Bank holiday observing on the Isle of Wight

[GavStar]

We try to go to our "seaside house" on the Isle of Wight regularly through the year. However although we've had the house for a few years, its only in the last year that I've realised how good the skies are compared to London - see this thread.

 I've just returned from long weekend at the IOW and amazingly the bank holiday has coincided with hot sunny days and lovely dark skies at night. Since getting the night vision monoculars late in 2017, I've been trying to test these out under the dark skies of our back garden in the IOW but until this weekend had virtually no success (maybe 30 minutes looking at the California nebula before it clouded over).

But it was very different this weekend

Day 1 - Friday

Arrived at 4pm. Brought the NV monoculars, 55m and 32mm televue plusses, 6nm Ha filter and 685 bandpass filter. Also brought my 72mm TS optics scope for midfield views along with my Tak FC100DF.

Had a nice pub dinner by the sea and then assisted with bathtime for my two daughters (aged 2 and 5). Originally the forecast for Friday night indicated the potential for clouds and the moon was interfering with Sagittarius, so I was intending to wait until the following night to start observing. However around 10pm my partner suggested I have a look at the skies for a quick look. As it was meant to be a quick look, I decided to try using just the NV monoculars with the 6nm ha filter for a scan of any large nebula. The links below gave some details of what I saw.

I had my SQM meter with me. At 10pm it was measuring 20.4 and the best reading at around midnight was 20.8. Not the darkest night I've had there, but I'm blaming the nearly full moon.

What I didn't mention on the threads was that to get the phone picks of the 1x viewing straight through the NV monoculars, I just taped the monoculars to my skywatcher AZ GTI mount - it worked ok, but next time I will remember to bring my l plate for a more reliable fixing!

By the time I packed up it was around 3am. My daughters woke up around 7am, so not a great deal of sleep that night.

Day 2 - Saturday

We took the ferry to the mainland and headed to Hengistbury Head for a day at the beach. By the time we got back and sorted out our daughters, I was completely shattered. I checked sky safari and the moon looked to have less impact on Sunday night (rising later at around 2am and being much less full and further away from Sagittarius. The forecast for Sunday night looked great, so I decided to head for bed to recharge for a big final night.

Day 3 - Sunday

Again up early and again a day at the beach, but this time staying on the Isle of Wight, and the lovely big sandy beach at Sandown.

Refreshed, I headed out to the garden at 10pm, and it was looking very good. SQM meter readings were around 20.6 at this time and progressively got better until around 1am they reached 21.1 - about the peak darkness I get in the back garden here, but still pretty magnificent compared with the 18.4 best I get in SW London. Milky Way was clearly visible in the skies to the east. The house in IOW has best views to the North and East. West is blocked by the house, south is blocked a little by neighbours houses, but there is a nice cunning gap between the houses which allows me to get some good southern sky views - at least for a bit anyway.

So this time I wanted to get some high mag views of the various nebula I saw yesterday at 1x. However, before that I had had a heads up from a thread that Jupiter would being having a nice GRS and shadow transit around this time. Jupiter was rapidly disappearing round the corner of the houses, so I had a quick non-NV season on Jupiter with my Tak FC100DF. I initially used my 4.5mm Delos but preferred the views with my 6mm (125x). Great to see the moon and the shadow close by the limb of Jupiter, I normally struggle to see the actual moons on the surface of Jupiter but since it was near the limb I could follow it. Around 6 or 7 cloud bands going in and out of visibility as well. A good start!.

Then I had a quick look with the NV at 1x to compare with Fridays views. If anything they looked even better. I had read on CloudyNights about the use of a 6nm HA filter causing nebula to disappear from view as they approach the edge of the field and this is exactly what happened here - really fun to move the monoculars like a binocular and see nebula popping in and out of view and I scanned around.

The next target was to get around 5 degree fov for the big nebula like the North America Nebula. I swapped the Tak for the 72mm TS and put in the 55mm plossl and NV (Televue TNVS afocal adapter). I entered the NGC7000 and pressed enter. The mount skewed around and as I looked through the eyepiece I had the brightest view of the NAN I could imagine. Direct vision and it looked bright white against the dark sky background. Fabulous.

Gamma Cygni nebula was also extremely bright and detailed. But I then moved on to see what the Veil looked like. This is a target that I have been looking forward to seeing with my NV at a dark site. The eastern section was marvellous - clear and detailed. However for some reason the western section and Pickering were not as clear, I guess not as much HA in those bits. Still it was by far the best view I've had and great to have all 3 sections in the fov at the same time.

I switched over to IC1396 which contains the Elephants Trunk Nebula. IC1396 was great (although not as detailed as the NAN). I had a good look for the elephants trunk itself - tricky but I'm pretty sure I could see it.

On Friday, I found ngc7822 and CED214 just by chance scanning around at 1x, so I went for a higher mag view with the scope. Very nice objects particularly in the 5 degree fov - that 72mm scope is a great buy for less than £400.

