Mostly M42 with some widefield binos 29.10.22

[Ratlet]

Last night was looking spotty but early evening showed promise with the cloud rolling away.  This was a false hope though as by the time I set up my imaging rig (testing a 135mm lens) the clouds had well and truly rolled in.

Fortunately my sleep pattern is like the Pleiades:  a cluster.  And so I was awake at 0400.  On with the warm clothes and a coffee and back out to see what was happening.  Turns out there was more clear sky than cloud!

Much like Gandalf in Moria, I had absolutely no idea where I was.  Last time I was out this early Orion was in the East and now it was very much South and I’ve no idea what Cassiopeia and Ursa Major are doing, but I do not approve.  Oh well.  M42 it is!

32mm Plossl in the 130pds for x20 was nice and bright and it’s an absolute pleasure when the nebula scrolls into view.  It might be wishful thinking but it looks like I can see more when it’s moving?  Perhaps it’s a survival thing…

I dropped in the SVBONY UHC filter and got a more contrasty view of the nebulosity and a some dimming of the surrounding stars which made it a worthy candidate for sketching.  The nebulosity looked like a stingray to my eyes although the pencil would seem to disagree.  I wasn’t completely sure if I could see much of the structure in the ‘back’ of M42 although after the sketch I realised that tapping the tube makes it stand out more, but not in time for the sketch.  Definite sighting of nebulosity around M43 though.  I think the scope was still cooling and I'm sure I can pick out more nebulosity although I could have sworn I saw more than I sketched so me still learning the smudging stick is also an option.

The clouds were making periodic appearances so I went north and decided to try and split Polaris.  I tried with my 8mm BST and 2 x barlow and the seeing just wasn’t there.  Polaris looked a lot like when they try show string theory on a documentary.

At this point I broke out my Nikon TC-E2 DIY widefield binos for an awe inspiring x2 magnification.  This was easily the best idea I’ve had this week.  They’re just fun to use and great for waiting for sucker holes.  Vibration isn’t really an issue so you can hand hold easily and they show a lot more of the background than eyes alone without the magnification making it hard to relate it to the sky.  What’s weird is that quite often I found if I saw something with them I could still see it after, even if I couldn’t see it before.  I got a bit excited (and still don’t know what I’m doing really) so I didn’t really observe I just mostly looked.  I did observe the Pleiades though with them and it was fascinating.  It was almost like in Stellarium where they have the generic background and then a photo image of the cluster.  I didn’t look real.  The binos are likely to either prove a hit for outreach or scare small children.  Pictoral evidence attached.

I did some observing of Mars with my SVBONY 8-24mm with the 2xbarlow (54-162x) but I couldn’t really see much apart from my oft repeated “it’s orange”.  I’m being a bit harsh really, but I could make out that it was a disk and with some wishful thinking some slight variation in the darkness.

I also took a peak at Sirius.  From my latitude it’s 15° and I could just make it out between the houses so it was as much to say I’ve observed it as anything.

I finished of the morning with another look at M42, this time with the 8mm BST (162x).  I could resolve the Trapezium comfortably although one (B I think) was very faint.  I’m much happier with this sketch despite the increasing haze.  I think at this point I doubled down on the ‘sketch what it looks like not what you see’ and tried to make it look like a swift.  I did see some very faint ‘nebulosity’ off to the left of the eyepiece although with hindsight I think this might have been dew.

Going to pay for it later in the day, but good fun all round and a nice boost.  I’m very happy with the UHC filter and will need to try it on some other targets.  I also need to dial in my star charts for using the scope as it’s own finder.  There are so many stars it makes getting lost very easy.  The widefield binos were the winner though. Just perfect for those gaps in the clouds.

Edited October 29, 2022 by Ratlet

[Ratlet]

Just figured out how to invert the images.  Much better I think!

[JeremyS]

Super drawing, especially the inverted one 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

[josefk]

nice sketches and great picture 🤜🏼 

...i hear your "stingray" and "swift" and raise you a rabbit - i think the nebulosity at M42 (in a star diagonal) looks like the Donnie Darko rabbit - the trap stars are the near eye - once you've seen it you can't unsee it. argh.

[Ratlet]

15 minutes ago, josefk said:

nice sketches and great picture 🤜🏼 

...i hear your "stingray" and "swift" and raise you a rabbit - i think the nebulosity at M42 (in a star diagonal) looks like the Donnie Darko rabbit - the trap stars are the near eye - once you've seen it you can't unsee it. argh.

I'll need to keep an eye out for that.  I'm going to experiment with trying to draw what it looks like and Donnie darko rabbit is definitely destinctive.

Personally I don't understand why they didn't name thors helmet the bunny nebula. Its even got an eye!  If it looked any more like a rabbit, Art Garfunkel would be singing a song about it.

[josefk]

Oh no. I don’t want to go down this Rorschach rabbit hole. I see the bunny. (I think) you’ll need to look at M42 back to front for Donnie Darko. “The ears” above the trapezium but the main nebulosity slanting right below those stars. That image would definitely help me draw it. I’m sorry I started this 😂