Royal Astronomical Society of Canada

Observing Highlights

Way, way past dark-thirty at the 10th Annual RASCALS Star Party 2010 and I was getting pretty sleepy. But I couldn't resist taking a few shots at M31 just to see what would happen.

Pillars of gas, dust, and hot-burning young stars form the center of NGC 7822. A giant molecular cloud spreads across much of the constellation Cepheus. This nebula is on the northern edge of this glowing star forming region about 3,000 light-years away from us.

This photo was taken from the 10th Annual RASCALS Star Party 2010 held in Metchosin.

M33 from three sessions, one at the 7th Annual RASCALS Star Party 2007 at the Victoria Fish and Game site, one at the DAO in Victoria in 2007, and one at the 10th Annual RASCALS Star Party 2010 held in Metchosin.

This part of Sagitarius is very rich and colorful. M8, the Lagoon Nebula is the dominant feature, a glowing cloud of hydrogen gas lit by newly formed stars in the cluster NGC 6523. The Trifid nebula, M20 in the upper centre has striking blue and red emission regions with prominent dark lanes. This photo was taken from the 10th Annual RASCALS Star Party 2010 held in Metchosin.

IC1318 Butterfly Nebula & Sadr - Aug 13, 2010

The area around Sadr (Gamma Cygni) features various nebulous regions which show in this photo as pink and red patches surrounding Sadr - the brightest star. This photo was taken from the 10th Annual RASCALS Star Party 2010 held in Metchosin.

It has been mostly cloudy during my stay in Hawaii. One evening I drove to Leeward Oahu and observed bright Venus, Saturn, and Mars set over the Pacific Ocean.

As I observed the Sun this afternoon using my Lunt solar telescope, there were two prominent features visible: a moderate sized prominence and some huge areas of plage on the surface. I employed a High Dynamic Range technique to capture both features in one image.

The stretch of sky in Cygnus that reaches from the North American and Pelican to the Veil Nebulae is incredibly rich with glowing emission and dark nebulae as well as amazing star clouds. This is a deep exposure of the region with a 100 mm lens. Taken on a cool, clear night at Cattle Point.

This wide field photo of the tail end of Cygnus was taken from a church field in Central Saanich as a test for a potential dark site. Yard lights and heavy dew proved to be a challenge. The dew in particular meant I had to eliminate half the shots taken during the session. Despite these obstacles, the resultant photos turned out amazingly well.

This photo is the full frame from the original showing (L to R): NGC7000 region: North America Nebula, IC5070 Pelican Nebula. Sadr region: IC1311, IC1318, NGC6888 Crescent Nebula

Photo taken with an Orion SS Pro CCD on a very clear, cloudless night at LB Pearson College, Metchosin, BC using a AT8RC telescope on an EQ6 mount autoguided with an OAG camera and PHD.

The vast Andromeda spiral galaxy is the largest member of our Local Group of galaxies. It has two small neigbouring galaxies, as well as some knots of star forming regions which appear as small blue coloured clouds in this photo. The dark lanes in Andromeda are quite distinct.

I used a Hutech-modified Canon T2i dSLR utilizing an IDAS UIBAR-III filter prime focus on the Victoria Centre Observatory's Tele Vue NP127is apo refractor on a Paramount ME.

Photo taken with an Orion SS Pro CCD at LB Pearson College, Metchosin, BC using a AT8RC telescope on an EQ6 mount autoguided with an OAG camera and PHD. Used an Astronomik 12 nm. Ha filter.

I have cobbled together a fisheye lens using an old supplementary lens that was made for a Canon Coolpix and attached it to a regular DSLR lens. The combination works quite well. I have put some images taken with it on my Zenfolio page.

1. They start with an ISS pass image taken at the VCO last night.
2. This is followed by an image from the CU that shows the Plaskett and surroundings as well as the sky.
3. The third one is of a fairly dark sky at the VCO on Friday night.

Taken at Victoria Centre Observatory using a Meade 14" SCT equipped with a Hyperstar operating at f/2, QSI 583c CCD camera.

On Friday evening I went to Mount Tolmie in order to get a clear view of the north-east horizon. Comet McNaught rose just after 1:00 and I was able to get a few shots before twilight. Photo taken using a Borg 77EDII at f/4.3 on Takahashi EM-11 mount ; Hutech modified Canon EOS 5D Mark II.

The Great Globular in Hercules is one of the best known globular clusters in the northern sky.  Photo taken at the VCO using the TeleVue NP-127 at f/5.2, SBIG ST-2000XM & Paramount ME.

I was able to image the very young new Moon at our VCO observing session using a SW Equinox 80 Apo Refractor and a Nikon D80. Thanks Bill for the tip.

The Hockey Stick galaxy NGC 4656 and 57 is near the Whale galaxy, NGC
4632 and the distortion of both is likely from the interactions they have had with each other and with NGC 4627, the small galaxy near the Whale. Maybe the Whale is really an opposing hockey team and penalties are needed.

I have imaged this combination before but managed to get a lot more exposure for this one. Subsequent processing has added more colour and detail.

