Nebula Night-Crescent + more...

[jetstream]

What a night!Well all 45 minutes of darkness....but it was a great 45 minutes I drove out to the quarry to test out the Leica zoom,but ended up using the 21.4 mag skies for the 21mm Ethos and my OIII-what a great combination.

I just could not resist checking the Veil neb out,holy,does this combo work & now I know why they call Pickerings triangle the "Wisp".More nebulosity than with my 17mm,with extensive tendrils coming from Pickerings,patches of cloud seen in places-and the Broom!What a detailed,long split.Tonight the Veil was easily seen(but faint) with no filter and it just came alive with the Astronomik.

I have been looking for the Crescent nebula from home for a while,to no avail.Tonight I picked it up right away,fairly big in the 21mm and kind of faint,reminded me of an up side down Jellyfish with no tentacles.This was my prize of the night.There was another surprise waiting though...

And this was the North American nebula Huge and actually bright,not Veil bright,but bright none the less.The "Gulf" was quite a sight,this nebula is so big it has to be seen to believe.

So my long awaited Ethos on nebula test came tonight and the results exceeded my expectations,I can't wait for Fall,to get some more transparent,even darker skies.

[swamp thing]

Great stuff Gerry.

Was observing these myself last time out. Love your jellyfish description. The tendrils of fine gas observable from a dark sky reminded me of the veil very much when I observed the crescent recently. A very overlooked object visually, that really rewards the observer from a good dark sky was my conclusion.

The veil itself. What more can one say. Dark sky, O-III filter, jobs a good un. It rewards all apertures doesn't it. In small scopes the entire thing is amazing to view, and big scopes just blow your mind on it. TBH I didn't think the view I got a few years back from a dark sky through a 16" could be beaten, after a look through the 20" though, I'm less convinced now. Can't wait to see it when it gets darker.

The NA neb is a giant ain't it. You can spend hours tracing that coastline round and round, great fun.

Have fun out there

[jetstream]

Tonight the transparency forecast is much better and it should be a great,but brief nebula evening.I would love to look through a 20" Steve,to help me decide what bigger dob to get.I really do love a biggish FOV,but maybe this is a non issue with big scopes.

I wonder what other good nebulas are out there to see now?

[Mike73]

Nice one Gerry.

Your not making it easy for me to resist Ethos you know!

Theres so many real gem objects in this area of sky which I've still not seen in my 16", the Lagoon,Triffid, Omega and Cresent nebulas were all stunning in my 12" + lots of little PN's and all those lovely globulars. As much as I've enjoyed the spring galaxy hunting I really enjoy the whole Cygnus to Sagittarius area in late summer.

[jetstream]

Well Mike,all I can say is that this combo works extremely well in my scope Last night was even better!More transparent,and I enjoyed seeing some of the Pelican nebula,with patches in between that and the NA neb.The Gulf zone was bright and I could not "get lost" in the nebulae with this combo.I just can't wait for fall.

The Milky Way was fantastic,showing across the whole horizon,and the big split showing was awesome-too bad the conditions only last for about an hour here

You know,I never thought the Wisp area was so complex,my 17E is great for larger brighter detail in the Veil,but the 21E really does enhance the view of the fainter portions of these nebulae.The Leica zoom provided the very best unfiltered view of M57 yet,no hint of turquoise as in the 10E,but the best direct vision detail seen.The 1.75x barlow really works in this EP,I'm going to try a little less and a little more.The Leica also showed M101 spiral arms easily and the view of M82 was among the best ever,very distinct dust lanes or whatever they are in the "bowtie".

Sky mag was 21.5,avg+ transparency,oh and Caroilnes Rose was so good to see again!

[scarp15]

Out of interest, at what hour of the night / morning did you experience your 45 minute time frame of darkness Gerry? Your account provides an insightful reminder as for what to look forward to post Solstice, particularly  through Cygnus and Sagittarius.  Expect that the 0-III filter will be almost permanently in place when late summer arrives.   

[swamp thing]

Tonight the transparency forecast is much better and it should be a great,but brief nebula evening.I would love to look through a 20" Steve,to help me decide what bigger dob to get.I really do love a biggish FOV,but maybe this is a non issue with big scopes. I wonder what other good nebulas are out there to see now?

I would strongly urge you to go to a star party Gerry and have a look through as many large scopes as you can.

The more time you spend at the eyepiece of big scopes the more you will appreciate their strengths.....resolution and image scale.

Your not after a wide field with a big scope, as exit pupil prevents it.

To give you some idea, use a x2 Barlow in your 10". The Barlow will show you the FOV and image scale a 20" scope will give you, and without the Barlow shows the surface brightness you'll get at the bigger image scale. If that makes sense

[jetstream]

Steve,great idea!I'll try the 2x barlow to check big dob scale.No star parties here for 200 miles in any direction at least...I'll keep checking things out.Obsession is only a little further,maybe they will feel sorry for me and let me peek through a new one!lol!

[jetstream]

Out of interest, at what hour of the night / morning did you experience your 45 minute time frame of darkness Gerry? Your account provides an insightful reminder as for what to look forward to post Solstice, particularly  through Cygnus and Sagittarius.  Expect that the 0-III filter will be almost permanently in place when late summer arrives.   

Hi Iain,the road trip was worth the view.I drove about 15 miles east and 5 miles north,to clear any minimal light domes that may impact Cygnus.Eventhough no domes were visible it makes me feel good knowing there were no potential contrast robbing domes in that direction.

I left the house about 11:10 pm,had to wait at bridge construction for 10 mins and ended up at the site about 11:35 pm or so.The dob is so quick to set up its a non issue-which I love.

So I started observing about 11:45pm,21.4 mag.I observed until I noticed loss of contrast on some galaxies about 12:40 am-the moon rise was starting to rise.I watched M101's spirals in the Leica for a while and when things started to disappear,I began packing up.Sorry to ramble,but hey,I do that sometimes!

[michael.h.f.wilkinson]

Very nice report. The Crescent is very hard, I find. well done getting it.