Author: richardhandy

Comet C/2014 E2 (Jacques)

Comet C/2014 E2 (Jacques) - September 23, 2014
Comet C/2014 E2 (Jacques) – September 23, 2014

Object Name: C/2014 E2 (Jacques)
Object Type: Comet
Location: Stokesley, North Yorkshire
Date: 23 September 2014
Media: 4H, HB, 2B and 4B pencils, blending stumps, kneadable eraser on white paper, scanned then inverted and edited using Paint Shop Pro
Telescope: 130mm Newtonian reflector, 13mm Plössl (50x / 1 degree FOV), no filter
Time: 22.41 UT – 23.44 UT
Seeing: III-II (Antoniadi scale)
Transparency: Good, LM:5.22
Notes: The comet was in the constellation of Cassiopeia. It appeared slightly elongated but I could not see a tail. The coma appeared a light green colour.

Steve

Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/sjb_astro/

NGC 40

NGC 40, "The Bow Tie Nebula" a planetary nebula in the constellation Cepheus
NGC 40, “The Bow Tie Nebula” a planetary nebula in the constellation Cepheus

Hello!

I submit you a sketch of NGC40, which is a planetary nebula in the constellation of Cepheus. The nebula is beautiful but its understanding is a bit complicated because the details are either difficult to see or obvious but hard to localise with precision.
It took me more or less two hours to draw NGC40 with my 250mm (10 inches) dobson with a Nagler 5mm eyepiece (that gives a magnification of 250x).
I draw with graphite pencils (4B and B) on 180g white bristol, then in used Photoshop CS6 for the colors inversion and stars processing (making them perfectly round and add the colors).

Object Name: NGC40
Object Type: Planetary Nebula in Constellation Cepheus
Observing Location: Rolle, Switzerland
Date: 6th September 2014

Have a nice day and clear skies.

José Rodrigues

Early Morning Pitatus and Neighbors

Lunar crater Pitatus and environs - September 17, 2014
Lunar crater Pitatus and environs – September 17, 2014
Lunar crater Pitatus and environs (labeled) - September 17, 2014
Lunar crater Pitatus and environs (labeled) – September 17, 2014

Pitatus is an old, large 97 km. diameter crater on the edge of Mare Nubium. The floor of this crater has a linear central peak which was casting a fine elongated triangular shadow at the time of this observation and sketch. To the south craters Wurzelbauer (88 km.) and Gauricus (79 km.) could be seen; both of these craters show badly warn rims; both much older than Pitatus. Attached to the northwest rim of Pitatus is the crater Hesodius (43 km.). At about the eighth or ninth day of lunation you can observe the famous “sunrise ray” beaming across the floor of Hesodius through a break in the wall with Pitatus. This is certainly a sight worth observing.

Sketching:

For this sketch I used: Black Strathmore 400 Artagain paper, 12”x 9”, both white and
black Conte’pastel pencils and blending stumps.

Telescope: 10 inch f/5.7 Dobsonian and 9mm eyepiece 161x
Date: 09-17-2014 10:00-11:25 UT
Temperature: 5°C (42°F)
Clear, calm
Seeing: Antoniadi III
Co longitude: 187.3°
Lunation: 22.6 days
Illumination: 39.0 %

Frank McCabe

NGC 40

NGC 40, "The Bow Tie Nebula", a planetary nebula in the constellation Cepheus
NGC 40, “The Bow Tie Nebula”, a planetary nebula in the constellation Cepheus

Object Name : NGC 40
Objet Type : Planetary nebula
Location : Melgar de Fernamental ( Spain )
Date : 2014, Septembre 3d
Lunar day 9
Drawing instruments : Graphite pencil , GIMP program to invert the colours
Equipment used : 8″ Newt , Baader ortho classic 6mm , Astronomik UHC filter

The object is easy to find but rather dificult to see , the central star hides the nebula

Clear skies

Gerardo

NGC 6995 (Veil Nebula)

NGC 6995, "The Veil Nebula", a supernova remnant in the constellation Cygnus
NGC 6995, “The Veil Nebula”, a supernova remnant in the constellation Cygnus

Object Name: NGC 6995
Object Type: Supernova Remnant
Location: Morella (Spain)
Date:31/08/2014
Media: white paper, graphite pencil, 7B, HB, scanned and inverted with Paint
Equipment: Newton 8″ + plossl 25mm + OIII filter
Sky Conditions: Clear sky, no light pollution, good seeing and transparency
Notes: Without OIII filter that nebula appears as faint “cloud” at the eyepiece field but I can see some structures along the nebula. Using OIII filter the image is incredible!, I can see much more details and structures and the contrast between the sky and nebula is higher. One of my favourite objects, awesome.

