Marvin Jenkins

The cloud took the jam out of my donut. I don’t want to play anymore. Marv

It has been going so well up to now. Moon, Jupiter with Io transit, Saturn with two moons, not a chance of Pluto, what was I thinking. Neptune lovely blue colour star but more soft and rounded. Uranus, obvious cream disk and Mars so bright the atmospheric distortion robbing of a detailed look. Just Venus and Mercury to go and a horizon to horizon cloud bank has covered the entire sky despite The weather man saying clear. Tell me if I am wrong, they do have satellites in space right? Marvin

Good work everyone. Total disaster for me though. Uncomfortable first part of the night on the sofa, only to wake at 2:30 to find the small bank of cloud to my south had turned into anvils then blown out all across the sky! Still partly clouded over this morning. Before starting all this I did get a great look at the Moon, Jupiter and Venus with the bins so all was not lost. All the gear is still on the barrow ready to go, so tomorrow morning I will have another go. (Not crossing anything anymore). Marv

Big bank of cloud to my south! First cloud in ages. It Is set to be completely clear by 2am So fingers crossed. I have the mount, scope, bags and boxes all loaded onto a barrow used for moving carp fishing gear round lakes. I need to get to the top of my lane and use the high ground to my advantage and loading a van to go 300 meters is a bit lame. Thanks for the good luck, I will give it my best shot. Marv

My weather is looking very promising and I am planning to crawl quietly out of bed at 2:30 am (can't believe I just wrote that). I will still have Jupiter and Saturn to my west and I have decided to go for the holy grail and try to locate Pluto which by all the apps is right between the two, however, at mag 14 I am probably wishing. Neptune then Mars then Uranus. I want to spend some time on Mars as I failed to see the polar cap at all last time it was well placed (sand storm?) One of my big goals this year is observe Ceres and it is in the mix. Hoping for a big show from Venus in the East then Mercury with the binoculars and skulk back to bed all happy with a silly look on my face. Now I have written all that it is bound to go wrong! Marvin with everything crossed.

Brothers in arms, I use it every time and it works a treat. See. There are three of us including the Cloudynights astronomer. Marv

How are you using your Nikon? Is it on a tripod with camera lense or attached to a telescope in some way? If on a tripod with lense, what is the focal length, ie what number in mm are you using. My kit lense which at its shortest is 18mm and longest 55mm will literally only give me tiny spots of lights for the planets. A much longer lense like 200mm will be better but I doubt if you will see anything more than the disk and perhaps the moons as points of light. To photograph the planets in more detail you will need to attach your camera body to a telescope and use a Barlow for extra magnification. You are also going to need to put your camera settings to manual. I would advise looking on the Imaging Planetary section on this site. Marvin

Great find, very interesting stuff although inevitably way above my pay grade. As seen as you are on a winning streak, BANG also makes a passing reference to a Hyper Nova. Are there any known Hyper Nova remnants visible in our night sky? That must be one really big event, always ending in a black hole I would presume? Marvin

I have been reading the most excellent book BANG! The complete history of the universe. Page 66 dealing with Supernova remnants mentions a star in the region of 160 solar masses. It is referred to as a Pair-instability supernova and no black hole or neutron star is formed but all the material is thrown outwards becoming available for the formation of more stars. Is the Veil nebula the consequence of one of these Pair-instability supernova? Marv

I think the first pic (daytime) is Venus. It does not appear round as it has phases just like looking at the moon so I would think in your picture it is roughly 3/4 illuminated. FYI we see these phases from crescent to half to full and back again because Venus along with Mercury are inferior planets ie inside our orbital path and closer to the sun than we are. Any planet farther away than us is always fully illuminated by the sun from our position. Marvin

Thanks everyone. I am very much at the beginning of the AP journey and the positivity means a lot. I have only recently started processing my own images and bit by bit I am starting to use the tools in GIMP to my advantage instead of scratching my head with a worried look on my face. As for the colours I was quite amazed when I looked at a single sub on the back of the camera. Like most at the beginning I used to think 'wonder what kind of colour tools they use to paint in those colours'. Now I know they are there for real. Marv

Hello everyone. My first go at M27. 1 hour 30 minutes of subs over two nights with darks flats and dark flats. Stacked in DSS and an attempt at processing in GIMP. I was using the EQ5 mount with the 150 pds and Nikon DSLR unguided so my subs are limited to a maximum of 60 seconds. Any advice welcome whilst I sort my eq6 out and save for a guide package. Marvin

The only annoying thing about just using a piece of dark cloth is if you were using a newt. The close proximity of the focuser to the open end of the OTA means you get some of the cloth in the way of the view. However, taping or velcro the cloth to the OTA above the focuser would solve that problem.

Wouldn’t surprise me if you could buy a specific Astro hood, but a simple dark cloth about the size of a medium towel would do the trick.

I have tried an eye patch as I find myself holding my left eyelid closed with my hand for some reason so I relax my facial muscles and right eye for observing. Someone else on here was saying that they also move the patch over there observing eye when looking at charts or phone screens to protect the observing eye, which seems like a good idea. I find an observing hood to be the best compromise as it only needs to be a dark coloured cloth over your head and eyepiece.

