Wiu-Wiu

As a fan of lists, the shorter the list, the better I like them  

With only 37 items in the list, this is one that could actually be done. Except for the ones in the Southern Hemisphere - or do they?  

(list exported from Deepskylog)

Well, the first two are done, only 35 to go! 

Recently picked up this Mak (150/1500) with upgraded focuser. Built like a tank! Gives some lovely views of doubles and clusters, good for grabbing it on the go for a quick look from my lightpolluted garden. 

Definately ice, Alan. You have been in very hot weather so the cooler has to work overtime. I have the very same pattern (honeycomb like) in my 071 mc pro. It is not corrected by flats as it disappears after a while.  
I work around it by either cooling slower, or cool at least an hour in advance. 
Bummer for when going out on location because I lose an hour of battery time that way. 

I’ve never seen anyone open up my 071 on the side, you might want to double or triple check the exact type! I open it up from the top (double plated) and the dessicant tabs are in the top next to the sensor.

nice ideas! So cool to see so many approaches! 
 

I use paper notes in the field, rewritten on rainy days to scan, put on my website, and classify in a binder. 
all my observations and sketches are logged digitally in Deepskylog . Very handy to doublecheck or even plan ahead.

I only draw in the stars I can actually see directly. I remember it being mottled and filled with little specs of stars, but drawing those in would do no justice so I only draw the glow. 

I'll need more practice, as I feel that more stars are being resolved now. 

Indeed, I only had one excellent night of seeing and transparency, but I chose to do high magnification sketches on planetary nebulae as that is what makes all the difference there.

I missed out on M33 - I feel like I should have tried, but I did spot M31 naked eye and had a look at that. There were just too much goodies in the South to look straight up  

Finally found some time to process the sketches made on my vacation to the dark countryside of Bulgaria. 

Hope you enjoy the views!

This PN looks like an exclamation mark, high magnification shows a dark indentation. Peculiar view!

Donut shaped PN with a brighter edge on the North side.

Quite spectacular PN, consisting of 2 arches. The PN appears like a little ghost. The South arch has 2 small extensions.

Definately an eyecatcher, this one! Its core appears triangular and shows 2 rows of stars, with a dark patch between them, just above the bright core.

Lovely compact GC:

A quite large, and slightly elongated GC, perched against a row of stars:

Lovely concentrated GC:

Lovely GC with dark areas in the disk. A smudge to the South edge appears to be a string of stars on short exposure photos

Not much to say, Very distinct and bright. 

This was a nice one, the PN is clearly elongated at lower magnifications but shows lots of detail when using great power. 

This peculiar PN has a clear central star with a dark ring around it, followed by a mottled nebula, with slightly jagged edges.

Well, you find yourself sketching the Christmas tree cluster, and notice that your atlas notes a Struve double star in its center. 

One of my side projects for nights of haze, patches of clouds, or when there is just not enough time or energy to get myself to a dark spot, is visiting (and sketching) as many Struve doubles as I can find. 

So I decided to sketch the double, and had a bit of work with it - being in the center of the cluster. 

So when processing my observation, I started researching where the B-component was, and to my big surprise I noticed this is a multiple star system. 

(source: Stelle Doppie  - Some other observation reports: here )

It is SO big, even 2 of the components are a Struve on their own (STF 952)

I wasn't able - or aware - to split the AB-pair.

You definately should put this one on your list and try to get as many as you can  

For reference, here it is in respect to the cluster:

This fine winter object is found in the constellation LEO. 

Sorry for posting this in the summer, I'm working away my sketching lag  

Working away my sketching lag. Got about 100 sketches to go 🙈

A is actually a double too, but with only 0.5" separation it wasn't split.

Asiair user since V1 came out. Back then it only took pictures and did your guiding. Upgraded to pro as soon as that came out.
By software updates they since then added multistar guiding, platesolving, multi target sessions, goto (on your image), autofocus, filterwheel, … FOR FREE. 
 

