A bit of fun in Lac-Cep-Cyg

[Piero]

Tonight, thankfully, the sky is clear. Now Lacerta, Cepheus and Cygnus are positioned quite well in the sky and I decide to give a go to this area which I am not familiar. The original plan was to spot some nebulae, in particular M76, The Cocoon and the Iris nebulae. Eventually, I got lost admiring all the gems nearby these objects. 

I was not able to see some targets, likely due to small size and low surface brightness for my telescope. Hopefully, they could be of interest for members using larger apertures. 

Generally, it was a nice evening, and I enjoyed learning a bit more about Lacerta and Cepheus. :-)

Below is my report. 

Thanks for reading, 

Piero

Date 09/09/2015   

Time 20:40-22:30   

Temperature 11C (14 km/h)   

Seeing 2 - Slight undulations   

Transparency 5 - Clear   

M76 Per Pln Neb 15x, 28x, 51x, 69x + OIII 

Little Dumbbell. Easy to find as it is close to the 4 mag star Phi Per. Invisible at 15x without filter OIII. Therefore, I put the filter at the end of the diagonal and with this it was faint but detectable. Increasing the magnification helped to make the object larger although did not show any relevant detail. This object remained as a grey fuzzy patch. 

NGC7296 Lac Opn CL 15x, 51x 

The location is easy to find as it is about 2 degrees NNW from Alpha Lac and 1 degree E from Beta Lac. I could not see it. I suspect it is made of few dim stars. 

NGC7235 Cep Opn CL 15x, 51x 

Little open cluster Epsilon and Zeta Cep, but closer to Epsilon. It is visible at 15x, but 51x shows it a bit better. 

Epsilon Cep Star 15x, 51x 

There is a dim grey/blue star next to it which is visible at 15x. I do not know whether this is its companion, but the pair is really beautiful to see.

Delta Cep Dbl Star 15x, 51x 

Lovely pair already splittable at 15x, but a fantastic view at 51x. The brighter is orange, the dimmer is grey / blue. 

NGC7226 Cep Opn CL 15x, 51x 

I could not see them. I suppose they are too small and dim for my 60mm.

NGC7245 Cep Opn CL 15x, 51x 

I could not see them. I suppose they are too small and dim for my 60mm.

NGC7243 Lac Opn CL 15x, 51x 

Also called C16. Really pretty open cluster. Its stars are not too bright, but not even too dim. At 51x it shines nicely to me. About 40-50 stars were visible.

IC5146 Cyg CL+Neb 15x + OIII 

Cocoon Nebula, also called C19. I star hopped from NGC7243. It was not obvious to spot. It appeared as a very faint nebula without structure visible with averted vision (and some patience!).

NGC7209 Lac Opn CL 15x, 37x 

Pretty open cluster formed by moderately dim but sparse stars. I think I saw about 40 of them. Interestingly, there is a group of quite bright stars located about 1.5 degrees South of NGC7209 which also offers a nice view. 

M39 Cyg Opn CL 15x, 37x 

I spotted a nice red star in the centre of this cluster formed by blue stars. Really pretty.

NGC7082 Cyg Opn CL 15x 

Located very close to M39, this open cluster is much dimmer. With a 60mm it is not particularly interesting to me, but worth be watched if observing M39.

NGC7023 Cep CL+Neb 15x + OIII 

Iris Nebula, also called C4. Easy to locate as it is positioned about 3 degrees SW from Beta Cep (Alfirk). Just a soft nebulosity was visible near the adjacent star HIP103763, but no structure and averted vision was required. 

IC1848 Cas CL+Neb 15x + OIII 

Soul Nebula. Relatively easy to see this nebulosity surrounding the thick chain of stars. Averted vision helped.

IC1805 Cas CL+Neb 15x + OIII 

Heart Nebula. A little bit more difficult to see than the Soul Nebula, but still visible. Again averted vision helped.

[laudropb]

Very nice report. It looks like you had a great session.

[cotterless45]

Nice report, there are some wonderful targets in Cepheus and Lacerta, mostly overlooked,

Nick.

[MarsG76]

Great report, looks like you had a great session.

[Helix]

Hi Piero,

I downloaded your observation logs from https://bitbucket.org/pdp10/aj/. Enjoyable reading. I like structured reports like yours. What software are you using for records?

Many thanks,

Tatyana

[Piero]

Hi Piero,

I downloaded your observation logs from https://bitbucket.org/pdp10/aj/. Enjoyable reading. I like structured reports like yours. What software are you using for records?

Many thanks,

Tatyana

Thanks Tatyana.

I created it. It's a little software running in batch mode. I am considering adding a graphical user interface, but it will take some time as I am working on it on my spare time.

I will write a new thread about it if people are interested, which seems so.

Thanks, Piero

[Helix]

Thanks Tatyana.

I created it. It's a little software running in batch mode. I am considering adding a graphical user interface, but it will take some time as I am working on it on my spare time.

