Jump to content

Narrowband

Telescopius, and planning sessions


Oat

Recommended Posts

Hi Folks

Firstly - i have read the 'sticky's

2 areas to this - one is to how best plan an observing session. What can be seen and when appreciating that some things are closer to the earth, or more visible at certain times of the year. I've got Turn Left at Orion but in honesty don't find it very intuitive. I also have planasphere however they show only constellations not plants or M's etc.

TELESCOPIUS - i turned to this site to get an idea of what to target each night and to picture what kind of image i can expect to see. But i really question the authenticity of this site. It suggests that with my little skywatcher ST80 frac that the image of the horsehead nebula should be similar to the below. I feel this is a massive overstatement.

Are there any better, or other online ways to plan your astronomy viewing sessions that may taken in to account your location and time, distance of objects, telescope and ep specs etc etc?

Please don't bash my enthusiasm 😎

Rgds

Tim

Screenshot_1.jpg

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hi

I think if that view of the HH nebula was through your st80 we would all be buying them pretty dam quick if they were in stock. The sky at night magazine is very good for listing things happening or to view in a calendar month and even the sky at night planetarium monthly vlog on YouTube proves very useful. If you have a smartphone try stellarium app it's very very good and you can use it on the pc to plan your viewing sessions. I use it a lot. Also try astronomy tools website where you can input your scope and Eyepieces to see what the real view would look like at certain objects 

http://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/

Clear skies 

Edited by LeeHore7
  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

That web page is a field of view calculator, its purpose is to show the amount of sky (true field of view) that would be visible with a particular combination of telescope and eyepiece. In that respect, it is (probably) accurate.

What you can actually see within that view is another matter. It's intrinsically harder for these TFOV sites to show you that - you could set up an 80mm refractor and 300mm dobsonian so that you had the same TFOV, but you would see a lot more in the dob. And then there are other factors like the local light pollution, atmospheric transparency, quality of optics, etc.   So these web sites often end up using stock photos from Hubble, etc. that show detail (and colour) that you would never see in an amateur scope.  That such great photos now exist in abundance is both a blessing and a curse - it can give rise to inflated expectations. Deep sky objects in particular are often just fuzzy patches in many scopes.

You say you don't find Turn Left very intuitive, but it does have the advantage over many sources in attempting to show you what you can really expect to see. As far as I recall, there is no entry on the Horsehead nebula, because you really won't see anything with an average instrument. But it does include many objects that will be visible, with honest representations.

If you haven't seen it yet, you might also like to read this:

 

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you mean how things should appear in your EP, I think Turn Left at Orion is pretty spot on; I have an 8" Dob and the suggested drawings are very similar to what I have seen so far both on clusters and nebulas. I have found this link quite useful when I plan things and what I may expect to see; these are sketches which gives you a true feeling on things during visual observation.

http://www.deepskywatch.com/messier-dso-sketches.html

Worth having a read at the Observing reports in this forum; I have found several targets as described by other members. The AP guys are doing an amazing job but do not expect to see the details and colours like in their processing.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

4 hours ago, Kon said:

If you mean how things should appear in your EP, I think Turn Left at Orion is pretty spot on; I have an 8" Dob and the suggested drawings are very similar to what I have seen so far both on clusters and nebulas. I have found this link quite useful when I plan things and what I may expect to see; these are sketches which gives you a true feeling on things during visual observation.

http://www.deepskywatch.com/messier-dso-sketches.html

Worth having a read at the Observing reports in this forum; I have found several targets as described by other members. The AP guys are doing an amazing job but do not expect to see the details and colours like in their processing.

I agree - the observing reports on this site are great for inspiration and ideas for good targets.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Zermelo @LeeHore7 @Kon @Pixies

Thank you for your time to reply. Much appreciated.

I find being prepared for astronomy quite difficult. How to come up with a target list for a particular session?

I'd love to see a fuzzy galaxy, i'd love to split some starts, i'd love to see the planets. I'd love to see nebula but appreciate that's more appropriate for photography.

I am close to an astronomy club and have made an enquiry with them for when gatherings are possible again.

Cheers all 

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

To get going, establish your horizon, i.e. which parts are accessible for viewing. Depends on your light pollution as well. South facing M42 is a delight (i can see it as a tiny smudge with naked eye from my skies), you will not see HH nebula with your current setup so enjoy the AP photos. Galaxies go for Andromeda Galaxy (a big fuzzy smudge, no much details), Leo and Virgo constellations have loads  (I and other have posted several reports in the observing section) this time of the year, ursa major has some relatively easy ones to find. Clusters are visible even with the moon out but nebulas you need to look at new moon and dark skies (no light pollution); loads of clusters in Cygnus. I am particularly interested in nebulas (see my reports, i am also a beginner but you get an idea on what's accessible with my setup and skies) but i have dark skies bortle 3/4. I am not familiar with your setup so others might point to limitations.

As mentioned above start with Turn Left at Orion and Stellarium is handy but you need to either zoom in to see whats visible or search by name; skysafari is good as well.

If you give more details on your skies and available viewing horizon you will get some more suggestions. I plan to see 4-6 targets usually so I can take in the views. By patient, have your eyes dark adapted and enjoy.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

@Kon thank you

 

I am in North Oxfordshire and Bortle 4. From the garden, I have good views to the west, north and east. To get views south i would need to go in to the field at the back of the house.

