was able to get together with some of my best astronomy buddies (Larry, Alfredo, and Jim) for a night of stargazing. With our different schedules, wives and family commitments, health matters, work agendas, etc., it's been hard for the 4 of us to catch up with each other for a long time. But those other 3 guys played a major role in bringing me up to speed when I stepped back in to amateur astronomy. We always have a great time comparing equipment and observations, and just hanging out together to talk about whatever amateur astronomers talk about in the middle of the night. We've followed each other home in early morning drives when the drowsiness is setting in. We've shared cookies, pizza, drinks, donuts, and other various unhealthy foods to keep the energy levels adequate for an all-night observing session. Much as I love the science and the observing and imaging challenges of this hobby, the best part of all is enjoying it with good friends.
So thanks guys for making this great hobby so much fun!
This picture is one taken last night at our session at the Mile Marker 44 site. It's the Silver Coin Galaxy in Sculptor, taken low on the horizon with clouds, so it's a bit noisy.
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Here's a picture of the Televue NP127is, a beautiful big refractor that I would love own. Televue sent a rep to demo their products at Starizona today, this picture shows the rep plus Dean, the owner of Starizona, and Larry. The little TV60is is also on the same mount, a neat but very tiny little imaging refractor. The setup is in front of Dean's new shop.
My original plan for this evening was to head out to the field for a night under darker skies in Southern AZ. Unfortunately, around 1:00 this afternoon it was so cloudy that we decided to call it off. Bad choice, because it's actually quite clear out tonight!
I've been imaging every night for the past week in my backyard, except for last night. Mostly I have been gathering photometry data for RX Andromeda 0058+40, but tonight I've decided to play a bit so I'm shooting The Triangulum Galaxy, M33.
I thought I had solved my spacing dilemna but tonight it seems I am back to elongated starts at the corners. What a challenge this has turned out to be!
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Amateur Astronomy sure provides me with a lot of crazy adventures. There are nights when everything seems to click, and then there are the other nights when I wish I would have left the gear alone and enjoyed my pillow instead. Saturday night was one that probably leans toward the latter.
I drove up to the Vekol Road site on Saturday afternoon with my friends Larry and Dean. It was new moon and Vekol Road is far enough out to have pretty dark skies (although Phoenix casts a substantial light dome to the North). My plan was to continue testing different spacing arrangements using some T-thread adapters lent to me by "the other Dean", owner of Starizona. I figured that would take me a couple of hours, then I'd spend the rest of the night taking some nice image data.
I managed to set up with only one injury, a pinched finger that throbbed a little but no big deal. But the spacing tests just didn't work out too well. It seems that nothing I do allows the 0.8 focal reducer/field flattener to achieve a nice flat field, in fact I actually get a more flat field by not using the reducer. So my thinking now is that something is wrong with the reducer. During the testing I took some pictures of NGC 891, the picture above is a cropped portion of the clear filter data. Since I was removing the camera a lot, I wound up forgetting to take calibration flats, so this didn't come out too good.
Meanwhile I ended up losing a tiny screw that holds the camera's "D-block", not an easy thing to find in the dirt in the middle of the night! I can still use the camera without it but one more minor nuisance...
So finally, somewhere around midnight I decided to just give up on the spacing and work on some data collection. I grabbed some data on my variable star project (RX And) and then went over to the Pleiades. Unfortunately I wound up having power problems again, my laptop is just such an energy hog that batteries started running out. Larry and Dean both pitched in with various extra batteries and cords, it almost seemed like some kind of telescope emergency room for a while as we frantically tried to prevent the scope, camera, or laptop from dying in the middle of an image. Finally I decided that I needed to disconnect the external guide camera and switch to guiding with the internal chip. BIG mistake. I unplugged the guider cable from one camera, moved it to the other, and...Larry says, "Uh-Oh, I smell smoke"! I also smelled it and quickly shut things down. It turns out I fried something inside a small unit that attaches to the camera, fortunately the camera itself and the telescope seem to have survived. At this point I was rather frustrated and since I had no way to connect the guide cable, I decided it was time to throw in the towel and call it a night. It was about 4:30 a.m. anyway so morning was near. But again, I didn't get any flat data for the Pleiades images which means I have several hours of good data that can't be properly calibrated.
Despite all this, I did enjoy meeting some new friends, hanging out with others, and seeing a brilliant Milky Way with nicely contrasted dark lanes spreading across the night sky. The technology may not always work perfectly, but the universe really does not care, and the wheel in the sky just keeps on turning away.
