TAG Galaxy
Deep Sky / General / Long Exposure Photography / Observing Reports
GSSP Night 3
After two nights of unmitigated success with Pumpkin, I decided to “zoom in” a little (well, a lot, really), and put up Cassie on the third night of the star party. Mounting […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
M33, The Great Triangulum Galaxy
I shot this on the second night of GSSP 2010. This is 1h total exposure, three 20m subframes, shot with Pumpkin/350D.
GSSP Night 2
With no polar alignment or setup required this evening, this was my first “full” night with Pumpkin. I started around dusk with some exposure bracketing on Rho Ophiucus, a nebular area of […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
M31, The Great Andromeda Galaxy
This was the first image I shot while at The Golden State Star Party (GSSP) 2010. This is 40m total exposure, two 20m subframes, shot with Pumpkin and the 350D with no […]
GSSP Night 1
We left the house around 8am, 4 people, with a packed trailer, Skybox, and “way back”. We headed north via Chico and Susanville. Let’s call it “the scenic route”. The drive was […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
NGC6946, Spiral Galaxy in Cygnus
Cygnus is not generally the area of sky you think of when you think “hey, showpiece galaxy”. But here you go. NGC 6946 has been dodging me for years, so I decided […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
NGC4565, Edge-on Spiral Galaxy in Coma Berenices
Normally, I don’t go in much for edge-on galaxies. I just don’t think that I really get enough pixels to work with for the amount of effort that goes in. But NGC4565 […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
M100, Spiral Galaxy in Virgo
Another night hunting galaxies in Virgo. This time I went after M100, which I was pretty certain to be a spiral. I had some initial difficulty getting Elbrus working. It took about […]
Astro knowledge / Deep Sky / General / Long Exposure Photography / Technology
M87, Elliptical Galaxy in Virgo
I have avoided the Virgo Galaxies for years. The reasons are many, but chief among them is that a lot of the Virgo galaxies are elliptical, which essentially means that they look […]
Deep Sky / Long Exposure Photography
Ha and Light pollution and Springtime
When I got home today, I tried to process the stack that MaxIM had created of my M81 shot from last night. That didn’t go well. So I re-stacked the subframes in […]
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.