A long Time Ago – In a Galaxy Not So far Away…

Only 21 million light years away, that is…21 million years ago – all was well until it wasn’t. One day brought on SN 2023ixf – a supernova explosion in the Pinwheel Galaxy – M101. We humans are just seeing it now.

Friday night at the Whirlpool

I can never seem to get enough of M51, the beautiful Whirlpool Galaxy, and it was irresistible on another Friday night impromptu stargazing session.

Hunting the Hunter

I couldn’t believe it – finally a chance to catch the great Orion Nebula whilst still in the early springtime sky. The Orion Nebula has been an elusive object. It’s one of the first deep sky objects I tried photographing through my new CPC-800 telescope in 2015. And I did manage to grab a marginally […]

C/2022 E3 (ZTF) Martian fly-by

One reason I don’t observe from home often is the narrow swath of clear sky I have through my wooded lot, even in the best conditions. But here, I caught Comet C/2022 E3 (ZTF) just in time!

The Planets Are Back!

It’s September 2022 and the planets are back! Well, at least at a reasonable hour. I posted a Jupiter image in the previous blog entry but I was up pretty late to catch that. Saturn is high in the sky at around 11:00 PM now, with Jupiter a couple of hours behind, and Mars after that. I got one of my best images yet of Saturn.

A perfect night at the cemetery

Nice weather returned to the cemetery for the evening of August 19, 2022. With the moon nowhere in sight and Saturn now plainly visible just after dark. And – with Jupiter in tow a couple of hours later – it was about as perfect a night as we get.

Darker and Starrier

Another gorgeous night at the cemetery on 7/26/22, and I’m continuing my flirtations with M101. A little less sky glow than from my previous attempt at the Pinwheel Galaxy, and a little cooler – less thermal noise in the camera. And, I timed it just right with my failing battery and managed to capture 53 images.

A dark and starry night

And stormy? Distant lightning was evident on the horizon, despite better than average transparency overhead and the beautifully clear sky from horizon to horizon. Yet, distant flashes punctuated the otherwise perfect night. No matter, the lightening must have been quite some distance away.

It blew up!

A blown-up view of M57.

Another shot at the Ring

Here’s another shot of the Ring Nebula, M57. 34, 90-second sub exposures stacked together worked better in my f10 telescope than 81, 30-second subs even though total exposure times were within 20% of each other.