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Showing results for tags 'observing'.
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Hi everyone! I hope you are all doing well! I just wanted to ask if anyone had any ideas for projects to do, as the sky is clearing up and i wanted to make the most of it. Anything, maybe finding or tracking a certain celestial object or mapping the moon! I'll leave it up to you!
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Hello everyone! I hope you are all doing well! I recently joined this forum for the express purpose of answering this question: Why does Mars look like a simple star through my telescope? I have a Starsense Explorer LT 80AZ refractor with a 10mm, 25mm and 2x Barlow lens, and my telescope has a max magnification of 189x! So why is it, on a pretty clear winters night, that the mighty Mars, the Red Planet , looks like a humble star. I love stars (who the hell doesn't) but i rather hoped to see a planet. What am i doing wrong? AM i doing something wrong or is my telescope inadequate (i doubt it th
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Hi, I got a skywatcher classic 200p just before xmas and I havnt done much planet viewing due to not having more than a 10mm eyepiece for magnification. I recently got a 2x barlow lens and tried viewing last night with a barlow and 10mm lens and it came out very blurry and I couldn't see any detail and it still seemed quite small. I was viewing on a close night when there was a break in the clouds so may have not been the best conditions. Any tips for how much magnification I need and how to see it better. Thanks.
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Hello, I've been into astronomy since I was young and more recently astrophotography. I've just (finally) got my new telescope, a Celestron AVX 9.25" Edge HD with various accessories including a reducer lens. I'm still trying to get the auto guider up and running as that's being a pain and need to get a dew heater for the telescope (currently lookjng for a decent one). I'm also looking into what filters to get as well as that's still fairly new to me, at least for the astrophotography side. I'm also very much into microscopy and looking at microphotography, I'm currently saving up
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Hello! I am looking for variable star databse using which I can practice star light curves in spreadsheet programs. I am doing this as my statistics project where I can do visualization, little bit of error reduction etc. I did see a few ones like AAVSO, but they either need some specific job title or specific star etc. I need something to have in general, like here is the data-choose what star option you want etc. Thanks! -
Hi everyone, I really want to get out and do some observing- it's been a long summer! Does anyone know of anywhere near Glasgow that you can get to by public transport that's ok for observing. I'm not looking for super dark skies- I just want to do something. I don't drive so mugdock, campsies etc are out of the question. Kelvingrove has been ruined by that glasglow event every winter. Thanks for any help!
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I have been waiting for this telescope for almost five months. Since May, 19th, to be precise. The day I went to the TS Italia store and saw for the first time the SLD model, model now discontinued. I even missed the last available piece just for a few days, once I finally placed my order, June, 25th. It was to be replaced by a newer model, available at the end of the Summer. Boy, am I glad I did miss it. The wait was definitely worth it. The new and improved model is simply beautiful. I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it on the Tecnosky website a few weeks ago, when they posted the- 7 replies
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Hello, Unfortunately, I will be moving from my Bortle class 3/4 skies overlooking the Cotswolds, to somewhere with class 6 skies Does anybody with any local knowledge around the Stotfold area have any observation site suggestions? Away from any local light pollution at least. It would seem driving east maybe productive according to https://www.lightpollutionmap.info Thanks Mike -
The summer equinox has passed and people are looking forward to Star Parties. I have never been to one, don't know what to expect, have never met the participants. As a solitary observer tucked away in my small North West garden I have been happy to gaze the night skies alone (Mrs Polar Bear often pops out for high mag views of the Moon and Planets) but otherwise I enjoy my own company and get along very well with myself. So I have taken the plunge and committed to attend CSP9 oop North in Cumbria. Watching the CSP9 thread develop I noticed comforting words such as friendly, whisky, bacon butt
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Finally the skies cleared yesterday, and at last a chance to do some observing. It turned out to be a really good session - one of the best I've had for a long time - and I got through a good number of targets in just over 2 hours. I started off with the 4" refractor, hunting galaxies - the Andromeda Galaxy and companions, and M33 in Triangulum. These were really well placed at around 8.30pm, and despite a knackered red dot finder (!) I was able to get a great view of M31 with the 24mm Panoptic eyepiece (giving x20 magnification - ideal for large, diffuse objects like this). M31 showed a bri
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Not much chance of any actual observing in the coming days, so instead I've been thinking of targets to look for when the weather finally improves. I was browsing around on SkySafari on the iPad and noticed that there's a globular cluster in Cygnus - M56. I realised I'd never seen it, and I sort of wondered how I'd missed the fact that there's a glob so well-placed at this time of year. So, that's top of the list. I'm also keen to have a go at M33 through my 4" refractor - I've only ever seen it in binoculars before, and a few months ago I failed miserably to see it at all in my 10" Dob at 50x
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As the poor weather and short nights are limiting my observing projects, I have been busy finishing a heavy duty aluminium and stainless steel parallelogram mount for my large 100mm APM binoculars. Here is a summary description of its build: http://refreshingvie...rammount.htm�.� It has been derived from a wooden version that I built last summer. I plan to give away the wooden model to a fellow SPOG astronomer who wants to do some bino observing while his camera is capturing photons on the scope. The parallelogram mount is an extremely comfortable to observe the night sky – the eyepieces rea
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Hi there, our Astro group were booked into our normal dark skies venue for an observing weekend in February. Unfortunately, the accommodations are now going to be undergoing renovation and will be closed for the first 3 months of the year. We are looking at a couple of alternative venues. These are field study centres, one at Blancathra near Keswick and the other Malham Tarn in the Yorkshire Dales national park. Wondering if anybody has any observing experience of the skies in these areas. Kind Regards Paul.
