reezeh

Took some of my own 

4 inch achro refractor f10

2x barlow

Olympus Pen-F digital 

Various manual exposures

ISO 800 - 1600

I got this with one of my 4 inch achro refractors, 3x barlow and Olympus Pen E-P2 in jpeg mode this afternoon at about 1622 GMT

Edit: First light with another 4 inch refractor: single exposure; nothing fancy as far as processing goes, just stuff like resize, brightness, artifact removal and unsharp mask.

On 18/10/2020 at 23:20, Soloula said:

Hi first post so hope this is in the right board.... My neighbour has just had four big spotlight dusk till dawn lights installed in the eaves of his house. It's like floodlights and I nearly cried when I saw them as the light pollution from them is terrible. They're not budging on switching them off when we're out. Is there anything we can do? Will the council deal with this as light pollution affecting the enjoyment of our property? Can I buy something to sit in/put out to block it out, although they're so high up and cover the full length of their garden that I don't know if this is possible? 

I was due to get my dad's 6" refractor telescope this year but now it feels like theres no point. Its not exactly portable to jump in the car and take it elsewhere as my lovely neighbour suggested My kids will be gutted too. We often sit out with some hot chocolate and binoculars stargazing. 

Any advice to a newbie would be much appreciated. 

Ask him politely again,  but secretly record the conversation, especially his response.

If it is, let's just say not very nice then buy about half a dozen guinea fowl and keep them in your affected garden.

I promise you within the week he'll be taking those lights down.  And if he complains, it's just like for like. He wants his floodlights, you have your guineas! 😃

15 hours ago, Kitsunegari said:

If you hold the shift button on your keyboard; and press print screen button on your keyboard;   You can then open up a paint app and paste a screen shot from the clip board    (ctrl+V)

 

 

I'm too  lazy to play finger-twister and just use Paintshop Pro 5 and 7 and use the screenshot facility in that. Has the advantage of of being able to export to most picture formats 😃

Yes for those who are wanting to know the sunspot group is 2814

If I wasn't working I'd be looking at that one as much as possible. 

White light only for me. Not got H-alpha or anything else like that as yet. Funds won't allow it atm but might be able to start saving towards that soon or will have to wait a few years til I get my pension coming in and any necessities out of the way 😢

On 11/04/2021 at 19:45, paulastro said:

Two books that will really set you are on the way  are:

How to observe the sun safely 2nd edition by Lee Macdonald.

Observing the sun - a pocket field guide by Jamey L Jenkins.

They both contain lots of essential and useful information and lots of practical observing information.

There's also the Solar Astronomy Handbook published by Willmann-Bell which is pretty comprehensive and well worth having. 

12 hours ago, ScouseSpaceCadet said:

Fantastic blinkin' news here! I have just walked toward the conservatory to check the sky. It was unusually dark in there, so I thought the LED street lamp causing most of my local light problems is broken (yippee!). Well I went out to check and through the binoculars could see a big rectangular shield covering the whole side of the lamp!

It must have been done today. This has taken a year and three requests. The last one being last week. Brilliant!

Don't give up if trying. 👍

 

The unobtrusive glow above was once a blinding lamp.

Won't it be great if they were all low pressure sodium yellow and shielded and fitted with passive infra red sensors to only come on when people and vehicles come near!

It'll be a win-win for everyone all-round 

That'll be like eating your cake and still having double! 

7 hours ago, Louis D said:

It's my neighbors' back porch lights that light up my backyard.  There's not much I can do about them other than asking them to shut them off when no one is in their backyard.  Some are sympathetic, others feel safer keeping their yard floodlit at night and refuse to change their ways.

If you're young enough to have a good amount of time ahead of you (no offence intended) perhaps you can plant a strategically placed shrub or tree or two. Maybe that'll deal with the problem as time goes by. Then again, the damn things seem to be triggered by the tiniest twitch of a leaf or blade of grass in the slightest breeze like the one next door to me.

He's angled it away a bit but it still spends more time on than off.

I'm resorting to the trees method...

On 24/03/2021 at 13:04, Michael Kieth Adams said:

Why radio telescopes fail to encounter signs of civilization.   Using radio signals for communication does not make sense.   Long distance conversations become next to impossible using radio, but using some form of communication based on entangled particles should be instantaneous, and would quickly displace radio communications. We hear nothing because we are listening for the wrong things.  Just a thought.

