Whistlin Bob

Yeah- it didn't show up so much in the editor at full resolution but stuck out in the jpeg like a sore thumb. It does leave quite a few artefacts behind, but they're easily dealt with if you take a bit more care than I did!

+1 on eBay to save your pennies for the collimating ep (though I use and prefer a laser) For me I'd go for the Baader zoom. I have many sessions where it's the only EP I use. Other Zooms are available of course 😁

Been playing with Starnet++ on a Western Veil I took with the 130pds a few weeks ago. Starless and less starry versions below. Kit- 130pds, HEQ5, Cooled 550d, Quadband Filter, 26x 6mins with Flats, Darks and Bias. Uploading it here I can see I need to spend more time on the background of the star-less one- still quite pleased though

Love these types of projects. Keep us posted 😁

@mikeDnight I don't how true it is, but I've been told that the internals of most binoviewers are more or less identical. I'm not sure how true this is, but it would certainly explain how yours perform so well. If the OP wants to maximise budget at FLO I wouldn't be scared to order the OVL ones they stock, although I've no experience of them.

I think people's experiences vary- I can only relate mine which has had good and bad about it. I bought some William's Optics Binoviewers second hand and in excellent condition through this forum- they came with a 1.6x and a 2x barlow and 2x 20mm Ultra Wide Angle eyepieces. So lets get the bad out of the way: - Unless adjusted correctly for the distance between my eyes it's quite hard to form a single image. This makes it hard to share views with people you may be observing with. - Because of the UWA eyepieces and where you put your head when you're looking through both eyes they're quite susceptible to reflections- I need a hood when I use them. - I use them with an 8" (same as yours) and a 14" dob- I can only achieve focus with 1 of the barlows in the 8" and both of them in the 14", so it's always quite a high magnification exercise when I use them. - In cold weather they're very susceptible to misting over. And the good? Only one thing: - The view on bright targets with 2 eyes in good conditions is absolutely stunning. Fabulous contrast and detail, and an illusion of three dimensions. I've read a lot about "spacewalk" eyepieces- that's exactly how I'd describe the BV's on open clusters and globulars- completely immersive. The moon is stunning, rendering enormous detail and making you feel like you're actually there. I've not had a really great planetary view through them, but that's more about the low altitude of the planets in the UK this year. I've a tingling excitement for when the planets are a little higher. I've had to learn what conditions to use them in to avoid disappointment. But when those conditions are met it's just a fabulous experience and extremely enjoyable. I don't regret their purchase for one second. Oh- and I've had to Velcro a weight onto the bottom end of the telescope to keep it in balance...

Excellent report 😁

Thanks Iain. I used a mixture of the zoom eyepiece and my 30mm aero on the quintet- it really was only on the cusp of being visible- it was easier to spot as a patch of light with the 30mm, the zoom gave it a little shape but I needed to avert vision more to catch it. I couldn't separate the galaxies, so you've definitely got further than me on it- which is encouraging as we using the same size instrument 😁 I'm well motivated to try again in a dark sky and see if I can get a little more out of it. On the California and Horse head I didn't get very far at all with the Hb filter- but it's the first time I've tried it, and my experience is that sometimes I need a few sessions to get the best out of a filter. Very excited for next time I'm able to go out.

That might take a while! I don't have mono CMOS due to budget constraints, much as I'd love one, and I'm a little more wary of getting something like that second hand. Astronomers seem to take good care of their stuff, but electronics seem a bit more fragile to me. Of the bits that helped me: Astro modded 600d - £250 Pixinsight - £200 IDAS D2 filter - £175 Those three items all moved my imaging forward a long way. The D2 works really well in my Bortle 5 street with LED lights on galaxies- you may need a different one for where you live. In addition I have an Ha filter and do quite a bit of HaRGB stuff which is good fun, PI helps with all of this- although cheaper packages such as Star Tools are available. I think it's well worth downloading the trial versions to work out which is best for you.

