Messier 52 sketch

[MZack]

An opportunity arose between the clouds a couple of nights ago. Here’s the open cluster M52 which is on the borders of Cassiopeia and Cepheus. Skies were fair and not dark plus local light pollution. 8 inch Classical Cassegrain x135. About 20 or so stars picked out with the rest a background haze. Done at the eyepiece, white on black which was a challenge using a red torch. 

Edited Tuesday at 07:00 by MZack

[SwiMatt]

Very nice sketch @MZack! Did you use a brush for the haze?

[MZack]

Hi

No, but that’s an interesting idea. 
I made a round smudge in the corner of the page with white pastel pencil. I took a thinly pointed blending stump and covered the tip in the pastel. Then I lightly marked the sketch using the tip of the stump, fairly randomly but following the generally outline of the background haze to create the effect you can see visually. Repeated loading the stump and adding to the sketch as needed.

6 hours ago, SwiMatt said:

Very nice sketch @MZack! Did you use a brush for the haze?

First time I’ve tried it and it seemed to work quite well. 
 

Malcolm