Moonlit EEVA

[AKB]

One of the joyous things about EEVA is that a bright moonlit night need not deter you from observing.

Nov 21, 94% moon, slightly hazy, windy, early evening, and not very good transparency... not ideal conditions, one would think...

...so for no particularly good reason, other than it wasn't facing directly at the moon, I fancied that I would take a look at NGC 66xx galaxies in Draco.  The Jocular observing list, used as a planning tool, is ideal for this sort of spur of the moment whimsy:  "I think I'll rank them by size and see how far I can go, and whilst I'm at it, I'll limit my choice to those above 40 degrees of elevation to make sure I get a clear shot at things."

• NGC 6643 – nice spiral structure visible. Nearby galaxies PGC 2763587 and 2764674 are mag 17.6 and 17.4 repectively.
• NGC 6690 – the bright star is mag 7.7 and PGC 2736579 is 17.6
• NGC 6654  – a lenticular galaxy with an interesting skew between the axis of the brighter central region and the weaker outer one.  PGC 61821 is mag 16.7, and outside this view, but just on the edge of the full frame is the star Alahakan at mag 3.5!
• NGC 6651 – another spiral with nearby star (unlabelled here) HD 171044 of mag 7.3 and  PGC 97551 at mag 18.2

One of the slight challenges is the number of very bright stars nearby, but my recent fettling of the C9.25 Hyperstar arrangement (now slightly stopped down to F2.5 and with the USB cable neatly curved over the corrector plate) has reduced spikes and flaring to something close to the minimum possible ( I believe and hope.)

Having seen the above, it's time for my evening meal, so what shall I point to nearby that might be fun to let run?  How about the Fireworks galaxy?  The image below is just 5 minutes worth of the 45 minutes total that it took, and, frankly, I couldn't tell the difference between the images... due, I suppose, to the moon's glow limiting the achievable contrast.    So this is NGC 6946 and Arp 29, and in doing a little research whilst writing up this observation, I checked my copy of the The Arp Atlas of Perculiar Galaxies where it's described as "Spiral with one heavy arm."  More than that, though, I was shocked and delighted in equal measure to discover that my image compares remarkably favourably with the image there – one of Robert Gendler's taken with a 12.5" RC and 300 minutes of exposure!

Just to make a point, I then gave it a whole 10 minutes on the Elephant's Trunk, Sh 2-131, and was amazed at what came out (this is with no filters at all.)

All this before 8.30 PM, since I had to go and do the washing up.

Hope you enjoy this as much as I did (the EEVA, not the washing up.)

Tony

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 22, 2021 by AKB

[Mike JW]

Hi Tony,

As I have commented previously I think you may have found close to the ultimate set up for EEVA. A great collection of shots, illustrating the power and usefulness of the EEVA technique. I think the Sh 2-131 is particularly good - so much to see and dwell on with that shot. I good idea to post all the shots in one post to show just how comprehensive EEVA can be, but don't forget there are the different threads in the forum to keep targets together such as Arps, Hicksons........

Cloudy again tonight here in E. Anglia but you may  well be clear. Looking forward to your next posts.

Have fun

Mike

[AKB]

30 minutes ago, Mike JW said:

don't forget there are the different threads in the forum to keep targets together such as Arps, Hicksons........

Thanks for that, Mike.  Trouble is, there’s not inconsiderable overlap between a fair number of classifications, so where to post?!