Thanks Frank- it's a 14 inch. Wow- we must have been pretty close to you earlier on Sunday- we were in Great Salkeld. It's such a beautiful part of the world. Returning to my Bortle 5 suburban home is gonna be tough!

Whilst he carried on I returned to the eyepiece as Orion was now high above the mountains and above the lighter section of sky. M42 – Orion Nebula – My first observation this season, at was as always a joy. With the UHC filter in I sent some time just enjoying the bright bow-like “front” of the object and then, with time, the billowing structure of the nebula behind began to emerge. Reflecting on the earlier observations of nebulae that evening, there really are no others that compare to it for me. It’s just an endlessly rich and fascinating object. NGC 2024 – Flame Nebula – feeling encouraged by the fabulous views of M42 I slid the scope up to Alnitak for a gander at the Flame nebula. I found that the UHC filter didn’t really add anything (especially as the blue/red separation it puts onto Alnitak is a bit distracting) so I took it out and found that I could still see it. Far more obvious than at home it appeared as two prominent patches separated by a dark lane. The branches that you see in images couldn’t be seen at all, but the shape was very clear as was the central dark lane. IC434 – Horsehead Nebula- finally! This was not easy at all. Following guidance I’ve read here and elsewhere I tried with a H-Beta filter in my Baader zoom but this wasn’t showing it at all. Switching back to the 30 mm with no filter I went through the ritual of just circling the area with the positions of the local prominent stars in my mind. The nebulous bank in which it sits was quite straightforward and with time the Horsehead appeared as a notch in it, a clear area of darker sky through the brighter part of the nebula, but not cutting all the way through. I couldn’t see the famous charismatic shape but the dark cut into the nebulous bank was there, as well as some hints of the shape in the clouds beneath it (I probably wouldn’t have been able to discern those clouds but for the darkness of the HH bit). I called Javier over, but the stiffening breeze was making it very hard to keep the scope in place and I was unable to show him. As it was 2am and he wanted to be up to photograph the dawn at 6 he announced that it was time for him to turn in. Reluctantly, and with this entertaining and interesting company on his way I also started to pack up. Reflecting back- what a couple of nights! My first time with a large-ish dob under pretty dark skies: it will not be the last. If you’ve read this far then- thank you – I’ve had fun re-living the experience and I would finish by repeating that the old cliché about the best upgrade to your telescope being petrol is one that I now firmly agree with.