Every year I start by evaluating the last for it's high and low points, things I could do better, things I missed out on and of course how to improve. One of the aims for this year is to try to look at a specific area of sky and take more time, study and allow objects more time to be viewed. A more patient accurate observing style if you will. Well that went out the window last night! How am I supposed to be disciplined to one subject when we have Neowise in the NW, Jupiter and Saturn in the East and the best milkyway of the year right over my head without any light pollution! What is an Astronomer to do? Observe everything of course. In my defence I did try to stay around Cygnus, why not? what an amazing constellation and area of sky in general. I did start with Neowise just after eleven, using the 130 newt. The core looks like a soft ball of coton wool and the coma was evident but I think I still prefer my low power binoculars. After PA and star alignment I give it all a check by asking for M81/82 and then the Sunflower galaxy. I should say now that I have moved onto the 150pds as I plan to test image M27 Dumbell Nebula for the first time. You may have guessed by now that this disciplined narrow focussed session is starting with a comet, moving into Planetary Nebular territory, quick hop to Super Nova Remnants, onto Andromeda galaxy and M32/101, dip into the planets, possible peak at M30 which would take me to 109/110 of the Messier list then cap it off with M27 AP session! And somehow I managed most of it. M57 Ring Nebula- I have observed this before and it did not disappoint. Needed averted vision at times to really discern the ring. NGC6992 Eastern Veil- Now Nebula are my nemesis as at present I do have any special filters for this task so I have always failed at the Veil. Not this time. 25mm ep and I could the cresent off white to grey filaments, that is a big win for me. Same for NGC6960, big smile on my face. NGC7027 Pink Pillow PN. Absolutely nothing, it does happen from time to time, these PN's can be tiny. NGC7000 Never managed this one before either. Can't see it but something odd. It's like I can see a negative of it. I can't see a hydrogen cloud in space but there appears to be a darker area obscuring background stars, which tapers to a point. Can I say I saw it when I didn't see it? NGC6826 Blinking Planetary. I think my third observation of this oddity. I remember having some advice on here about how to observe the blink and I found it more of a dimming then brightening over a few seconds. Five seconds direct then five seconds averted vision seemed to do the trick. NGC7009 Saturn Nebula. I can see it is elongated and looks slightly blue in colour but I think it is at the limit of my kit. Now for a change and I have been missing Andromeda, so M31 here we come. 40mm ep and right away a reminder of just how big that thing really is. M32 and M101 direct vision companions in the fov. I need now to head over to my SE so I spend some time on Jupiter and grab a look at Saturn. Not enough time on Jupiter sadly but enough time to discerne the weather bands and work out the three moons that were visible. I think Europa was hiding behind the giant planet. M30!!!!!!! I have a somewhat compromised southern horizon so I was not confident of seeing this Globular Cluster but luck favours the brave and there it was in the notch between the only trees that give me a problem. 109 of 110 Messier objects with M68 in Hydra left to go. So close yet so far. So we draw to a close with a 17mm ep look at M27 Dumbell. Interesting object and appears quite large for a PN. On goes the camera for a short 30 minutes of subs and darks. The picture below is the end result and before a hail of "this is the observing thread" I am going out again tonight to get another 2 hours data to combine with this one. If anyone is interested I will post on the relevant Imaging thread when I have processed it. Now back to that New years list of resolutions…………. Marvin

Excellent images by the way. As astronomers we love our close ups to look at detail and structure but a good widefield puts it all into perspective, and yours do just that. I was out last night under amazing skies and saw quite a few meteors including a very large bolide to my north with an amazing sparkling orange tail. With so much in the sky at the same time (Comet, meteors, space junk the planets) it really bought it home to me how dynamic a place space really is. I tend to sit back and take in the sky as a tranquil, calm place but it is actually a shooting gallery. Marvin

Yesterday evening attempt at Neowise after my first try Sunday morning. This time a stack of thirteen images in DSS. Nikon D3100 on a tripod with Nikon 80-200 set at 100mm, all 10 second exposures. Marvin

I got a look last night a little after 23:00 my time. I wanted to see the flip side so to speak, after observing it Sunday morning and getting a few pics. Nice to see the difference between sun down and before dawn. It was a fair bit higher in altitude than I thought it would be, but I almost gave up thinking Stellarium must be wrong! I walked back down the lane and gave one last forlorn look and bang there she was. Quick about turn and run back to my spot. That transition from last light to almost darkness is critical. Just those few minutes made all the difference. I took some photos (15 for first attempt at stacking a Comet) and had a good look with my old 10x30s. Quite different from Sunday morning. The tail wasn’t quite so bright, but another hour might have solved that. The core though was so much tighter and defined, like a bright point of light rather than a diffuse ball at the head of the tail. so happy to have had a second stab and managed to top and tail the experience especially as the weather has no idea what it wants to do. Hopefully clear on the weekend and I will attempt to get the 130 newt on it. I will post the picture on Imaging Wide Field and Comments if anyone wants to see another Neowise. Marvin

I just wanted to say to all those people new to astronomy and new to this site, my photo is a tripod mounted Nikon 3100 with kit 55-18 lense. I used a cable operated shutter release. There is no special equipment or processing with the exception that I take my pictures in RAW format then convert to JPEG. The picture you see at the top of this thread is my JPEG copy. In short, if this guy can do a basic shot you can too. Good luck and keep up the hard work. I will be looking out for your input. Marvin

I am using a 1970s pair of 10x30s and the view was incredible. Held against the side of a convenient telephone pole to remove hand shake. Marv

It all got to much, I forgot Mars was even around.👍

I was totally gob smacked that it looked that good. I sent the pic to my brother in Melbourne Australia and he thought I was pulling his leg! And so many people have done way better than me that is for sure. For something like that it is worth the travel and I congratulate you on your commitment to this amazing addiction. Ma v

Thank you very much for your kind comments. I have to say that it was better to the naked eye, I actually swore out loud. I am very fortunate to live in a rural setting but I was hoping a car would come along the road on the right and leave a trail. It was well worth the early alarm call. If any off you are in doubt go and see it, you will not be disappointed. Marv

Thing is I love the picture but how do you get it framed.😁