I have had a play with stellarium and a phone app called sky view. 

My set up is pictured below and in my signature. I mainly use the 80mm refractor it's just a joy to use.

Tonight i set on Mars, but there's not too much to see, also set on capella and sirius. My main achievement for tonight was Plaides - i've put a pic below which i took on my phone (probably someone will now tell me it's not plaides 🤣)

So, some progress tonight but not easy to select which targets to go for.

 

 

 

IMG_20210317_225620372.jpg

IMG_20210317_223312520.jpg

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Indeed that's Pleiades, well done! Mars is quite far to get anything decent at the moment. M13 in your East will be impressive, NGC 884 at your North, M44 on your WSW, M35/NGC2158.

 

As I mentioned earlier have a look at the Observing reports. See these recent links (same setup as yours?):

 

Edited by Kon
  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

With your equipment in Bortle 4 skies there will be plenty within your reach.

As @Kon says, although Mars is high up at the moment it is getting too far away to show any detail.  Jupiter and Saturn are no longer visible to us either, so forget planets for a while.

If your main concern at the moment is just drawing up a list of potential targets for an evening, then there are quite a few resources that are, or can be, sorted to match the time of year (or equivalently, "right ascension").

The first is (I'm going to keep mentioning it) Turn Left at Orion. In mid March, you can look in the section "Seasonal Skies: January - March" for objects that you might be able to see for a few hours after dusk, depending on your horizon visibility. The most obvious of these is the nebula M42 in Orion, still visible in the south. The book also describes some great double stars in and around Orion, ranging from easy to quite challenging. And Castor is easy to find, and a nice split. You have already found the magnificent Pleiades group in Taurus, but there are other open clusters you can look for nearby: M35 in Gemini, and M36, M37 and M38 in Auriga are all well placed. The book mentions several more in the neighbourhood of Sirius, if that's accessible.  Later on in the evening you will have chance to see objects described in the April-June section. The Beehive (M44) in Cancer is a lovely cluster, and M67 is another nearby. Also in Cancer are two nice doubles, iota Cancri and phi-2 Cancri.  Leo will be rising in the east, and that contains one of the very best doubles, Algieba. Leo also contains several galaxies that can be seen (as fuzzy blobs) in a small scope, and it is followed by Virgo and Coma Berenices that have several more. If you stay up very late, Bootes will be high enough to explore, and again there are several good double stars listed in the book.  And of course there is also the "Northern Skies" section with objects that are good for most of the year here, including the double cluster in Perseus and the galaxy pair M81 and M82 in Ursa Major.

There are many web sites that also have sorted lists of suggested objects, for example:
https://jareksastro.org/skylists/lists.htm
https://www.astroleague.org/observing.html
https://skyandtelescope.org/observing/111-deep-sky-wonders-for-light-polluted-skies/
https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/43881-object-list-indexed-by-constellation/
 

Some newspapers and web sites also publish regular "what you can see at the moment" sections:
https://astronomy.com/observing/sky-this-week
https://skyandtelescope.org/astronomy-news/observing-news/
https://www.skyatnightmagazine.com/online-planetarium/
https://britastro.org/skynotes
https://tonightssky.com/MainPage.php
https://www.theguardian.com/science/series/starwatch

 

And finally, several astro phone apps include "best objects to view tonight" sections:
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.skywatcher.synscanapp&hl=en_GB&gl=US
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.simulationcurriculum.skysafari5&hl=en_GB&gl=US


 

 

 

 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

TBH I find planning tricky. Ideally you do it on those very common cloudy nights and then when you are out with the scope you will know exactly what you are doing. It rarely works out that way for me. Trouble is you usually don't know when your next clear night will be - whether it will be moonlit or moonless... and then if (when) you don't get the conditions you'd planned for your plan becomes out of date. The planning process is useful for getting some ideas into your head even if your plan doesn't completely work out when that rare clear, dark night happens.

Probably best to have a separate plan for moonlit (double stars etc) and dark nights (DSOs).

DSO-wise M81/2 are a good target once you've cracked M31 - they need a few star hops but once you find the right spot you get two galaxies for the price of one. From there galaxies get fainter and trickier so these two are good for 'getting your eye in'. I also return to them when things are not going well elsewhere just to check that I can see them and it's not a problem with bad transparency or something really daft like forgetting that I left a filter screwed to an eyepiece. Only snag is that these two are pretty awkwardly high in the sky just now.

Tools-wise, others have mentioned the usual suspects. I'd add a few...

Stellarium has a free desktop version which is more fully featured and has more stars than the free tablet/phone version. It can do eyepiece and camera previews too and you can mess with the light pollution levels and so on. I often struggle to relate the tablet Stellarium view to what I see through the scope - the scope shows more stars. Getting an idea of your true field of view with each eyepiece is a useful step - the tablet Stellarium does tell you the FOV for what it is displaying so you can figure out some idea of scale.

Sky at Night mag does a half hour or so on YouTube at the start of each month which gives you some more clues about what is good and what is not... with very little effort on your part other than subscribing to the channel and remembering to watch it each month.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1D8hxXif5bQ

For double stars I keep this page open in the browser on the tablet - it's all on one page so I have all of the info there without a network connection.

http://users.compaqnet.be/doublestars/

Enjoy your scope. It won't show you what a big dob will but it will get you out there on some occasions when setting up a big scope would not be worthwhile.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.