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Well here we are at the Autumnal Equinox. Each of the two equinoxes marks an exciting change of seasons. The Spring equinox ushers in the long days of summer, with many fond memories of lazy carefree days gone by. The Autumnal equinox announces the coming of long winter nights, the kind where cozy blankets and cups of cocoa bring a peaceful happiness.
But the fall equinox also brings more observing opportunities, especially here in Arizona where the shorter nights of summer are often made useless for astronomy by the monsoon clouds. Quiet, chilly nights at the eyepiece can be some of the most pleasureable (as long as it doesn't get too cold!)
The skies have been clearing up for the past few days. Last night I decided to get started with a photometry program, which is something I've been wanting to do for a long time. So my first foray into this interesting area was to use the ccd to image RX Andromeda, a cataclysmic variable. I used the B, V, and R filters. I'll start off with differential photometry, which basically determines a star's magnitude by comparing the intensity to that of other stars in the field. I've still got some work to do on the data reduction but my first pass at trying to determine a magnitude for RX And resulted in an estimate of 11.355, which is consistent with what other observers have been reporting to the AAVSO (it's currently near its peak). My intention is to monitor this star for at least the next couple of weeks (it seems to have a period of about 2 weeks), and learn enough about how to work on this type of data to submit my observations and magnitude estimates to the AAVSO. I got data both Thursday and Friday nights using the 12", which is currently the scope that is set up in the dome (the 14" is down for maintenance).
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Guess where I am…
This weekend, after a long work week, I was able to get away for a few days to take a trip with my brother Darryl. I left early on Saturday morning, very tired because I ended up staying out with my scope until about 1 a.m. on Friday night. I met up with Darryl in Houston and we flew on to Miami. I was lucky and got a first class seat, which really helped me catch up on some much-needed rest. We then drove to my oldest brother Eric' s house to spend the night. I don' t see them often, especially Eric and his family, so this was a super way to start out our trip.
On Sunday after church and lunch, we drove North and visited my niece at her college. After dinner we backtracked a little bit to our hotel in Cocoa Beach. This morning, we got up and headed over to Kennedy Space Center to spend a day amongst the rockets. What a blast, pun intended!
We took the "Nasa Up-Close” tour which meant we were able to drive right up next to the various launch pads, assembly and test buildings, etc. We saw the runway where the Space Shuttle Atlantis is scheduled to land on Wednesday, and we saw the huge Crawler Transporter heading towards Launch Pad 39B to retrieve the Mobile Launch Platforms. The Moon programs seem to be a prominent theme at the KSC as NASA is gearing up for new manned moon missions. We got to see the control room that was used for the Apollo missions, several Saturn rockets, and a bunch of other rockets in the "Rocket Garden”.
Wildlife was also present everywhere, there were numerous alligators making their slow motion security rounds, and even an American Bald Eagle in a large nest.
There is a new ride in the works, it' s not ready yet but there will be a Space Shuttle experience ride next year. Looks like a lot of fun. The 3d IMAX "Magnificant Desolation” was an excellent presentation of what it would be like to be on the surface of the moon.
So basically it' s been a fun day. After KSC we took a walk along Cocoa Beach and then went out for a filling dinner. Tomorrow will be travel back to reality day.
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On Friday night I was out for a while, trying to find the right spacing arrangement for the focal reducer/field flattener on the 4". I never did find a combination that gave me the results I'm hoping for - it seems that no matter what I try, the field is not flat. Since this is the William Optics 0.8 FR/FF that is sold specifically to match the Zenithstar 105mm, I'm a bit disappointed to have so much difficulty getting it right. Although I'm having fun with the imaging so far, I would like to see less elongation of the stars in the corners, which this should correct.
I also tested out using a separate autoguider, which will be a big help when the guide star is too dim for certain filters. That part of my test night ended well although there was about an hour or two of frustration before it came together.
So, more testing needs to be done. In some ways I guess that's o.k. because part of the fun of this hobby is doing the engineering to make everything work right.
Anyway I couldn't go the whole night without something to show for it so here is a very short exposure (a few 30-second stacked exposures) of the Open Cluster M39. I calibrated it with dark frames but no flats. I used this field because it has a lot of stars across the field, making it easy to quickly determine whether the image has elongated stars in the corners.
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