m81/82, my first sketch

[4lefts]

hi,

it's not much, but i made my first astro drawing at the nlo on friday night. there were a lot more stars in the eyepiece, but this is far as i got by the time it clouded over completely and i packed up. what i got here was done through the holes in the approaching cloud.

mostly i'm quite pleased. i think i over exaggerated the brightness of the galaxies, and i'm not happy with the shape of the edge on galaxy at the bottom (is that 81 or 82? i forget); it was thinner than that really. but it's hard to be subtle and precise in the red-lit near-dark.

and i forgot to mark the compass points. any pointers for things to do better next time much appreciated...

cheers

stephen

[paul mc c]

The edge on is m82, that is very well done Stephen i sketch at the eyepiece and then reproduce it later in side on a permanent log book,taking notes on what i see ie brightness of certain parts of the galaxy or nebula and making i more detailed sketch while it is fresh in my mind.

Keep up the good work.

Paul

[JAO]

Stephen

That is a great first sketch

[The Viper]

great sketch

[RikM]

Smashing start, well done.

After I scan my sketches in, I use Photoshop to tweak the relative brightnesses etc and add some colour to the brighter stars. You can get it really quite close to the EP view with a bit of post scan processing.

[great_bear]

Nice - very nice.

[MjrTom]

Very nicely done

I love to look at sketches as they show just what you can see at the eyepiece.

A great way to judge how big a scope you need or how dark the skies need to be to contend.

Thanks for sharing

[4lefts]

thanks for all the kind words! paul and rik - yeah, i need to work on my post processing skills - here i basically scanned, inverted and tweaked the levels - i also upped the blue a touch, but that's it. i need to figure a nice way to only tweak the levels inside the sketch circle, and i like the idea of sketching at the eyepiece, and making notes, then redrawing the sketch properly at home. definitely one to try. thanks.

[rjsc2001]

you are very good at it. keep it up.

I just love those sketchs . In fact they are the basis of what to expect on the eyepiece.

[Nexus 6]

Looks great!, so wish I could have a record of my observations this way, alas my art skills are way short of this standard

thanks for posting

[DarkerSky]

Well done. Looks really good. Always a super sight in the same FOV