Bright Sun Dogs

This afternoon the sky showed some high faint clouds which resulted in bright sun dogs.

Photokina 2016 - Cologne

Visiting the biggest trade fair of imaging, camera's and video in Cologne, Germany.  Testing of new lenses, camera's and discovering new gadgets.

As Nikon fan I was able to test different camara's and lenses.

Also interesting was guiding equipment for use on tripods and made for wide fields photographs. Below guiding Mini Star Adventurer is build by Skywatcher and will be next month for sale.

At the end I bought a special gadget for my smartphone, a Pro Clip Lens Fish Eye 180° from Kenko. The results so far are very cool !! Image below made without editing.

Halo around full moon

On sept 16, 2016 clouds prevented the penumbral eclipse of the moon. In stead we could observe halo's around the moon as clouds were sometimes very faint.

Sun Pillar above Averbode

This evening just before sunset, a very bringht sun pillar could be observed for some time. This atmospheric phenomenon is caused by the reflection of sun light by ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere.

Start of autumn

Today at 16h21, local time, official start of autumn. Also known as the September equinox and the moment the sun rises exactly at the east and sets directly in the west. From today onwards the sun moves across the south untill solstice, december 21.

350 Astronomical blogs and usefull links

Amazing, already 350 astronomical blogs posted. Have a look and visit my astronomical links using the page of my blog

Beautiful Sunset at Motovun Croatia

Moon ASI224MC & TAL200K

Earlier this week I was able take some pictures of the moon using the ASI224MC camera on the TAL200K.

Results were stacked using Autostakkert! and editing using CS4.

Famous craters shown : Kepler and Mercator. I put also the landing area from Surveyor 1 - the first US moonlander.

Super-Harvest Blood Moon

Sept 16, 2016 It was be possible to observe a super-harvest blood moon. Unfortunately clouds showed up without any chance to make observations.
We talk about a harvest moon when full moon happens near autumnal equinox. Beside this the moon is "very" close to the earth so we can see a "bigger" moon or super moon. And also it was a penumbral lunar eclips seeing the moon darker then normal .... that's what we missed due to the clouds.

Moon 82% - Sept 13, 2016 TAL200K & DSLR

Using my DSLR Nikon D60 on TAL200K. Picture edited using CS4. In focus, No crop.

M57 Ring Nebula ASI224MC

Practising with ASI224MC camera on my TAL200K resulted in 100 frames of each 8.5s. All pictures were stacked using RegiStax and edited using CS4. I did not made any blacks which could have used to reduce some pixel errors.

Sunspots 2885-2890

As my telescoop was still standing outside I took the opportunity to take some pictures of the sun. Pictures are taken with Nikon D60, TAL200K with self-made AstroSolar Baader Sunfilm. Limited editing done using CS4.

Source SpaceWeather.Com - Note that the small sunspots left are not seen yet !!

M27 & M13 ASI224MC TAL200K

 Some more pictures taken during the night of september 10, 2016. Set up with AS-EQ6 GT mount, TAL200K and ASI224MC camera. Taking frames of multiple seconds withfull gray scale on SharpCap 2.8 software. In total 10 frames taken and stacked using RegiStax6 and DeepSkyStacker. Afterwards modification done using CS4.
Difficulty is still having too much light versus a dark background. But will find out next time.. hopefully.

M57 TAL200K ASI224MC

Also today some good weather and thus time for more experiments. Exploring the ASI224MC camera on the TAL200K was this time succesfull as I got the camera into focus.
I took M57 as the target object. Taking 10 frames each 8.5s . Frames were stacked using RegiStax6 and edited using CS4.

M27 The Dumbbell Nebula

Last night I was able to observe and take pictures of M27, known as The Dumbbell Nebula. About 1300 light-years away this planetary nebula is seen within the constellation Vulpecula. It was Charles Messier himself who discovered this nebula in 1764 and it was the first planetary nebula ever.

Of all pictures made I took three for stacking purposes, al three with different exposure time and ISO values. After stacking with DeepSkyStacker the result was edited using CS4.

Finding Uranus

You need to have some patience to find Uranus (magnitude 5.9). Below my starchart I used once the goto put the scope into postion for Uranus. The chart is an exact copy (North down, east left) when you look into the finderscope 9x50. Using the chart will guide you towards Uranus.

Uranus with Titania ans Oberon

Using my AZ-EQ6 GT I was able to locate Uranus. This is my first time ever I could observe Uranus. Low above the ESE horizon in the constellation Pisces, When enlarging the picture I got Uranus together with two moons Titania and Oberon (via Stellarium0.14.3). Both pictures are edited using CS4

Small Moon

F10 TAL200K Klevtsov-Cassegrain

After 3 months thinking time and testing I made finally my decision and choose for the TAL200K. This is a Klevtsov-Cassegrain type telescoop with a primary mirror reflecting the light into a secundary mirror and corrector. The 8" aperture with focus length 2000mm (f/10 ) is Russian made and thus very robust.

Weather Summary for August

Higher temperatures and less rain compared with last year August.