This photo was taken from Pearson College Observatory, and shows a section of Markarian’s Chain in the constellation: Virgo.

Optics: TeleVue NP-127 at f/5.2, SBIG ST-2000XM
Mount: Losmandy G-11

The Needle Galaxy is a magnificent edge-on spiral galaxy in the faint constellation Coma Berenices and is the largest edge-on galaxy visible in our skies. This color image reveals the galaxy's bulging central core dominated by light from a population of older, yellowish stars. The core is dramatically cut by obscuring dust lanes which lace its thin galactic plane. Smaller Galaxy NGC4562 is also visible in this field.

Photos taken at the Victoria Centre Observatory using the 14" Meade LX-200 SCT & Hyperstar f/2 optic; QSI 583c colour CCD camera.

This photo was taken from Pearson College Observatory, and shows the Sombrero Galaxy with its distinctive dust lane in the constellation: Virgo.

Optics: TeleVue NP-127 at f/5.2, SBIG ST-2000XM
Mount: Losmandy G-11

The Moon imaged with the VCO 14" SCT and Hyperstar using the QSI583cs CCD camera.

I ended up going to Mt. Doug. because I wanted to be as high up as possible. I ate supper at the top, set up my ED80 and my 10X50 binos, and watched the Sun set. Noticing the exact hill behind which the Sun set would be key to any possibility, as the Moon would be setting further north than the Sun did. Those thin wispy clouds made any possible naked eye sighting impossible but it still didn't stop the effort. I was also able to show many people Venus (naked eye) and both it and Mercury through my little refractor.

I did though keep scanning the appropriate area with my binos and saw in a clear blue patch what looked to me like the thinnest, pale white/grey, properly orientated crescent. I though at first it was just one of the cloud wisps but stayed steady on the object and noticed how it didn't move as the background did. I stayed on it for several minutes and the shape never changed until a grey patch moved in front of it and I never caught site of the crescent again. This was at exactly 2023hrs PDT (watch set by the NRC website). While I was observing the crescent with my binos I did switch to my refractor for a moment at 18X but found it made the background too bright and I saw nothing. When I switched back to the binos it reappeared. This to my mind helps confirm for me that I was seeing what I believed I was seeing.

Even though a naked eye sighting and record didn't happen, I'm thrilled with what I did accomplish. To my limited math skills I think this is a hair under 15hrs old Moon optical sighting.

There were multiple solar prominences visible on the Sun this afternoon, however a series of three in one group stood out as particularly spectacular. Reports from the previous day told of a single huge arching prominence at this same location on the solar disk. I took a series of photos through my Lunt solar telescope using my Canon 7D dSLR a-focally. See the other photos for a full disk view and for close-ups of the other prominences.

Taken from Pearson College. Equipment: SW Equinox 80mm Refractor on SW EQ6 mount autoguided with an OAG camera. Orion Filter Wheel with Astronomic 13nm Ha filter. Imaging camera: Orion SSPro V1.

The International Space Station is seen flying over Victoria as observed from Mount Tolmie using a Canon 7D dSLR and a Bower 8mm f/3.5 Fisheye lens.

The weather cooperated for Victoria Centre members, so they could use the 1.8m Plaskett telescope at the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory to acquire photos of a wide variety of objects. M1 Crab Nebula, NGC2903 galaxy, M82 Cigar Galaxy (all by John McDonald).

Thanks to Dave Balam,  our very capable telescope operator.

Collection of Plaskett 2010 Photos - taken by Victoria Centre members

My first image produced with the Williams Optic 66 acquired earlier this years. The entire complex nebula is quite nice and detailed compare to previous M42 images taken with CCD. Next things to learn... flats and darks!

Northern Star Trails - Feb 17, 2010

This image is a combination of 30 second images taken continuously all night from Yellow Point Lodge on Vancouver Island. The date was 2010-02-17 during the Vancouver Olympics so the ski regions and city lights show up in the lower right. Many lights from boats and airplanes can also be seen.

Northern Stars Overnight on Vimeo - a time lapse video using the same still photos.

This image was created using my Ha image of February 17, 2010 as a luminance layer and my color image of January 20, 2008 for the RGB layers. I used ImagesPlus 3.50a to align, scale rotate, split LRGB and combine the Luminance (Ha) and RGB channels. Photoshop and Noise Ninja were used to finish the image.

My first attempt at enhancing a LRGB image with hydrogen alpha through the VCO's TeleVue NP127is & a SBIG ST-2000XM CCD camera using LRGBHa Astrodon filters.

The weather finally cooperated for Victoria Centre members, so they could use the 1.8m Plaskett telescope at the Dominion Astrophysical Observatory to acquire photos of a wide variety of objects. Thanks to Dave Balam,  our very capable telescope operator, it appears everyone had their chance to image some of the objects from their lists before the high haze took its toll on the seeing. Observing log (text file).

The Orion Nebula is a lovely sight visually and is strikingly beautiful when imaged in the light from the rich field of excited hydrogen gas that is feeding star formation in its core. Taken from Yellow Point Lodge, on southern Vancouver Island.

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Last updated: September 02, 2010

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