Next target was getting the Heart and Soul into the same fov, which I did. The heart looks very much like a heart, better than I've ever seen it. I think the Soul is much less interesting. But great to see them together and large in the eyepiece view.

It was now around 1.30am and nice and dark. This was the time for the key part of the evening - viewing the various Sagittarius nebula. I had tried to view these objects before, but because they are low in the sky in the UK, I had little success - often I find they are clouded out. Not this weekend

So a quick scan with the NV monoculars at 1x just to see what's actually visible. I'm liking not just the views through these, but the way they give you a good quick appreciation of what's on offer and so enable me to determine what objects I should zone in on. It was a truly remarkable sight. I immediately counted five bright nebulae patches off to the south (between or just above the neighbours houses  ).

So from bottom to top, these were the lagoon (looked the biggest), Trifid, Omega/Swan, Eagle and finally a clear patch of nebula that I had no idea what it was. I've just looked it up and it appears to be Sharpness 54.

I started with the Lagoon since it was lowest and I was worried that it would disappear. PeterW suggested from looking at my Friday phone pics that I needed more image scale on these nebula (I admit the swan did look a bit small and weasily). So I used my Tak as the biggest scope I had to had and the 32mm plossl (instead of the 55mm which I used on Friday). Despite lowering the speed of the system to around f6, the views remained very bright and the increase in magnification to around 25x was helpful for image scale.

Of these, the Lagoon was my favourite - I stayed on this object a long time - I was entranced by the views - first time I've ever seen this and I love it. Again incredibly detailed views of the nebulosity and really bright and clear (and big - taking up a large part of the fov).

But the Eagle and Swan were fantastic as well. Unfortunately the trifid was blocked by the time I went to view it so that will have to wait for another night.

By now it was getting late (around 3am) and the moon was up (and the sun  not too far away). I had another early start to catch the ferry back across the Solent and drive across London. However I couldn't resist a final scan with my NV monoculars at 1x just watching the nebula popping in and out of view as I scan. I need to give my 3x NV lens another try with the scanning and see how much the vignetting impacts.

So a very enjoyable long weekend away - beach during the day and NV observing at night!!! The merits of NV are many in my opinion and my eyes have really been opened up to 1x viewing this weekend. I would say that NV viewing at a dark site is a very different experience to NV viewing at a Light polluted site. You can see an awful lot at a LP site (horsehead etc), but at the dark site the richness of the views are just out of this world. I'm already making plans to get my bigger scopes down to the IOW more often. The views are just too good not to have the option of higher mag NV viewing.

I've added some phone photos to this post broadly in the order that I set out above. These photos are unprocessed and are 10 second exposures. They give a really good representation of what I actually saw at the eyepiece. For some, eg the Veil, Lagoon, Heart and Soul, I think the photos are worse than the eyepiece views. For some, eg Elephants Trunk, I think they are slightly better, but all give a broadly correct representation. In the eyepiece, the views are white rather than the blue tint of the photos. In London I have to turn the ISO right down to 50 to avoid getting the background sky too light. However, I noticed at the dark site, the background sky turned out black, so I pushed out the ISO to around 100. More experimentation is needed here.

Finally I've put in a photo of the views across the Solent of Portsmouth (you can see the spinnaker tower if you zoom in) as viewed by me this morning, waiting on the beach before going to get the ferry home...

[Piero]

Wow, that was a lovely story to read!

I've just finished reading an article about NV technology on the June issue of sky and telescope, which confirms some of your great findings with this new tool. Let's hope that future laws will be less restrictive and costs more affordable to people. 

Thanks for sharing this beautiful report.

[jetstream]

I am enthralled with you're evolution of NV viewing, it all keeps getting better. I might have to "git me one of them there nightvisions"

Kudos Gavin,Gerry

[Stu]

It doesn’t get much better than that Gavin! Great read and a lovely weekend by the sounds of it. I suspect you may be a little jaded today though  

M8 is a favourite although not one I’ve seen that often, and I’m sure your views were amazing. Thanks for the full report, great stuff.

[GavStar]

1 hour ago, Stu said:

It doesn’t get much better than that Gavin! Great read and a lovely weekend by the sounds of it. I suspect you may be a little jaded today though  

M8 is a favourite although not one I’ve seen that often, and I’m sure your views were amazing. Thanks for the full report, great stuff.

Jaded? Moi? Er just a bit. I wasn’t intending to stay up until 3am for two nights at the weekend. But after being clouded out at the iow when I’ve visited so far this year, I just had to stay out and look ?

Someone has just pointed out to me that the ‘pillars of creation’ are visible to some extent in my shot of the Eagle nebula - certainly didn’t expect this ? I will need to get a bit more aperture on this section at some stage for a better look...