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Hello to all! Just posting some of the images I took recently! (Total first attempt from someone who can't even hold a camera properly) I was out to conduct a public overnight sky observation event, which was the last event before 6 months of monsoon. For a lot of time, we had cloud cover too! These images don't include much of editing more than just some basic stuff in cellphone. I forgot to take the photos in RAW so either way I can't do much! Quite happy with the first attempt. Will improve even more in next season! Nikon 5300, with the basic 18-55 lens. A
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Hi everyone! I have a Celestron Astromaster 114 eq (114/1000mm), and I do use it whenever I can, but I'm still quite the newbie when it comes to observing. My point is, I'd like to observe the planets, but I dont't think the standard eyepieces that came with my telescope (10 mm and 20 mm) are powerful enough for that. For reference, the "furthest" I could see were the rings of Saturn , but they were very small and faint too. Are there any specific eyepieces you could recommend? :) And of course, any tipps and advice are also very much appreciated. Thanks, Sophie.
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lets imagine I wasn't to see a nice DSO about 15' size and I think it should look good nicely framed with a 1 deg field of view in the EP.. Which would give the better (or higher probability of seeing anything at all ) view from a semi urban light polluted home site (e.g Bortle 6)? a) an 100mm f/6 refractor (fl 600mm) and a 10mm EP (60 deg afov, gain 60x = fov pf 1 deg) (and exit pupil of 100mm / 60 = 1.6mm) or b) a 200mm SCT with focal reducer to give f/6 (fl 1200mm) and a 20mm EP (60 deg afov, gain 60x = fov of 1 deg) (and exit pupil of 200 / 60 = 3.3mm) My gut -
Hi. Was up at dawn observing Mercury rising in the southeast and slowly swept my binoculars left. I was able to vaguely see a small triangle formed by Upsilon Ophiuchi, HR 6128 and HR 6137. That was the limit of view as sunlight was washing out anything else to the left of that. But I clicked on the adjacent HR6144 star in my Sky Guide app and it lists as being 6,900 light years away. When I checked the Ski Safari app, the same star is listed as 1,900 light years. I went online and found little info but, “In the Sky” web page it’s HR 6144 at 9 kilo years / 9,000 light years. Does anyone have
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I am considering buying a Skywatcher al/az+eq mount to use in alt az mode for lunar CCD photography. I currently have a celestron 11 CDC and a celestron 8 on a nexstar evo mount. I can use both these telescopes with the celestron 'solar system align' and sharp cap for short (~10 sec 300-500 frame) captures. I want to replace the nexstar evo mount for the C8 with a sturdier Skywatcher AZ-EQ 5GT mount BUT - 1) the altz/az option is supposed to be 'for visual use'. Does this mean its tracking in lunar rate/alt-az mode is very poor ? 2) I am confused about 'alignment' (is this only neces
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Hello stargazers! I am a 14.5 year old boy currently exploring the hobby of astronomy! My first Telescope is the Celestron Firstscope! This post is going to contain mostly everything i do from now on! i will occasionally post some tips and tricks as well as some images(rarely) I am soon getting a 8" dob , but that doesnt mean i wont be using the Celestron firstscope. Hopefully, one day i can look back to this and remember the beggining of my journey as i am intrested in studying astrophysics/ astronomy in university . And if not, i will continue exploring this hobby
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Hi there! I hope you can help, I'll be in the Bay Area for a bunch of days and I thought to try some astrophotography. Could you please suggests some location options to do some astrophotography in California, ideally not further than 2-2.5h from Menlo Park? Thank you! Tom -
Hello, The link below is a round up of the southern sky in January from the point of view of Wellington in New Zealand. We’ve tried to capture a bit of a cultural flavour too with some of the night sky descriptions that are relevant to Māori. So if anyone is heading down to the Southern Hemisphere in January then be sure to have a look at some of the objects - if you’re already in the Southern Hemisphere, you might find it useful too. Here it is :The January 2018 Night Sky. Sam
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Hi, The link below is for the night sky next week, in the Southern Hemisphere. Because the Moon will be up, it focuses on the Moon, Jupiter, Mars and a few clusters. The night sky for 22-28 January 2018
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Hi i was wondering how many of you do sketching? I’ve tried to find some sites to help me get an idea on how it can be done but slightly struggling. For example what type of pencils and paper are preferred is it better to draw on black paper or white? I won’t have goto on my Mount when my scope comes so not sure if it will make it harder without one.Obviously I need a red torch as well. Would like to get some good sketches of the moon and clusters first and then galaxies/nebula and spend a good amount of time on sketching an object. If you have any tips It would be much appreciated also i
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So, I’ve set the scope out in the garage to cool but now I’m trying to weigh up the pros and cons of observing tonight. Pro - It’s the last clear spell forecast here for a week so I might regret not taking the chance. Con - Its -3 already and only going down from here. Pro - The seeing was great last night. Spent a couple of hours on the moon at over 450x! Very stable and detailed so it decided to max out by barlowing my 3.2mm BST to give over 700 for a test and although that was less detailed it was still acceptable, so wouldn’t want to miss conditions like that again. Con
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Well, I was finally able to put the newly repaired Sphinx through its paces over the weekend, Saturday night turned out a bit of a bust weather wise, however it gave me the advantage of already being set up for the following evening which was a completely different story. Sunday...? Transparency not all that great, (perhaps NELM variable 3 to 5) and with a half moon shining, not ideal conditions for deep sky observing, however was still able to bag a few old favourites, including M53, M13, M92 and M51, M81 & 82. Then spent the next two hours exploring some galaxies in Canes Venati
