Category: Gear
Astro knowledge / Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
NGC 4725, Spiral Galaxy in Coma Berenices
Trying to round out the set of the largest galaxies visible from this latitude. This is another galaxy that I would not have known about if not for “The List” (see M106 […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M106, Spiral Galaxy in Ursa Major
Chasing all of the Spring Galaxies before they get away for another year. Who knew M106 had so many friends? IDs of the dimmer galaxies TBD. 90 minutes of exposure time brings […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M64, The Black Eye Galaxy in Canes Venatici
The galaxies around Ursa Major have been providing me with lots of opportunities to work on shooting stuff near the limit of the image scale I can really produce with Veronica and […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M101, The Pinwheel Galaxy in Ursa Major
I attempted another 1-hour integration of M101. I think this really needs more integration time. I might be able to combine the hour from February and the hour from May into one […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M51, The Whirlpool Galaxy in Ursa Major
I went back to the unguided well one more time, this time positioned post-meridian-flip. I was losing a lot of images (because I failed to rebalance the scope after the flip), and […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M63, The Sunflower Galaxy in Ursa Major
I tried out some 3-minute unguided images on M63. Worked OK. Lost a few images, and the clouds rolled in just about the time I needed to do a meridian flip… More […]
New mount = Happy
After a couple of days of being “closed for renovation”, the ad Astra Observatory at Newark, CA is back in business with the new Losmandy G-11 mount. I had to modify the […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M101, The Pinwheel Galaxy in Ursa Major
Two shots of M101, my first attempt at this dim face-on spiral galaxy. 19 three-minute subframes here. 9 5-minute subframes on this one.
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M63, The Sunflower Galaxy in Ursa Major
First attempt at M63. Could use more work.
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M51, The Whirlpool Galaxy in Ursa Major
This is my first halfway decent shot of M51. It’s a *lot* smaller than most of my targets. This is a stack of 10 five minute images, and it looks like I […]
RECENT UPDATE
Polar Alignment Calculations
Here’s a page that derives Polar Alignment Calculations. (update 5/2020: the original site is gone, so I found the text on Wayback and am inserting it below. This is by the original […]
Gear / Observatory / Telescope
Special Guest Star takes the mount at Hilltop O
The Astro Jedi needed somewhere to store his light sab—- I mean, bucket, and I was only too happy to accommodate him. I have decided that I need to come to a […]
General / Maintenance / Observatory
Dome shutter is motorized again!
I finally decided to bite the bullet and fix the shutter motor. Things went sideways last winter, and I’ve been opening the shutter manually (and tying it shut with rope, so we […]
Trixie 2017 – tube mods
I finally got around to cutting the MTA-UTA tubes to length; the only eyepiece that would come to focus with the focuser spacer in place is the Televue 55mm Plossl. If I […]
MOST COMMENTED
Observatory
Observatory 2.0 – Time has come today!
General / Maintenance
First Light, a deeper look
Mount / Observatory / Telescope
Observatory 2.0 – Result!
Observatory
Observatory 2.0 – The Pier goes in
Gear / General / Maintenance
Martin Farmer Wormblock installation notes
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
NGC2244, The Rosette Nebula
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
Another beautiful night.