It was clear as soon as I arrived that the conditions were not quite so favourable- the sky wasn’t quite as dark (although the Milky Way was still easily visible), there was broken cloud scudding across it and a pretty stiff breeze across the exposed site. I quickly discovered that the ¼ to 3/8 adaptor had fallen out of my SA as well so that put paid to any serious imaging plans. No worries with the dob in the back of the car ready to go again. From the observing log: M45 – Pleiades – very twinkly so seeing not great, but nebulosity was clear again. A wonderful sight. M1 – Crab nebula – quite easy to pick out even with no filter. Whilst I couldn’t see the tendrils that feature in so many images, the uneven shape was nice and clear and there was an obvious fading from the core through to the outer sections, with some uneven mottling within the object. Double Cluster – I had planned to make the most of the dark skies and focus on fainter objects, but the double is a favourite and was clearly visible naked eye so I pointed the dob at it and was surprised to find that even clusters are enhanced by the dark sky. Just so many stars! So next up… Melotte 20 – this is barely visible as a cluster naked-eye at home, but here it was almost as prominent as the Pleiades. Pointing the dob at it gave almost bewildering fields of stars- so densely clustered it felt as though they were joined in a net. NGC7331 & Stephans Quntet- The view was very similar to Sunday night and good to affirm the sighting. I concentrated more on NGC7331- the closer galaxy nearby which was quite prominent and showed a bit of shape. Again- I couldn’t distinguish arms, but it was good to be able to see so much more than from home. M81- Bodes – Tried again for the spiral arms and spent some time on it. Outer reaches were visible and definitely the shape of the galaxy was not an even circle, but if I’d tried to draw what I could see there would be no arms on it. That’ll have to wait for another dark skies trip. NGC1499 – California Nebula – This was really tricky to make out. I could detect it more as an interruption to the brightness of the stars in the field than anything else. I tried again with the UHC filter and a sort of fibrous structure was evident, but it took a lot of concentrating and relaxing and averting vision. IC5070 – Pelican Nebula – As I had the UHC in I popped across to this one, but it was again very tricky to make out. There’s a bright ridge running above the 2 brighter stars and this was clearly visible, but the rest of the object only appeared intermittently in averted vision. Whilst I caught glimpses of it around the field of view I certainly would not have been able to draw the shape of it. NGC7000 – North America Nebula – It was natural to move onto this after the Pelican. The Eastern seaboard section was similar to the Pelican- hinted at, but not obvious. It started to become more easily visible around Florida and the Gulf Mexico and the Cygnus Wall was quite prominent. At this point a bobbing white light appeared in my peripheral vision. Someone walking with a torch. I always feel quite exposed when out on my own in places like this and I sat quietly, but with heart pounding, as the light gradually made its way toward me. Then it started sweeping the field, and stopped dead when it found me. Feeling a show of confidence was in order, I waved my hand in the air and shouted out a cheery “Good evening!” as if it’s the most normal thing in the world to be found on your own sitting on an ironing chair in a freezing cold field in the middle of a late October night. The torch again started bobbing towards me and as he came closer I could see he was clutching a tripod and camera bag and was most probably a like minded soul. My visitor turned out to be Javier- a Spanish amateur photographer having a week’s holiday in the lakes. He was very interested in what I was doing and my equipment, so I whipped out the filter and started showing him some galaxies which he was very taken with. An explanation of what he was looking at, and the distances involved caused some rather pleasing swearing and evolved into a lengthy conversation about the likelihood that the universe is infinite and whether or not the multiverse theory is a pile of nonsense (not the word used). His mission for the night was to take some nightscapes of the stones with stars beyond, using his torch to paint them in. It’s a fun technique and I was able to join in with my camera , which are the pictures that you can see here (his results were better!).

29/10/19 Castlerigg Stone Circle Wonderful as Sunday night was, the one downside of the site was that cars coming over Whinlatter pass would sweep their full beam headlights across it. I wanted to do some imaging with my Star Adventurer so tried for somewhere equally nearby that wouldn’t have that problem. Castlerigg is a place I’ve loved for a long time. It was built 3-4000 years ago on a plateau surrounded by mountains. We’ve found no evidence of settlement at the site and it was built pre-Bronze Age- no-one really knows what these early stone circles were for but it was obviously an important and sacred site for the inhabitants of the area at that time. And it’s a heck of a place to sit and look at the stars.

