Society for Popular Astronomy

I had a great night - 13/14 - here in northern France. Over 100 Geminids. It looks like there are more tonight

Joop,

I understand your problem . To help me, I am building a glossary of Messier object. Here is example of M31. I have tried to make it look as though a small telescope under low mag. I probably get too much colour. I hope that helps.

David D

How about Antares?

David

Bill, Do you see the effect only with the latest most sensitive cameras? I am using a GW902H which is a bit long in the tooth now, but I will have a look back through my records. If I find any I will pass them across. Have you any idea as to how common they are? 1 in a 100, 1 in a 1000 etc. It would...

Hi, I use a 50mm lens at f1.4 with an exposure of 8 sec with the ISO set at 6400. I take about 30 images and then stack them. I get down to about mag 10 stars. For a bigger image for parts of a constellation (ie. an open cluster, M45, M35, M37, M38), I use a 150 mm lens at f2.8, with an exposure of ...

Well we had a good night here in France! 40 meteors of which about half were identified as Geminidsby UFO Analyser. Unfortunately the weather closed in after about 0200Hrs UT.

Its grey here today though so I will have to wait and hope.

David

I certainly agree, try before you buy. Also try them in dim light. I was surprised many years ago when, in dim light, a pair of cheaper binos out performed an expensive pair!

However most reasonable makes of binos perform OK these days.

David

Unfortunately I am old enough to remember the 60's when street lights went off at 11 pm. The logic was Pubs close at 10-30, 10 minutes drinking up time and the 20 minutes to get home. It all worked fine! If you were out after that you needed a torch even the thieves. I wouldn't bet on it getting bet...

Two obvious comments. Firstly is the weight of the camera moving the telescope and taking the moon out of the fov. Secondly, you need to get the camera to the focal plane of the telescope. This means moving the focusing closer to the lens. Also turn off any auto settings on the camera. You might wan...

Hi,

Managed to get another image last night. Same exposure and stacking as before. But one can see clearly the movement of Ceres and Vesta against the stars, by comparing with my earlier post below.

David

Hi, I managed to get a wide-field image of Mar, Vesta and Ceres. I have been waiting for th moon to be out of the way! It was taken with a fixed 50 f1.4 lens and 10 frames stacked.

Weather permitting I hope to build up a series over the summer.

David

Very good. I have also had a little project with Uranus. I have been imaging Pisces using a 50mm lens with an 8 sec exposure. It picks up Uranus very well and I have got 6 images over the last 3 months showing the movement nicely. I tried the same with Neptune but haven't got so many images this app...

Hi, My advice would be to go for some easy objects first. One, they are easy to find and two, you can actually see something. The moon, Jupiter, Venus are all visible at the moment. As are M45, M42. After that there are plenty more Messier's to look at. It is very easy to get disheartened by trying ...

Of course, this is only in recent times. The Earl of Rosse built a 72 inch back in the 19th century! Ireland 1 USA 0!

David

I am thinking of buying a new setup as follows: Skywatcher Esprit 120 ED Pro triplet telescope on an AZEQ6 Mount. It seems to be a good setup but any advice:comments would be appreciated.

Thanks

David