Thank you.

Open Cluster NGC 6940 in Vulpecula

NGC 6940, an open cluster in the constellation Vulpecula
NGC 6940, an open cluster in the constellation Vulpecula

Greetings to all the ASOD community, I share this sketch of a fascinating open cluster in the constellation Vulpecula. It is amazing the eyepiece, lots of stars of various magnitudes with asterisms of all forms in the imagination and also a double star, all accompanied by the gaseous layer that surrounds the star cluster. Very good image even at low power.

Best regards.

Object name: NGC6940
Object type: Open Cluster
Location: Pueblonuevo del bullaque Ciudad Real ( Spain )
Date: 29 August 2014
Hour: 00:00 < 00:00
Media: Graphite pencil, processed and inverted gimp 2.8
Optical equipment: Televue Genesis SDF 101 F 5,4 Eye piece Ethos 8mm
Magnification 67x True field 1,5°
Sky conditions: Transparency 3/5 Seeing 2/5. Temperature 15,9°C / RH 53% SQM 21,40 Bortle 3/9

http://dibujodelcielonocturno.blogspot.com.es/ web site

Crater Gassendi and the northern part of Mare Humorum

Lunar crater Gassendi and the the northern part of Mare Humorum - September 5, 2014
Lunar crater Gassendi and the the northern part of Mare Humorum – September 5, 2014

Here is a sketch of the Moon on the 5th of September from my backyard
in Adelaide, South Australia.

The moons phase was waxing at 83%, with only the very western edge
still in shadow. I observed with a C11 SCT. Seeing was quite
reasonable, so I took a 15mm eyepiece + 2x Barlow for a close look.

The shallow illumination on Mare Humorum made the creases on the mare
floor stand out. Crater Gassendi, toward the bottom, showed stark
shadows. Rimae Hippalus was visible, passing through the partially
submerged crater Hippalus at the top right. Because I used a diagonal
prism, the sketch is mirror imaged.

I used pastel chalks and black and white pastel pencils on black
paper.

-Ivan

Goldilocks & The 3 Sun Bears

Three prominences on the solar limb - September 11, 2014
Three prominences on the solar limb – September 11, 2014

Aloha!

While observing our ever changing Sun today I was struck by a grouping of prominences on the western limb. All of them of high intensity and curving towards the same direction. They made me think of the story of Goldilocks & The 3 Bears!

Cindy (Thia) Krach

Solar Sketch
Black Strathmore Paper
Pastel and colored pencils
60mm Lunt h-Alpha
56X
Maui, Hawaii

Webmaster’s note: Cindy has been instrumental in organizing a new Sketching Observing Award Program for the Astronomical League. Check it out here.

A Little Rose

NGC 2237, a close up of NGC 2244, the Rosette nebula, centered on the well known dark vein
NGC 2237, a close up of NGC 2244, the Rosette nebula, centered on the well known dark vein

Here is a sketch of an observation I did several years ago: NGC 2237, a close up of NGC 2244, the Rosette nebula, centered on the well known dark veins.

Instrument: dobson Obsession 25”, 635mm
eyepieces: nagler 31mm and Panoptic 24mm
power: 100x and 130x
filters: Lumicon OIII 12nm and Astrodon OIII 5nm
sky: SQM 21.15, limit naked eyes 6.4v
place: Observatoire des Baronnies, southern french Alps
length of observation: 107 min

Classic drawing with graphite, and pencil on 180 gr Canson paper, scanned and processed with Paintshop Pro

More details of the Observatory: www.obs-bp.com, of the observation: http://www.deepsky-drawings.com/ngc-2237/dsdlang/fr

Cheers

Bertrand