Waddensky

Maybe they're easier/more interesting to sketch than to image? 

https://stargazerslounge.com/forum/52-observing-and-imaging-double-and-variable-stars/

You can download the charts for several alternative telescopes (sadly, not the originals from the paper version) from the Turn Left website and create your own table with them.

To compare observing spots, primarily. I don't use the Bortle scale myself (I use SQM values and readings), but I noticed that it gives observers an idea of how much darker a spot will be compared to other spots they're familiar with. It's easier to compare Bortle values than SQM values. 

Average reading in my garden is 21.05 mag/arcsec2 (Bortle 4 I believe). My favourite nearby spot reads 21.41 (Bortle 3).

Excellent scope in my opinion. I use the NexStar Evo 9.25 for outreach activities. Nice, sharp views and although significantly larger and heavier than the 8", still perfectly manageable. Dew shield is probably necessary depending on your location.

No experience with AP though. 

16 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

Light pollution atlas 2022 also features click for more information when opened in OpenStreetMap

I'm currently at 20.34 according to that data source (which I think is very much the case).

It also provided me with new possible observing location that I must relay to my local astronomy buddies

 

That's great! 😄

It's good to realise that the light pollution data is based on a method outlined in a paper by Cinzano et al. (link) that uses satellite data and a light propagation model to calculate the sky brightness. It's not based on actual measurements of the night sky. In my experience, the model is quite accurate though. 

The Bortle scale is quite subjective and most websites use old VIIRS data to calculate the sky brightness. This website uses the most recent data I know of, from 2022. It doesn't list the Bortle scale but it has a colour legend that more or less matches the usual colours that are used for Bortle maps. 

If you want to know the actual sky brightness of your observing location, you can buy a Sky Quality Meter. I have one, nifty little devices. 

13 hours ago, Paul M said:

Folk that know a thing or two about supernovae, aren't watching Betelgeuse with a telescope. No, they'll be like me, running their own neutrino detector. 

You can also sign up for supernova early warning system alerts like this. Also based on neutrino detectors, and alerts you a few hours before the optical supernova becomes visible. 

Hope this stream runs for another 100,000 years 😉.

This is incredible! Pictures like this make it so clear that M78 and the surrounding NGCs are just small, illuminated parts of the huge dust clouds in the area. What a detail. Very, very nice!

7 minutes ago, jacko61 said:

Everyone seems to be avoiding the obvious - visitors from another planet

graeme

 

Occam's razor 😉

20 hours ago, StuartT said:

An annoying feature of the clearoutside website is that they seem not to understand cookies! It doesn't matter how often I enter my coords it always reverts back to Exeter whenever I go back to it. (presumably because that's where the FLO people are based)

You can enter coordinates without cookies in the url, like this: http://clearoutside.com/forecast/52.09/5.12

Yes, both the moving lights and the flashes are most likely satellites. I can't remember a night that I didn't see them. If you enter your location on websites like Heavens Above, you can find out when they are visible with amazing accuracy.

Satellites, most likely. A few years ago I would have suggested Iridium satellites, but the ones that produced these very bright flashes are currently being or already have been de-orbited.

Hi Gonariu and welcome! Don't worry about your level of English, they've accepted my broken English for years now without any complaints 😉.

Interesting paper from Alexander et al. on arXiv: The Autodidactic Universe

From this article: "Our universe observes a whole bunch of laws of physics, but the researchers say other possible laws of physics seem equally likely, given the way mathematics works in the universe. So if a group of candidate laws were equally likely, then how did we end up with the laws we really have?"

Most stargazing forecast apps, including mine, use a single weather model as source. It's usually best to use these alongside other sources of weather data, preferably as 'local' (high resolution) as possible. There are convenient websites that allow you compare several weather models at a glance, such as this one. This will give you an idea to what extent the models are in agreement.

5 hours ago, keora said:

and actually see real live telescopes

This is a great idea actually to get an idea of size and weight of the different models.

1 hour ago, keora said:

I’m not sure  about a Dobsonian. if I buy a medium sized one I suppose I could stand it on the ground, but it might be too heavy to cart around. If I buy a small one, from my limited knowledge of scopes, do I have to stand it on a little table or do I kneel on the ground?

Smaller dobs are tabletops, they need to be placed on a table. Some of them have a thread to mount them on a camera tripod, but I don't know if that works well - I've never tried it.

Most dobsons can be disassembled into two parts, the base and the OTA. The base is heavy and quite unhandy to carry around. I'm pretty sure the weights of the seperate parts can be found online.

On 08/04/2021 at 09:40, Stardaze said:

Definitely need an OIII for the veil 

A good UHC filter will do too. The Veil is one of those objects where a filter makes all the difference between completely invisible and bright and detailed. A very remarkable contrast.

Great selection of objects and nice reports, thanks! The 'wobbling technique' is very effective to detect the faintest targets.

Oof! A challenge indeed. B was only confirmed visually in 1896 with a 36 inch refractor. The smallest aperture I could find that was able to split Procyon visually is an 18 inch binodob. Sounds like mission impossible from the Dutch mountains with the usual seeing and your average scope 😉.

Lunar twilight is a real thing, but can largely be ignored for most practical purposes. So if the Sun is sufficiently below the horizon (more than 18 degrees) before the Moon rises, you can enjoy a dark sky. But my guess is that it's not yet fully dark at 10 PM.

Still, I'm pretty sure viewing galaxies is much better with the full Moon above the horizon than in a Bortle 8 environment. The Milky Way will be quite washed out though.

4 minutes ago, NorfolkGazer said:

As a bit of a side topic on this one, would anyone know what size I would have to draw the three reticles for the Telrad to be in scale with the deep sky watch printouts. Apologies if this is hijacking the thread a little, but it seemed the best place to post it. Was thinking of drawing them on a clear sheet so I could use it with the atlas to star hop.

It depends on the paper size you print the charts on (it's a vector PDF so you can pretty much choose any paper size). The Deep-sky Watch atlas has a declination grid of 5 degrees, if you measure the distance between two grid lines you can calculate the size of the Telrad circles (they are 4, 2 and 0.5 degrees).

Had another look at the nova tonight with the 10x50s. The moonlight hindered a bit but the star was easily found with the help of some averted vision. I even spotted M52 as a ghostly glow.

I got the feeling the nova was a tiny bit dimmer than yesterday.

It's a lot of fun to follow the developments night after night. It reminds me of my observations of the naked-eye nova in Delphinus in 2013.

How fast is super fast? Most visible satellites are in LEO and roughly have the same speed.