The thought has occurred to me before. 

Just commenting. 

I do believe that the sunspot / group is 2813

It's roughly where 2812 was a few days ago.

I'd be having a white light look but it's rather cold and windy here and my options are either setting up the CI700 with the 152mm refractor which will take ages or trying the Nexstar 102gt and getting frustrated by the wind. 

Tempted but I'll pass for now as 2812 wasn't easily visible for me last weekend and there's not even any faculae to look for 😢

3 hours ago, TerryMcK said:

Yes it has shrunk. I imaged it for the first time on Sunday and looked for it yesterday and it was there but seemed to have split into two much small spots. I saw it(them) around 11AM and by 4PM couldn't see them.

I was wondering if it was just lost in the seeing for me. It was about 11 UT I started to look. 

Itching to know what's just beyond the limb coming around our way; anything worthwhile setting up for? 

I know that it's early days in the current cycle  and that trends have been downward. I just hope that for at least as long as I'm stuck with white light that there's something to see and no Maunder-type minimum in my lifetime at least. 

1 hour ago, johninderby said:

You should read this.

http://www.esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Exploring_space/How_we_see_the_far_side_of_the_Sun

It's not so much as the far side, more rather what's just beyond the edge of the limb

12 minutes ago, johninderby said:

Was better a few days ago although still tiny. Maybe some proper spots next week? 🙏🏼🙏🏼

It's a pity that there's not a few probes in orbit of the sun. At least it'll give a heads up. 

On top of that, Bradford is even cloudier than the rest of the UK 😭

It was a tiny pore on the  site earlier but has disappeared.

I was rather hoping to catch something. It isn’t as if I have many chances or clear weather.

At least I saw some faculae, so at least it's not a total waste 

Decided to have a look at the sun using Altair herschel wedge on 102mm refractor today. Eyepiece used Vixen LV 8 - 24mm zoom and filters Baader solar continuum and out of curiosity OIII, red and deep blue, plus semi-APO.

No matter what, I couldn't make out 2812 at all, apart from perhaps the slightest glimpse, but the faculae 2811 stood out sharply. I checked on the status of the spots and the info said they've shrunk.

Did anybody have any luck seeing it today?

As a note, I did like the results of the continuum and OIII. The OIII seemed to bring out 2811 quite well. 

There's absolutely nothing wrong with just looking. I've done it often enough. Spending time with Nature gives a better connection than anything like 5g or wifi ever can. It's what's missing in a lot of people's lives these days.

Hi and...

Hi 👋

2 minutes ago, wulfrun said:

Indeed, asterism would be a better title. Twas only light-hearted, I don't expect much IAU interest! I wonder what names we'd have if we started over, from scratch.

Probably ones like that and others that'll probably be moderated or get me a ban for even mentioning them 😂

I was just going to add this as an edit to my reply...

I think that'll be called an asterism. Somehow I don't think the IAU will be in too much of a hurry to add that as an 89th

Now if you could find a Trek-inspired reference; say, The Klingon's Forehead it'll probably be official faster than you can say "beam me up Scotty" 😃

52 minutes ago, callisto said:

Mine doesn't

FLO need a new sticker, especially for me:

"LIGHT POLLUTION GUARANTEED"

On 12/02/2021 at 16:25, Deadlake said:

A filter wheel, no more fumbling around with filters in the cold night. Always fun making sure they don't drop out. Also bit more back focus for larger EPs.
 

I wondered if how good a filter wheel would be for visual 

On 09/02/2021 at 19:05, mce said:

Pure nostalgia here. This was my first astro book, back in the 1960s, but I lost it somewhere. So for the sake of a little over 2 pounds ...

There"s nothing like old books and nostalgia 😍

It's a photography term originally; faster meaning lower focal length to aperture ratio, slower being higher ratio. It basically means that lower f- number makes a brighter image than a slower or longer lens (or mirror), which results in faster shutter speeds.

Another way to look at it is that faster makes a smaller image at point of focus and compresses the available light tighter. Slower optics magnify the image, or spread out the light, making it dimmer.

Eyepieces are often suited or designed for faster or slower optics. For instance, the much maligned Huygens is an atrocious performer in say a fast dobsonian at f4, but well be more tolerable in a long focus f15 refractor. 

I hope that kind of helps.