I will write a new thread about it if people are interested, which seems so.

Thanks, Piero

Very interested. I use Excel to record my logs but prefer something less rigid.

Looking forward

Many thanks

Tatyana

[Piero]

Very interested. I use Excel to record my logs but prefer something less rigid.

Looking forward

Many thanks

Tatyana

Some form of structure as input is required for this program too. Right now, the command line version only requires that the fields are separated using a TAB delimiter but nothing else.

Therefore you can create these sessions with a common spreadsheet (e.g. Google spreadsheet) or even a simple text editor (e.g. wordpad, Kate, emacs..).

The program will load all the session files structured in this way and generate latex code. Then it uses pdflatex for compiling this latex code automatically. The nice layout is due to latex.

[Helix]

Some form of structure as input is required for this program too. Right now, the command line version only requires that the fields are separated using a TAB delimiter but nothing else.

Therefore you can create these sessions with a common spreadsheet (e.g. Google spreadsheet) or even a simple text editor (e.g. wordpad, Kate, emacs..).

The program will load all the session files structured in this way and generate latex code. Then it uses pdflatex for compiling this latex code automatically. The nice layout is due to latex.

Thanks Piero.

Last question. Can you extract, rearrange and filter your logs as in Excel? For example, I observed NGC 7008 5 times during autumn and I want to compare all 5 observations. I can filter my records and see only 5 last observation of NGC 7008.

[Piero]

Thanks Piero.

Last question. Can you extract, rearrange and filter your logs as in Excel? For example, I observed NGC 7008 5 times during autumn and I want to compare all 5 observations. I can filter my records and see only 5 last observation of NGC 7008.

Sure! 

You cannot have a single report including only the multiple observation for NGC7008. However, these are parsed by the program and with a graphical user interface it will be possible to extract and visualise only the observations for NGC7008. 

At the moment, the software generates two PDFs documents. One includes all the sessions sorted by decreasing date; the other includes all the observations sorted by target increasing. 

Therefore, with the second type of generated document, you can actually compare the multiple observations for the target NGC7008 in one go (which is what you are interested if I understood correctly).

The only thing is that the document is comprehensive, so it includes this structure for the other targets as well, instead of a separate report per target. This file is called astrojournal_by_target.pdf and is located in the link in my signature, if you want to have a look at it. 

e.g. 

One single document

M1

- observation dated 01/01/2015

- observation dated 03/02/2015

- observation dated 05/02/2015

M2

- observation dated 01/09/2015

- observation dated 04/09/2015

and so on.

[Helix]

Sure! 

You cannot have a single report including only the multiple observation for NGC7008. However, these are parsed by the program and with a graphical user interface it will be possible to extract and visualise only the observations for NGC7008. 

At the moment, the software generates two PDFs documents. One includes all the sessions sorted by decreasing date; the other includes all the observations sorted by target increasing. 

Therefore, with the second type of generated document, you can actually compare the multiple observations for the target NGC7008 in one go (which is what you are interested if I understood correctly).

The only thing is that the document is comprehensive, so it includes this structure for the other targets as well, instead of a separate report per target. This file is called astrojournal_by_target.pdf and is located in the link in my signature, if you want to have a look at

and so on.

It is absolutely brilliant. This is what I want to achieve. Tidy, neat, transparent....

Many thanks

[Piero]

It is absolutely brilliant. This is what I want to achieve. Tidy, neat, transparent....

Many thanks

Thank for the nice comment! I am flattered! 

Anyway, this software simply converts to a Latex format. 

Latex itself generates that tidy neat and transparent output format which, also for me, is just amazing! 

[Helix]

I am downloading LaTex already :)

[Special K]

Great stuff! We were in the same section last night then, ha ha! I knew I had company

Good result on the Heart and Soul. Last time I tried I couldn't make out much nebulosity. Delta Cephei is a beauty isn't it?! If you get back up there try for Sharpless 2-132 one degree South of Epsilon Cephei. I picked up some of this dog-bone shaped nebulosity with the O-III. This is also a busy lane of the Milky Way! Good hunting.

[Piero]

Great stuff! We were in the same section last night then, ha ha! I knew I had company

Good result on the Heart and Soul. Last time I tried I couldn't make out much nebulosity. Delta Cephei is a beauty isn't it?! If you get back up there try for Sharpless 2-132 one degree South of Epsilon Cephei. I picked up some of this dog-bone shaped nebulosity with the O-III. This is also a busy lane of the Milky Way! Good hunting.

Hi Kevin,

Do you mean the wizard nebula? I will have a look, thank for letting me know!

[Special K]

Hi Kevin,

Do you mean the wizard nebula? I will have a look, thank for letting me know!

Actually that's a different nebula, Sh2-142, based around the growing star cluster NGC7380. (Which has now made it on to my list for the next time, thanks!)

Here's Sh2-132 from the Interstellarum atlas showing the dog bone shape.....

So many little clusters dotted around but so hard to see in my scope!