Arp 206, an irregular galaxy in the constellation Leo MinorDetail sketch showing the nomenclature and location of the components of the Arp 206 system
Dear All,
I grabbed an observation of a real cracking Arp galaxy in Leo Minor before work this morning at 05.30am. The sky was the most transparent that I have enjoyed in 2014 thus far.
I hope that my sketch and detail map of Arp 206 are of interest?
The naked eye view of the Sun through solar eclipse glasses and detailed view of AR 2214 through a refractor telescope with a white light filter – November 20, 2014
Object Name (Sun)
Object Type (Sun photosphere)
Location (Artignosc-sur-Verdon/France )
Date (2014/11/20)
Media (graphite pencil (sketrch down) and watercolor (full sun up) on white paper, Paint.net)
The old sunspot 2192 is now making its second pass across the face of our sun with a new number : 2214.
It’s the first time that I can see a spot naked-eye after a complete sun rotation. For the inverted watercolour shown here up, I use special glasses for eclipse, the orange color is this of my glasses, you can see some mist in the foreground meaning that the conditions were not perfect. For the telescope view I use a white light objective filter, I add an orange color layer after scanning.
Messier 6, “The Butterfly Cluster” in the constellation Scorpius
Butterfly Cluster M6
Open Cluster
Hartesbeespoort Dam South Africa
28th October (2014)
Graphite Pencil, smartphone photo using the invert function on PS phone app.
In Southern Skies at the moment and made the most of the opportunity to sketch some really nice deep sky objects in and around the teapot including M7 and the Lagoon Nebula (with Mars adjacent to it)
NGC 281, “The Pacman Nebula”, an emission nebula in the constellation Cassiopeia
We organised about one month ago a nice starparty on a location about 40 minutes driving east of Brussels. The skies cleared up (not common this time of the year …) and we enjoyed the splendid autumn sky under quite dark conditions.
My observation list included a mixture of IC, NGC and Hickson objects, with The Pacman Nebula (NGC 281) in Cassiopeia as main objective of the night. Hereby the results of more that one hour of observation and searching subtle details with averted vision in this beautiful object.
Details:
* Object Name : Pacman Nebula (NGC 281)
* Location : Meldert – Belgium
* Date : 18 October 2014 – 22h55 UT
* Optics: SCT C11 (279mm f/10) on CGEM mount – ES82 34mm (82x – FOV 50 arcm) – Astronomik UHC filter
* Sky conditions: NELM 5.9 – SQM 20.32 – Seeing 2/5 – Transp. 2/5 (Antoniadi)
* Media : Media: graphite pencil on white paper, scanned and inverted (GIMP2)
Observing notes:
Beautiful emission nebula complex, subtle but surprisingly easy visible. A bright oval patchy area is visible in the central area, just east of a smal rich star cluster. Averted vision brings a clear bright extension towards the west with a large subtle patchy glow in the northern area. At the southwestern side the nebula is less bright, with a faint glow extending towards the south. A dark lane can be detected using averted vision, resembling a “byte” in the central area and extending towards the west.
NGC 253 (Caldwell 65) aka “The Silver Coin Galaxy” is located in the constellation Sculptor
NGC 253: Sculptor Galaxy
This galaxy in Sculptor is commonly known as the Silver Coin galaxy and is designated NGC 253 (Caldwell 65). It is a beautiful, large, bright galaxy with a mottled appearance and known to be producing huge numbers of new stars. This spiral galaxy is about 12 million light years away from us and glows at visual magnitude 8.
This target is located at: R.A. 00 hrs. 47.5 min. Dec. -25° 17’
This is a must sketch target.
Sketching:
Time: 12:15 am – 11:30 am local time October 17, 2014
Location: Mesa, Arizona
Telescope: 10” f/4.5 Orion Newtonian with a 13mm Hyperion eyepiece for 88 x
White sketching paper 8.5” x 12”, graphite pencils 6B, 4B, 2B, blending stumps
Sketch inverted after scanning.
The Rabbit on the Moon, a naked eye sketch showing a commonly recognized pattern – November 5, 2014
Rabbit On The Moon
Lunar Observing Pattern
Pilanesberg Game Reserve South Africa
5th November
Jet Black Canford Paper with White Pastel Pencil. Used a smartphone to take a picture and crop.
Sketched on holiday in South Africa – The ‘Rabbit on the Moon’ pattern really jumps out at you from Southern Skies and creates a whole new observing experience if you are used to the Northern hemisphere.
Solar prominences and filaments on and near the limb – November 16, 2014Solar prominences and filaments on and near the limb (colorized) – November 16, 2014
Aloha!
Another Sunday morning spent happily with the Sun. Today the first prominence that struck me was one that had the appearance of a very fine “tree” near a “bridge”. The details & seeing were excellent today and I could make out swirling and looping details within the prominence, a lacy network of light and dark. The prominence could be seen spilling onto the solar surface as a filament.
I usually just cant leave done alone, so I tried some different things to colorize and experimented with Photoscape software. I fell upon the magic button – something called color balance. What fun to add color and see more of what I observed in the eyepiece!
Solar Prominence
Lunt 60mm PT
14mm & 6mm
11-16-14
Maui, Hawaii
Black Strathmore paper, Conte’ white crayons and watercolor pencils
Photoscape Software
IC 59 and 63, “The Ghost of Cassiopeia”, emission and reflection nebulae in the constellation Cassiopeia
Object Name: IC59 & 63
Object Type: bright nebula
Location : Altpernstein / Austria
Date : 14/11/2014
Media :graphite pencil, black paper
observed with dobson Starsplitter II 18″ with UHC filter and 19mm Panoptic (105x)
SQM: 21.1
Messier 29, an open star cluster in the constellation Cygnus
I was watching around Cygnus and ran into M29. I found the surroundings were as spectacular as the cluster, so I opened the field and started to draw keeping the cluster to the right.
Object Name: M29 – The cooling Tower NGC6913
Object Type: Open Cluster
Constellation: Cygnus A.: 20h 23m 56s; Dec: +38° 31.4′
Location: Pelayos de la Presa – Madrid – Spain.
Date: October 18th 2014 22:30 h.(CET)
Temperature: 15 ºC
Seeing: 3/5
Telescope: Celestron nexstar 5′ S/C.
Eyepiece: 25 mm celestron
Magnification: 50x
Media: Graphite pencil on white paper. Scanned and then inverted and processed image with GIMP
