Category: Inverted

A 25 Million Year Old Announcement

Last week the supernova SN 2011dh in M 51 galaxy was near its maximum brightness around magnitude 12.3 and I was able to observe it with my 120mm refractor. The two famous interacting galaxies are very well placed in the sky these days. At the eyepiece, the main galaxy has a bright central region and a big, oval halo; the satellite galaxy has a nearly as bright core but a small and round halo. I needed 77x to spot the supernova in the southeast rim of the main galaxy, although the best view of it was at 149x. At this magnification the supernova was easily visible next to a fainter star. The sketch is a composite of both magnifications. It was remarkable that the supernova was visible even in late twilight conditions. SN 2011dh is a type IIb supernova that resulted from the explosion of a supergiant star with 18-22 solar masses, at a distance of 25 million light years. What a sight!

Sketch: 2HB graphite pencil on white paper, scanned and processed with Photoshop CS3
Object Name: The Whirlpool Galaxy (M51) and SN 2011dh
Object Type: Galaxy and supernova
Location: Asturias, Spain
Date: June 19th, 2011
Instrument: 120mm f/8,3 refractor + Hyperion 13mm (45x) & UWA 6.7mm (149x)
NELM: around 5.2, moderate light pollution

Regards,
Diego González

Golden Ringed Planet

Object Name: Saturn, Titan (T), Iapetus (J), Dione (D) and Rhea (R)

First Sketch:
CM1317,8º / CM2184,7º / CM3 319,1º
Rings: B = 10º
Location: Itajobi, SP, Brazil (backyard, downtown)
W49º03′ / S21º19′ / +460m
Date: December 27, 2010 – 06h30min (U.T.)
Seeing: 5/5 (Great!)
Telescope: reflecting 180mm / 1080mm (f6) dob mounted
Eyepieces: SP 32mm; SP 10mm; SP 6mm; 2,5x Barlow. No filter employed.
Media: graphite pencil on white paper, scanned then inverted and colors edited
Observer: Rodrigo Pasiani Costa

I spent that whole night observing the sky from backyard, and one of my targets was Saturn. Despite the clouds, the seeing and transparency were great, so I could see Saturn like never before (450x without any loss). Both the shadows of the rings on the globe and the shadows of the globe over the rings were clearly seen, splitting one another. The Cassini Division could be seen in both ends of the rings, but the difference in the outer ring color was not notable. A dark stripe crossed the planet, fading yet very remarkable. Another shy dark stripe intended to follow the first one, however was not able to cross the hole bright disc. Two of its moons were visible. In fact, Iapetus was probably visible too, however it was far away from the planet, and I missed it.
The next night it rained a lot, and I spent it doing something else. The following three nights the sky was clear again, and I could observe Saturn and its moons. I made this four sketches (in second picture) to show the dance of the moons around Saturn, all made at the same hour, during four days. Follow the sequence:
a) December 27, 2010
b) December 29, 2010
c) December 30, 2010
d) December 31, 2010
I hope you enjoy it, it was really pleasant to observe Saturn last summer.

Rodrigo Pasiani Costa

Luna Occults the Seven Sisters

Hey Artists!

I must show you an occultation of the Pleiades by the moon. This was the finest one
I have seen to now!
One by one of these bright “Seven Sisters” stars disappeared behind the dark limb
of the moon. The cresent with earthshine was very beautiful to see in the scope with
low power (50x). Just after the occultations, I made this sketch.
Info on the sketch. I used pen and pencil on white paper and inverted.
Observation was made from Trondheim, Norway.

Best wishes from Per-Jonny Bremseth.

Messier 62 in Ophiuchus

Hello,

I’d like to share my sketch with you.
Object Name: Messier 62
Object Type: Globular Cluster
Location: Poltava, Ukraine (49.52N, 34.57E)
Date: 2011 Jun 04/05
Media: graphite pencil on white paper, photographed and inverted colours, some post-processing in ACDSee
Comments:
viewed with 20×90 binoculars;
Bortle class 5, no significant light pollution in southern direction;
clear skies, very good transparency, however some haze above the horizon might be existed, ZNELM near 6.1 mag;
the object is not so easy for my latitude, rising no higher than 10 degrees

—
Sincerely,
Roman Kostenko
Society of amateur astronomers in Poltava, Ukraine
—
mailto:poltava-astro@yandex.ua
website http://astronomy.pl.ua

M92 Undervalued Younger Sister

Hallo!
This is my sketch of Messier 92 – globular cluster in Hercules. It > is undervalued younger sister of great M13 😉
But very intersting.

Object: Messier 92
Date: May 27, 2011.
Place: Banica, Poland
Equipment: SCT 5″ with SWAN 20mm
Magnification: 62,5x
Media: Graphite pencil, inverted, tooling with PS
Author: Aleksaner Cieśla (Wimmer)

Small, Bright Ball in the Scorpion

Greetings!
This is my sketch of Messier 80 – globular cluster in Scorpion. In my 5″ scope cluster is small and dense.
Cluster has interesting bright core.

Object: Messier 80
Date: May 26, 2011.
Place: Banica, Poland
Equipment: SCT 5″ with SWAN 20mm
Magnification: 62,5x
Media: Graphite pencil, inverted, tooling with PS
Author: Aleksaner Cieśla (Wimmer)