Whilst this was pretty stunning, even better was the view straight up. Our little eyrie was up at 300m, and although Keswick was only 6 miles away the height seemed to take us above the outer reaches of the light dome leaving the Milky Way bright and clear across the sky. The number of stars was breath-taking: much the darkest bit of the sky was the rift running through our galaxy. My friend Ian, who happens to be holidaying nearby at the same time had arranged to join us, and I had the dob set up just in time for his arrival. I’ve bored him in the pub on many occasions with my astro obsession and so it was great that the skies obliged us with such a wonderful display. We started off with a naked eye tour, first of the main constellations and then of the brighter larger objects that we could see- the Pleiades, Andromeda and Auriga cluster all easy to spot with the naked eye (thanks Paul M, a clubmate at RAG, for the laser pointer suggestion). Then we moved to the dob for some showpieces... M31 – Was clearly visible with the naked eye so I just pointed the dob at it- no star hopping. Checked in the finder to make sure I had it right and there was the whole thing in the finder! Bright core, elongated shape even M32 visible. Move to the eyepiece (30mm/55x) and it’s like a photo- and clearly bigger than the FOV. M110 was just there- no effort, no AV. Dark lanes prominent. A suitable “Wow!” from Ian. Yeah- it’s always like this, honest… M27 – Dumbbell – Like M31 I was able to put the scope right onto it, and it could clearly be seen in the finder. In the eyepiece, with no filter, both the applecore and the wider fainter sections were visible. Gorgeous. M57 – Ring Nebula – Stuck out like neon. A glorious sight with real texture in the outer regions and obvious darkening in the centre, although I couldn’t see the central star. M45 – Pleiades – very bright and with clear nebulosity visible in patches around the brighter stars. M81/2 – Bodes and Cigar – Nice rewardingly clear view, although try as I might I couldn’t see spiral arms. Ian very impressed with the idea that Ian’s kids are younger than mine, so he had to head at this point and with the temperature dropping through zero Sam retreated to the car- I had an hour before forecast cloud to go after some fainter stuff. M33 – Surprised to see this appearing in the finder as well. In the main eyepiece it was clear as day- and with a spiral structure. I’ve had it before on M51, and flattened in M31- but here it was, laid out in an exquisite swirl across the field of view. NGCseveral – The Veil. I’m quite accustomed to my back garden view of this in O3- sinuous green strands against a pitch background. Here, with no filter, the nebulous regions were brighter and richer, the challenge was only picking them out from the dense star fields that crowded it. East and West were easy to spot but the central sections were harder to pick out. Popping a filter in would have made it easy, but for this night I wanted to see it unmolested, so to speak. NGC892 – Spiral Galaxy in Andromeda – A nice pleasing streak across the FOV. Tried for some time to see the dust lane, but it was not visible to me. At home this object is not visible at all. Stephan’s Quintet -YES! I read about this object some time ago: a cluster of five galaxies , four of which are interacting, sat above one of the arms coming off the square of Pegasus. It’s almost a ritual on better, clearer nights at home that I go and have a look and fail to see it. Well here it was. To be fair it was a faint uneven smear: but still- the light of four dancing galaxies 200 million light years away with a fifth nearby at 39 million years photobombing them. Not a bad way to finish the evening. Oh- and I got a star trail over the Northern end of Bassenthwaite lake:

I’ve had two superb evenings, so please bear with me as I’ve got a bit wordy…. 27/10/19: Whinlatter Forest Park The Clear Outside astro weather app was promising a clear night on Sunday so I managed to get out for quick recce during the day. The nearest dark skies looked to be in Whinlatter Forest Park and, whilst the main car park was surrounded by very tall trees I managed to find a side road that had been closed off after 50 yards with pretty good skies and lovely views out across Bassenthwaite Lake and towards Keswick. Arriving around 7:30pm with @EmuStardust in tow we were greeted by the view below:

Away for half term at the moment and staying in close proximity to some dark skies. Amazingly, for Cumbria, there has also been some lovely clear nights- and best of all, my wife agreed we could bring some astro kit with us. She may not have expected the whole boot to be taken up with it. Good job we have a roof box for the rest of their stuff (don’t ask how many days I’ve been in the same underwear)…

I'm also a midlander on holiday in the lakes this week. Spent Sunday night in Whinlatter Forest Park with much the same experience as you. Just stunning!

Very nice. I've been playing with vintage lenses myself a bit this year- it's amazing what they can do!

Really nice image. I agree on the image capture- I tend to set mine running then get a dob out. Sometimes the imaging goes wrong and I lose a few subs, but I hate missing time at the eyepiece.

Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been imaging the Crescent using different focal lengths and filters Widefield 135mm I was working out that this is the fourth time I’ve been imaging in or around the Sadr nebula. On this occasion it was because I’d already started on the data for 900mm shots of the Crescent and I thought it’d be nice to have a wider shot of the general area, putting it into context. I was inspired by @Stub Mandrel's recent results with his Triband filter to see if the same (or similar) technology in a clip filter would help with wide frame nebula images and acquired a Skytech Quadband (that transmits 2 35nm bands around Ha, Hb, Oiii and Siii – hence the name) . I must say I’m quite impressed- I got this from a sequence of 20x 150 second captures on Sunday night under a 99% moon using a Russian made 135mm vintage lens on a modded Canon 600d and a Star Adventurer. Normally I’d only attempt proper Narrowband under these sorts of conditions, but I thought it coped pretty well under the strong moonlight. The only slight concern is the halo around Sadr itself. The photo picks out how prominent the Crescent is (below centre and to the right of this picture), but also shows how “busy” this bit of sky is- the Butterfly nebula pops out, with its prominent dark lane, but the fainter cloud that it’s a part of extends beyond the frame. There are also clusters aplenty- my favourite is M29 – the Space Invader cluster just below and to the left of the centre. Probably my eighties upbringing… Hydrogen Alpha These are taken using a Baader 7nm Ha Filter on a modded Canon 550d in a Skywatcher 200p- altogether I got 12 10 minute subs before clouds stopped me. I think this is the best of the shots for showing the structure of the object and the shockwaves that form its shape; the monochrome also highlights the cloud of the larger surrounding nebula. Oiii This came from the same setup and 10 more subs, this time with an 8.5nm Oiii filter, and a 99% moon on 13th October. The only Oiii visible in this shot is around the nebula itself. The signal was quite a bit weaker than the Ha; this picture was created by discarding the Red Channel and then combining equally the Blue and Green using Pixelmath in Pixinsight. Bi-colour Finally, it’s all brought together using the same process- this time feeding the Hydrogen into the Red channel and the Oxygen into the Blue and Green. I spent quite a bit of time playing with this one. Just feeding the data in, the red was total dominant and I progressively multiplied the Blue and Green until it was more prominent (the eventual multiplier used was 2). I also experimented with trying to change the balance to bring a little more colour into it, but that also artificially unbalanced the star colour so I decided to leave it even, which makes the Oxygen mostly white. I’ve really enjoyed taking these different views of the same object and learning about it. The nebula itself, 5,000 light years away, is 25 light years across and is caused by fast stellar winds erupting from the Wolf-Rayet star visible at the centre of the nebula. It’s thought the star will imminently (in astronomical terms) become a supernova.

I often question myself as to why I spend weeks checking the weather forecast and then sitting outside on freezing winter nights. Reading through this thread gives the answer: I'm addicted to the thrill of these moments and clearly I'm not alone. There are so many to choose from, but for myself I'm going to put forward the time when I was mucking around with an inherited 3 inch Newtonian and managed to successfully aim it at a bright star, only to be rewarded with an eyeful of moons and stripes. My first view of Jupiter and the start of an addiction...

Welcome to the 14" club! I've had mine for 18 months now and love it a little bit more with each session. Mine's an Orion USA model, but I'm pretty sure it will have come out of the same Synta factory that yours did and will be optically pretty similar. They are heavy beasts- once mine is put together (it's a truss design) I need another person to move it even in two pieces. Aside from that inconvenience it's perfect: loads of light gathering power but completely comfortable to use without a ladder and will happily fit in the boot of a Ford Focus without dropping the back seats. I look forward to hearing more of your adventures with yours! 😁😁

A few years ago, at our local club meeting (which is rural), a few of us had stayed into the small hours and the police turned up responding to reports of shifty looking characters hanging around the forestry centre- us!!! They had some fine views of Saturn and Jupiter before departing 😁😁😁!

That's really good! Any ideas what the bright light is that appears on the right hand side just below halfway on about 12 seconds?

I was about to post on this thread about my own positive experience at my local group when I saw that Rosliston is your local group too! Like @Trikeflyer I'm a member and manage to get along to most meetings. Back when I was a newbie a few years ago I was made very welcome and the help I received was a catalyst to really getting involved in the hobby. It's actually a very exciting time in the club as we've been working for some years towards having our own Observatory at the forestry centre- it's very close now to completion. If you make the science day that would be great- there will be plenty of members attending. Alternatively, if you want to go to a meeting I understand it can be daunting going on your own- if you want to pm me prior to it I'll be happy to meet you there and introduce you other members of the group 🙂.