Gfamily

A perfectly novel idea is the Pentax Papillio binocular design. These are pretty compact, with the unique ability to focus to less than a metre - so they can be used for very close up work as well as distant. It's named as a suggestion that they can be used for seeing butterflies close up - though they often move off too quickly, but they are great for looking at flowers close up. I have also found them very useful in museums, as you can get very close up to exhibits in their display cases - one review (properly) described them as much a long distance microscope as a short focus binoculars. There are 2 versions, I have the 8.5x21mm, and there is also a 6.5x21mm. As mentioned, they are by Pentax, so optically they're very good - the only possible caveat is that the design makes it impossible to make them Water Resistant, but they are very compact so easy to put away if it starts to rain. Review here https://www.bestbinocularsreviews.com/Pentax-Papilio-II-85x21-Binoculars-Review-286.htm

There isn't any other satellite that is anywhere near as bright as the ISS, so if it wasn't the ISS it probably wasn't a satellite . The Heavens-above website gives the times for ISS passages, and on 17th July they were at their max height at about 10:20 and at 11:58, so it wouldn't have been the ISS (if your timing was accurate). Are you saying that the track you saw on Sunday started in the East and travelled towards the West? That would be very unusual in a satellite (as they tend to use the Earth's spin to give them extra speed at launch so tend to traves from West to East. There are many satellites that have a North/South orbit, which might have 'looked like the wrong direction', but it's hard to say for sure. NB the Heavens-Above website doesn't suggest any bright satellites moving from East to West on Sunday.

Have a look at the binocularsky.com website. Lots of great information there, and your can sign up for a monthly newsletter that gives an observing list suitable for binocular users. +1 for recommending the Opticron Adventurer 10x50 binoculars. I bought some for MrsG and she uses them at our place in France, though she uses a tripod and trigger head to make observing easier. She uses a 7" tablet to cycle between the newsletter and Stellarium when tracking down the targets.

Indeed. One of my first thoughts when looking at the Carina Nebula First Light image, was - ooh, that looks like Christmas wrapping paper!

FYI - the M74 images are from a proposal to study star forming locations in nearby galaxies, so there's probably huge amounts more to come. https://www.stsci.edu/jwst/phase2-public/2107.pdf 19 JWST targets, with data to be combined with HST,VLT and ALMA observations

I'm not sure if we have a post that explains how to connect the AZ-GTi to allow control via Stellarium on a laptop over WiFi. In response to a query on the "Getting Started" forum, I put this together. I think it's complete.

At 1am on Monday morning (for viewers in UK), Saturn's moon Iapetus will start a rare transit of the planet. It'll take about 10 hours to complete. Discovered by Cassini in 1671, Iapetus's surface has two distinct regions, one bright, and one much darker. As it is tidally locked in its orbit, this means that it is 2 magnitudes brighter when to the west of the planet than to the east. I would be very surprised if this would be visible, but worth knowing about if you're up and observing

Long response: What concerns me is that there is no comparable Space Telescope that isn't named for an Astronomer. Rather, sometime in 2002., the then NASA Administrator decided that a previous NASA Administrator should be marked this way. Hmm I think lots of scientists and engineers had found out about the (official or unofficial) intolerance of homosexuality in the 50s and 60s, and since then, many LGB scientists and engineers will have had to keep their silence. By 2002, there was no way that the previous homophobic attitudes could be justified - so I can't see how someone who was so involved with the 'Lavender scares', and the promotion of homophobia could be considered suitable. Short response What 'huge contributions' to science did JW personally achieve?

Afraid I can't give any information about your specific queries, but personally I'd not be too concerned about minor scratches and pinholes in a Baader filter, they're not going to admit any more light than your normal pupil unless they have a total area exceeding 5-10mm^2, and standard magnification is going to disperse even that over a larger area of your retina than your naked eye would give. I would though be concerned about any defects that are very obvious.

All the best, let me/us know if I've missed anything.

Hi Andrew. Download the SynScan app for Windows from the Skywatcher website. In Stellarium add a telescope mount as follows (you need to scroll the lower part of the screen down to get the Connections Settings entered) Then power up the AZ GTi Connect your laptop wifi to the SynScan_aann wireless network Start the Synscan app and connect to the telescope - Align the telescope using Synscan app (I'm not sure if this is necessary, but I do it) Connect to the telescope You should then be able to Select Objects in Stellarium and GOTO them (Current position in Red, Selected object in Blue)

Credit should be given to Judy Schmidt who processed the data. https://twitter.com/SpaceGeck/status/1547854886657675265?s=20&t=mJdFKM4j8oQ-OR6IoqEAzQ She isn't sure why she's getting the double edge on the right.

I'm sure they will, just as I'm sure that old people and the people with power will continue to find reasons to disparage the young and idealistic. All we can hope is that enough of the young and idealistic carry the faith forward so that society improves in tolerance and acceptance of others. So, although the 60s was a time of great advancements in social attitudes in many ways, the leaders and administrators saw many of those advances as threats - hence the 'Lavender Scares'.

I'm not sure of this has been posted, but there's a rather splendid gallery of images available now. https://webbtelescope.org/resource-gallery/images 247 lovely images of which the first 15 are recent, and well worth exploring.

Imagine the SMACS 0723 image is up on someones iphone screen. Now imagine them standing on the goal line of a football pitch and you're on the other goal line. That's the view. Hard to believe.

Hard to tell. If there's any real amount of red shifting in the target, it would be a lucky chance to get a spectral line matching the narrowband filter passband - so I would be sceptical that it would have any use for real far field targets. However, there may be some value for exoplanet atmospheric analysis, but I don't have any knowledge of what those spectra look like. [ A little knowledge is a dangerous thing, so anything I suggest could well come with a Hazmat warning]

That makes sense F = Filter nnn = wavelength in microns x 100 W2 / W / M / N to indicate whether Very Wide / Wide / Medium / Narrow spreads

It's at least two separate sessions, you can tell by the offset diffraction spikes around the brightest star

Try here https://www.nasa.gov/nasalive

There's a dark sky map available here In terms of finding decent places for observing, the gostargazing.co.uk website has maps of 'observing sites' on a region by region basis. At this time of year, go South rather than North, as the skies get darker earlier, and it might also be useful if you are looking over the sea, as you may have less light pollution in that direction; so maybe think South Devon.

They've just announced that Joe Biden will be unveiling one of the images this evening at 10pm BST. It'll be on NASA TV channel and loads of other places as well I'm sure. https://www.nasa.gov/press-release/nasa-updates-coverage-for-webb-telescope-s-first-images-reveal Edit to change time to 10pm BST

A very simple solar finder. Plastic from a coffee jar lid, plus a piece of wood from the shed.

The OpenStax e book on Astronomy has a chapter on "cratered worlds" that might be of interest. Available online, as a pdf or as an ebook. https://openstax.org/books/astronomy-2e/pages/9-1-general-properties-of-the-moon ETA: I expect you're already familiar with this, but if you want information about specific features, the Virtual Lunar Atlas has a brief summary available when looking at the map https://ap-i.net/avl/en/start

What are the main differences between SS6 and SS7 as far as the Pro version is concerned ? I'm a SS6 Plus version user, and it would be useful to know whether it's worth looking at going for the new version. I know I could look on the website, but I'm more interested in knowing what makes real users go "Oh, that's really good!"

It's worth letting people know that because you're in the dark, you can keep both eyes open - which makes it much more comfortable.