I never looked back. Portability is a big plus, and I run the whole thing from ONE battery in the field. 
I also have a pier in the garden and after adding a small travel router, I can check the session from my bed, as it connects to my home network. 
 

I just adore the multi target session planning! New features are always in development, I think they are working on mosaic feature now. Adding an EAF to my rig made me wonder what the heck I was doing before. I can’t do without one anymore.

in short: you won’t regret getting one. trust me.

First week of observing with a new instrument on a dark, southern location, is asking for showpieces! I couldn't resist taking aim at M20 and start sketching. 

Finder: APM, hands down the BEST finder I have. 
https://www.apm-telescopes.de/en/optical-accessories/finder--pointer/apm-finderscope-50-mm-90-erect-image--24mm-reticle-eyepiece-55.html

they have other options too, might want to look into that so it fits your scope.

Scale is 15 mm per degree. 

The Sky atlas 2000 Deluxe has a scale of 8,2 mm per degree. 

But that said, the Interstellarum field edition is a really nice item to have next to your scope at night, it's really detailed. 

I had to trim this down in quality in order to get it uploaded. I can keep scrolling through it on my desktop end never get bored. 

My first "summer project" - a 13 panel mosaic; all shot with the Esprit 120. 

All processing done in AstroPixelProcessor, just some light levels and curves in PixInsight.

Enjoy!

It has diminished in brightness, indeed. 

Took another pass last night and there is definately a difference when compared to the reference stars around it. 

I read a thread about this yesterday evening and planned a quick stop of the suspected region in between subs. 

Raw image, 300s, Esprit 120. 

Brightest star in the frame (left) is FF AQL.

Imaged over several nights, I tried to make a mosaic of the entire Veil Nebula region, but it seems there is still some space between this and the Eastern Veil. I'll shoot that in one of the upcoming nights, and try again  

For now, this is what I'm left with... 

(Esprit 120, Cem 60, Asi 071, STC Duo narrowband filter)

A 2 night, 2 panel mosaic of the Witch Broom, 88 x 300s in total. 

HA-O3 duo narrowband filter, Esprit 120, Asiair, Cem 60

Imagine the views through a tank Frac ! Quite noisy on the mount, but definately stable, and safe! 

From Belgium here, so I don’t even have to worry about dark sites 😝

But indeed, sitting in half dark, moving around and scaring people that way, I can imagine one needs to prevent getting their head bashed in. 
I always have a 10€ Decathlon red night light on, at my feet. Prevents me from falling over my stuff, but also ‘shows’ people I’m there.

While observing, I did have the odd wildlife passing over and next to me, the most terrifying one was a family of wild boar in France, but I was lucky enough to be in an enclosed garden, at the right side of the fence. 
i don’t even want to know what animals I haven’t seen. 

Hartelijk welkom, marfa! Lots of Dutchies here, too  

I almost have an entire administration behind my sessions. It still gets tweaked here and there. 

My sessions are numbered, simply by date in reverse, and always the date when the night started; if I were to do an observation tonight or even after midnight; it would be session 20210606

I've got object notes and double star session notes. All can be used in a session, I'll just number the pages. there are multiple objects on a page. 

Some pages, like the double star one, have small field sketch circles on them. Others have no room for that, but I also use different sketch templates ranging from small, double circles, single circle, or big circle, depending on the target and the detail. 

It looks a bit like this:

Front page

Double star session, so DS template

STF 1254 was good enough to make a big sketch, the in-session number is 20210418/01 (first sketch of the session) and overall sketch number 263. 

More sessions (and ideas) on my website  

I recently aquired a second hand filterwheel, and wanted to test the asiair’s new planning update. 
 

played around with filter changes, autofocus, platesolving and plan mode for 3 nights, this piece was a 2 panel mosaic. 
stitched together in APP, final processing in PI. 
Esprit 120 - asi 071 - cem 60. 
Duo narrowband ha-o3 filter.