Albireo and swan nebula

[Mr niall]

Well it’s been a while since I knew I was definitely going to have a good clear night for observing! Put the scope out about 6pm and by 7 it was dark enough to get cracking, moon was fab and bright but unfortunately was also in the general direction I was observing so played its part and made life difficult.

First target was Albireo, easy find, and easy split using the 30mm so switched to the skywatcher 7-21mm. The best balance between separation and contrast was around 150x although did notice that it was almost impossible to get a sharp focus, did a bit of checking and noticed that the diagonal mirror was truly a disgrace! Gave it a quick clean and this improved things a lot but I was still getting a bit of smudge and smear. Used albireo to do a star test and all seemed to be in order. My objective seems to dew up very quickly and I think this may be the source of the problem so will need to make that a priority. Was a definite and easy to spot colour difference between the two stars very cool.

Next went hunting for M17. What a nightmare! Was looking in the wrong area for ages. Eventually found it after about 20 mins - much much lower in the sky than I was expecting, as a result was a real stretch to see it on my tabletop mount. Viewing was a real challenge - it seemed to ebb and morph, one second a vague smudge the next a blanket of stars, the shape seemed to change. Strangely I ended up redrawing it after the session as I kept tripping over myself trying to draw at the eyepiece. And I just started using a blending tool which is a big change to the old finger smudge that has served me well up until now. Had to give up at that point - I was worried if I stayed out any longer I’d have actual fish swimming around on the objective!

 

[Hayduke27]

Nice Swan Nebula!

[orion25]

Nice sketches. Two of my favorite targets 

Reggie

[Astro Imp]

Great write up and sketches, Albireo is always worth a look, seems rude not to.