TAG Nebula
Deep Sky / Gear / General / Long Exposure Photography / Maintenance / Observing Reports
Pumpkin by her lonesome
I mounted up Pumpkin by herself tonight. The mount’s been having a problem with guiding, very rough behavior in RA. I’m going to be tuning the mount up tomorrow, but the sky […]
Astro knowledge / Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography / Maintenance
A tale of two images
This is a tale of two images. These were taken on successive nights. Same setup, same exposure time, everything. The first night was unguided. … and the second night was autoguided with […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
NGC 2174, Emission Nebula in Orion
One of those objects that just doesn’t get much press. This is a huge nebula, the size of M42, and well-placed in the sky, between the foot of Gemini and the head […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
B33, The Horsehead Nebula in Orion
A second clear night in a row gave me a shot at getting a full 2 hours of B33. The sky background sure isn’t dark. The moon was a little bright tonight, […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
NGC 2244, The Rosette Nebula in Monoceros
Finally, a halfway-decent shot of The Rosette Nebula. This object could have been shoehorned into the FOV a little better, and of course would have been a snap in Pumpkin. But Veronica […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
B33, The Horsehead Nebula in Orion
A rare clear night during January. This was shot perhaps a bit too late at night. I did 2 hours on (what I thought was) The Rosette, see that image for details. […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
NGC 2239, portion of the Rosette Nebula
In short, I missed. In the upper right hand corner of this image is NGC2239, a chunk of The Rosette Nebula. I meant to try to cram in the whole thing, but […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
M45, The Pleiades Cluster in Taurus
M45, The Pleiades, Open Cluster/Reflection Nebula in Taurus Second try at M45 with the new 66mm refractor. Still a little noisy; under a very bright waxing gibbous moon. 2 hours of integration […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography
B33, The Horsehead Nebula in Orion
Pumpkin first light. I was wrapping up for the night, knew I had the FOV to sort of aim in the general area and probably get my target, and shot one 3min […]
Deep Sky / Gear / Long Exposure Photography / Optics
M42, The Great Orion Nebula
A ho-hum version of M42. The FOV on Pumpkin is really too side for this target (I had the whole Sword of Orion in the FOV. vertically.) but I was having fun […]
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.