Best week in ages!

[Big Dipper]

I guess that a big 'thankyou' is in order to the cloud gods who, since my birthday early last week, have given me six clear nights out of the last seven (couldn't wish for a better 'prezzie'). 

Since acquiring my AstroTrac camera platform in 2007, I have discovered a very 'new' enjoyable dimension to amateur astronomy - finding targets by the age-old method of star hopping - and observing old friends with my binoculars while leaving my remote timer & AstroTrac to take pictures at the same time!

When I owned my 11" SCT, and in common I suspect with many other imagers, I tended to spend far more time moronically dialing in RA & Dec values on my setting circles than looking skyward. My current setup has required that I have had to 're-learn' the sky - something that I have found to be great fun to do. As an example, it took only a few seconds to star hop in a south-westerly direction from Altair to two 3rd magnitude stars & then to follow a 'V-shape' of stars from the second 3rd mag star to locate M11. While my AstroTrac, digital Canon 350D & auto remote timer take a series of shots, I have enjoyed the time sitting out in the garden with my 10X50 binoculars and, following earlier preparation of targets etc. locating favourite DSO's of the past & trying to look at them 'properly' so as to appreciate them more. The aforementioned M11 and my favourite planetary M27 (the Dumbell) have been two of my most recent widefield observations.

A couple of offerings from this past week - IC1396 in Cepheus (taken with a 135mm camera lens) and M11 the Wild Duck cluster (taken with a cheap Miranda 70-300mm zoom lens set at 300mm).





Last night was cloudy for the first time in a week. However, after a predominantly cloudy day, the skies have now cleared for what I hope will be another very enjoyable session tonight.

I do hope that some of you here have been as lucky as I have been recently.

Clear skies!

[brianb]

When I owned my 11" SCT, and in common I suspect with many other imagers, I tended to spend far more time moronically dialing in RA & Dec values on my setting circles than looking skyward.

I agree, however it's a real timesaver for someone like me who has an observing programme including many objects scattered over the sky. However when the sky is reasonably dark & transparent, star hopping is a real pleasure, & I find I can often "beat the computer" using a simple altaz mount - the way my WO 110 FLT is now mounted, and used as a "grab 'n 'go" rich field scope for "brighter" variables (in the mag. 9 to 11 range).

I do hope that some of you here have been as lucky as I have been recently.

7 in a row !!! - interference from high cloud some nights but last night was a cracker, despite the Moon, really transparent and with seeing verging on the good (steady) - had a couple of neighbours round looking at Saturn & the Moon whilst it was going dark, they were lucky, despite the lowish altitude Saturn was pretty crisp, probably the best visual view I've had all year.

[Big Dipper]

When I owned my 11" SCT, and in common I suspect with many other imagers, I tended to spend far more time moronically dialing in RA & Dec values on my setting circles than looking skyward.

I agree, however it's a real timesaver for someone like me who has an observing programme including many objects scattered over the sky.

Yes, I can very much relate to the 'time is of the essence' philosophy. I was still using film when I had my 11" SCT so I always had to allow for as much clear sky as possible, bearing in mind that I used to average about an hour at a time for exposures.

Last night I had fun tracking down M17 (though the sky was too bright to see it visually through my 10X50 binoculars). However by the time that I had framed it in my DSLR the nebula disappeared behind a chimney pot. As I had spent a while on polar alignment I decided to wait patiently until it reappeared from behind the obstacle. By the time that this happened, the time was around 2.45am with the sky in the northeast already getting significantly brighter. I therefore only obtained 5 subs of around 2 minutes duration each (posted below along with a misframed heart nebula which I was unable to detect in the camera's LCD display after test exposures, due to moonlight). I shall shoot M17 again properly come next clear night!

[martinastro]

Andy, those are great images and a real testiment to all those clear nights lately. I hope you get many more!

I have to say, I haven't had a cloudy night here yet, so I have lost count of the amount of clear nights I've had but it certainly is a record this year. Although there has been more cloud on recent nights it never has been enough to stop NLC observation so observation of the twilight arch has been uninterrupted for a long time now. I hope it lasts