Messier 57, the Ring Nebula - shaking off the dust

After about 6 weeks of rain and clouds we here in North Carolina caught a brief 3 day break of sun and STARS!!!

Full res on AstroBin - http://astrob.in/full/113385/0/

In case you didn't catch the live show, this week we kicked off a new style Amateur Astronomer hangout called "Nights at the Round Table" hosted by +John Kramer

Check out the replay for some introductions to the panelists, how we got started in imaging and a nice overview of our scopes, equipment and techniques.

Mars 2014 ANIMATION!

Mars 2014 ANIMATION!

Using 7 processed and derotated source images from 7 different nights as seen in the labeled WinJUPOS map

Using Photoshop to feather out the seams, this map used for the final animation

A brief and related tutorial on processing Mars is here:

Akule Planetary Equipment H/W

Type: Custom Home Built Newtonian

Aperture: 356mm (14")

Focal Ratio: f/4.5 - 5x TeleVue Powermate at f/26 / 9,315mm EFL

Primary Mirror: Carl Zambuto 14" f/4.5

Camera: Point Grey Research Flea3 - FL3-FW-03S1M (monochrome)

Color Filter Wheel: True Technology UK (Tru-Tek) - SupraSlim with Visual Wide Wheel (built in diagonal)

Filters: Baader Planetarium LRGB Telescope Filter Set

Filters: Astronomik ProPlanet 742 IR-pass filter

Filters: Astrodon-Schuler UV filter

Images: http://imgur.com/a/0znBY#0

Blog: http://maphilli14.webs.com/apps/blog/?view_type=1

Akule Planetary Processing S/W

OS: Lenovo W530 (Microsoft Windows 7 64-bit)

Acquisition: Torsten Edelmann’s Firecapture

Processing: AutoStakkert 2 -> AstraImage -> WinJUPOS -> PhotoShop -> Gimp

Mars' 2014 retrograde colors, a look back to my images this apparition.

As Mars only comes around every other year I pursued the red planet fairly aggressively this time around.  I had a few nights that ended up solely on the cutting room floor and the rest are presented here.  19 nights worth of images.

Whole season is here

FULL HD SIZE HERE!

My images do not match the timing of the real retrograde motion of Mars as my observations are spotty based upon weather and time.  Retrograde motion is explained here, http://mars.nasa.gov/allaboutmars/nightsky/retrograde/. 

My images start in the lower right back in December of 2013, when Mars' apparent size was a mere 6.7 arc seconds. Mars begins my image's 'normal motion' through to April 1st, 2014 and then begins retrograde until my image on May 13th.  Again these are not the dates of the real retrograde but an aesthetic representation for the sake of a pleasing looking image.  I left a bit of room at top in case I get any more chances this year but the past few weeks have been quite stormy and had no chances to get anything of worth.

Highlights include a published image on SpaceWeather.com on  March 29 (http://www.spaceweather.com/archive.php?view=1&day=28&month=03&year=2014)

and a few animations....

I didn't get Phobos or Diemos this year.

I do plan to make a full globe animation from the above images if that's what you're wondering!

Thanks for sharing this great ride with me watching the red planet and all the changes in weather and detail.

Mike

Asteroid Trifecta with animation.

I've got the bug, the bug of observing minor planets.  I think it started with the pass of Eros in 2012 (http://astromaphilli14.blogspot.com/2012/02/asteroids-eros-and-tyche.html)  When treating my images I found another little drifter, faintly moving through . I was hooked!  I thought I had discovered something. Turned out the classic case of what's new to me was something already discovered in 1886 but whatever. In learning more since then I've struggled with getting the hang of things. After upgrading from a DSLR to a CCD I found myself reinvigorated. With some recent clear skies and a bit more patience and some growing discipline I have observed this group of three asteroids; (1530) Rantaseppa, (4478) Blanco, and (4687) Brunsandrej. All within the same FOV for my scope and camera of 37.5 x 28.3 arcmin.  Then in an effort to get a +Minor Planet Center designation I found them again a few days later, all still 'apparently' together.

Using Astrometrica to measure position and magnitude you will see the number designation followed by the magnitude in parentheses.

NOTE there are MANY other asteroids in this fov as there are most, but my 2min subs in the 14" didn't quite make out the fainter, say mag18-20+ objects.  Not yet!

Night one - 20140221

Full field

(1530) Rantaseppa

(4478) Blanco

(4687) Brunsandrej

Boring! it was fun to see, but on Night 2

Night TWO - 20140224

In this video you will see an animation of the three asteroids moving over the course of 23:27 to 23:45 EDT or just 17 minutes of movement!

Easiest to click the direct YouTube link and make fullscreen HD (http://youtu.be/rpSW-wN1NS4)

Planets x3 as the weather moves from Winter to Spring

As the North Carolina weather moves from dry, large temp swings winter to the warm, moist and hazy spring I found a spell of settled weather the days of May 7th and 8th.  Starting with the 8th in this post I observed Jupiter, the Moon, Mars and Saturn.  The first time I've had three major planets in a single night in many years!

My Scope +Akule
Type: Custom Home Built Newtonian
Aperture: 356mm (14")
Focal Ratio: f/4.5 - 5x TeleVue Powermate at f/26 / 9,315mm EFL
Primary Mirror: Carl Zambuto 14" f/4.5
Camera: Point Grey Research Flea3 - FL3-FW-03S1M (monochrome)
Color Filter Wheel: True Technology UK (Tru-Tek) - SupraSlim with Visual Wide Wheel (built in diagonal)
Filters: Baader Planetarium LRGB Telescope Filter Set


Jupiter - not too shabby for being low and late in the season.

All the rest of this past, and quite productive Jupiter season (
https://plus.google.com/photos/+MichaelAPhillips/albums/5920900341220145457?banner=pwa)

Mars

All the rest of this season (https://plus.google.com/photos/+MichaelAPhillips/albums/5962944171620737953?banner=pwa)

and the mighty Saturn sporting a 20 degree ring angle!

Here's last years collection (https://plus.google.com/u/0/photos/+MichaelAPhillips/albums/5842690900648084529)
Still working on this years! This is only the 3rd shot and 2nd with this camera.




The 7th's images are...

Mars' animation of nearly 1 hours worth of rotation

Final derotated image

And finally Saturn from the 1st night!

More of my Astronomy work on the main page: http://maphilli14.webs.com/

Also these images were assembled in an automated fashion with some custom scripts in sikuli and python.  The total time in the stacking program AutoStakkert2 and the sharpening program AstraImage is seen in my Resucetime stats for the week:

4h 34m of automated AstraImage stacking and 3h 34m of AS2 stacking = 8hrs and 8min of time back in my life instead of babysitting mundane programs that made me bored out of my mind!  ;)  Yay for automation!  Basically it frees me up to surf reddit on my cell phone!  haha!

8" Mars quickie

My 1st since Early April. Here I live near too many trees that kick off pollen. Here's my scope in 2012

Anyway, I learned my lesson well, it's sticky, thick and doesn't clean up off the corrector easily so I decided to take my time with the 14" newt and clean and grease the mount gears, center the focuser and scrub the primary during this endless season. I couldn't resist last night and took out the C8 for only the 3rd time in almost a year. I didn't touch the collimation and only wanted to observe Mars visually. As breezy at it was and as poor as the forecast was I was impressed at how much I could see at 500x with a 4mm eyepice. I slipped in the 2.5x PowerMate and color DBK21AU618.AS camera and shot a pair of shots. It's not what I'm used to using the 14" so much but it was fun tossing about running on battery power!
Thanks for reading!