 

[Stu]

2 hours ago, GavStar said:

Someone has just pointed out to me that the ‘pillars of creation’ are visible to some extent in my shot of the Eagle nebula

I did have a quick look for these but wasn’t sure. Comparing with a web image, there is definitely something there so would be really good to see the results with some more aperture.

[GavStar]

42 minutes ago, Stu said:

I did have a quick look for these but wasn’t sure. Comparing with a web image, there is definitely something there so would be really good to see the results with some more aperture.

I’m thinking of taking my c11 over to the iow. I should be able to get around 100x compared with the 25x magnification I used at the weekend. Will be interesting to see the results, Eagle is a reasonable height in the sky so I’m hopeful. 

I was surprised that I could get good detailed views on eagle, swan and lagoon even running at f6 so that helps in terms of getting increased image scale.

These nebulae must be quite strong in Ha since they appeared very bright in the eyepiece.

[Littleguy80]

Awesome report. I love the photos. I was out every night over the weekend. I’m a broken man today but it was worth it!

[jetstream]

Gavin, I think there is more on the table from truly dark skies, once you get over 21mag skies there might be more flexibility as far as image scale and ISO are concerned. I find even a quarter mag makes a difference and the scale is not linear...

What is the maximum ISO setting of your NV?

[alanjgreen]

2 hours ago, jetstream said:

Gavin, I think there is more on the table from truly dark skies, once you get over 21mag skies there might be more flexibility as far as image scale and ISO are concerned. I find even a quarter mag makes a difference and the scale is not linear...

What is the maximum ISO setting of your NV?

NV is not a camera, it is military night vision. The device operates at f1.2.

Here is mine (it's the same as Gavins)

HTH,

Alan

[GavStar]

3 hours ago, jetstream said:

Gavin, I think there is more on the table from truly dark skies, once you get over 21mag skies there might be more flexibility as far as image scale and ISO are concerned. I find even a quarter mag makes a difference and the scale is not linear...

What is the maximum ISO setting of your NV?

Gerry, 

Apologies if i have misunderstood your question, but I’m first and foremost a visual observer. And this is my focus with NV - to get the best visual views possible of DSOs within the constraints I have in terms of sky quality and type of equipment. The phone pics that i post here are purely for a permanent record of what I’ve seen visually and my aim is to make them as close as possible to what I actually see at the eyepiece, not to make them better (since that turns me into an imager, which I’m most certainly not ?) But it’s subjective so I just do my best with the phone pics to broadly replicate the eyepiece view.

So when I mention ISO I am solely talking about the settings on my phone camera when taking the phone pics through the NV eyepiece. There is no iso setting on the NV for normal visual observation. I can go up to iso 800 on my phone but this makes the sky background too washed out and also may start not resembling the eyepiece views. 

I’d love to use the NV under your skies. ? In fact I’d love to just look at your skies with my eyes - looking at the Milky Way naked eye is just wonderful and not something I’m able to do very often! 

Hope this helps?

Gavin

[Stu]

2 hours ago, alanjgreen said:

NV is not a camera, it is military night vision. The device operates at f1.2.

Here is mine (it's the same as Gavins)

HTH,

Alan

I do think that it is a credit to SGL, and an indication of the expertise available that you have been able to pick up all the info needed to put your system together so quickly. Great stuff.

[PeterW]

Great to see you having success on the fair Isle. We’ve had 21.5 at Brighstone but the view depends on the transparency, which can change quite a bit. Don’t think I’ve ever seen things as well as the locals claim is possible.
@jetstream… interesting to see you might be looking to take the plunge…  then there’d be no stopping you finding the tricky nebs. The tighter stars and gain control that @gavstar has make a big difference. 

PEter

[jetstream]

8 hours ago, GavStar said:

Hope this helps?

immensely.

Thanks for the explanation Gavin, I mixed up the ISO vs gain....

[GavStar]

4 hours ago, jetstream said:

immensely.

Thanks for the explanation Gavin, I mixed up the ISO vs gain....

On the subject of gain, I find it extremely useful to have variable gain control on my NV monoculars.

I noticed at the dark site at the weekend I could turn the gain nearly full up since the background sky was dark and stayed black in the eyepiece. 

Last night in London, if I turned the gain up the sky background became too light to really allow the nebulae to show. By turning the gain down quite a bit, the sky darkened and the constrast was significantly improved allowing me to view the nebulae albeit with some detail loss. I think this effect is more noticeable at 1x views. When using the NV with my scopes at higher mags, the sky background is naturally darker even in London (although still not the pitch black of iow)

[Stu]

34 minutes ago, GavStar said:

I think this effect is more noticeable at 1x views. When using the NV with my scopes at higher mags, the sky background is naturally darker even in London

That is a very similar effect to what you see visually. With large exit pupils, the sky background quickly becomes washed out, which is why using say a 100 degree widefield eyepiece to achieve same field of view as a longer focal length 50 or 68 degree works well.

I guess it makes sense that turning up the gain just amplifies the background and reduces the contrast. So, dark skies still rule