Category: Inverted

The Double Cluster and a Comet

Object : Comet 103P/Hartley and Open Clusters NGC 884 / NGC 869
Date : October 07, 2010
Time : 19:00-20:00 LST / 02:00-03:00 UT
Location : Wittmann, Arizona USA
Medium : Charcoal pencils, fine markers, painting brush, windows paint for inversion and color touch up, white paper.
Magnitude : comet-( ~7,5 or 8) open clusters combined magnitude of ( 4.2)
Weather : New Moon!, dark and clear skies, no clouds, no winds, ambient temperature of 85 deg. F.

Comments :
I finally gave it a try to sketch this all inclusive view of the Double Cluster and comet Hartley. The naked eye open clusters of NGC 869 and NGC 884 are clearly visible, but the elusive comet 103P/ Hartley is still a bit of a challenge to notice without the aid of binoculars or a rich field telescope. Comet Hartley is so diffused it was reported to have a 31 arcminute coma as of the date of this report. Depending on how much light pollution you are pestered with, that might keep you from seeing the comet in its entirety- or you may be looking at only the brighter portion of the nucleus. Speaking of brightness, I was able to compare its magnitude to some defocused stars nearby and I conclude to estimate it at 7.5 or 8. Obviuosly not a naked eye object, just yet! It would’ve been nice to detect the color but the diffused nature of comet Hartley doesn’t bring out the green hue comets are associated with. Right now only in photographs will you enjoy that treat.

The Double Cluster with an average magnitude of 4.2 is best appreciated under the view of binoculars. From the city, it’s hard to notice the the faint misty glow, but from rural areas, it stand out almost immeadiately if not with averted vision. Through the binoculars or a 4 to 6 inch telescope the clusters show their true beauty. Mostly composed of young blue stars, they also host a sprinkled few orange stars that add to the visual interest. Both are great low magnification targets to be admired. Keep looking, keep sketching, keep submitting, maybe comet Hartley has a surprise for us in the next few weeks!

Dark and clear skies,

Juanchin

Cluster in Cassiopeia

Object Name: M 52 (NGC 7654)
Location: RA 23h 24′ Dec +61º 35′
Type: Open Cluster.
Constellation: Cassiopeia.
Observing Location: Bonilla. Cuenca. SPAIN
Date: October 2, 2010
Time: 23h T.U
Media: graphite pencil on white paper. Image processed with Gimp 2: inverted
and level adjustments.
Telescope: Celestron S/C 8″ Mount Cgt5
Ocular: Hyperion-Aspheric 31 mm, 65X

Spanish-English translation using Google Language Tools:
M 52 is a rich field of stars to be located in the Milky Way. I used the 31
mm eyepiece to capture the beautiful surrounding environment.

More information about the drawing http://astrodibujo.blogspot.com/

Mariano Gibaja

Comet 103P/Hartley

Comet 103P/Hartley is now approaching Earth and increasing brightness but it is not as easy to observe as the 5th or 6th magnitude given by ephemeris suggests. I was able to see the comet on October 7, when it was very close to the Double Cluster (NGC 869-884) in Perseus. With the 120mm refractor I get the best view at 45x: the comet has a big and very diffuse, round coma with a brighter condensation in the central zone. The coma (or comet atmosphere) gets gradually lost in the background sky, so it is difficult to tell its size, but I think It could get close to the size of the full Moon. As other observers have noted, it is visually very similar to big galaxies like M 33 or M 101. Later I could see it with 7×50 binoculars, but with a lot of difficulty and knowing its precise location.

Sketch: 2HB graphite pencil on white paper, scanned and processed with Photoshop Elements 2.0
Object Name: 103P/Hartley
Object Type: Comet
Location: Asturias, Spain
Date: October 7, 2010
Instrument: 120mm f/8.3 refractor + Panoptic 22mm (45x)
NELM: 5.5

Regards,
Diego González

Glorious Orion Nebulae

Observation Notes:

In my ongoing effort to refine my observation and sketches of M42/43, I made a new sketch on January 14. I used most of the previously sketched star field as a starting point so I could spend more time on the nebula. Working within a larger 6 inch circle really helped. The minty green color was striking throughout the nebula, particularly around the trapezium. As for structure, the sketch pretty much tells the story, except for the fact that there was a lot more detail to be squeezed out. I can tell that I’ll be coming back again and again for more.

Object Information:

The Orion Nebula lies 1500 to 1600 light years away and is the brightest diffuse nebula in the sky. It is the brightest portion of a much larger cloud of gas and dust which extends over an area of 10 degrees. This cloud also contains Barnard’s Loop, the Horsehead Nebula and the reflection nebula around M78. The brilliant M42 extends to a diameter of 30 light years.

The incredible complexity of the nebula is so great that various aspects of it have been given some creative names. Some of the more prominent are: Fish’s Mouth = the dark lane extending from the north into the brightest portion of the nebula
Wings = the bright regions to both sides
Trapezium cluster = the bright cluster of stars pointed to by the Fish’s Mouth
The Sword = the wing extension to the south on the east
The Thrust = the bright nebulosity below the Trapezium
The Sail = the fainter western extension

The Hubble Space Telescope discovered dark, protoplanetary discs called Proplyds around the region of the Trapezium. These investigations have shown that the blazing radiation of the Trapezium stars is eroding the Proplyds so that the lower-mass stars forming there may not maintain enough material to form planetary systems.

M42 was discovered by Nicholas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc in 1610, but it seems strange that its nebulosity was not discovered sooner, since it is easily visible to the naked eye. Charles Messier cataloged it in 1769.

Subject M42 (NGC 1976) / M43 (1982)
Classification Diffuse Nebulae
Position Orion: M42: [RA: 05 35 17.2 / Dec: -05 23 27]*
M43: [05 35 31.3 / Dec.: -05 16 03]
Size* M42: 90′ x 60′ / M43: 20′ x 15′
Brightness* M42: 4.0 bMag / M43: 9.0 bMag
Date/Time January 14, 2010 – 10:00 AM
(January 15, 2010 05:00 UT)
Observing Loc. Cinder Hills Overlook, Sunset Crater National Monument, AZ
Instrument Orion SkyQuest XT8 Dobsonian (203 mm dia./1200 mm F/L)
Eyepieces/Mag. 32 mm (37.5X)
Seeing 5/10 Pickering
Transparency Mag 7+ NELM
*Sources DSS; NGCIC Project; SEDS
*Based on published data.

Jeremy Perez

Tale of Two Clusters

I want to post my drawing about two clusters.

Object: VdB-Ha 23 – NGC 2546
Constellation: Puppis
Date: 06. 04. 2010.
Time: 19:07-20:20 UTC
Location: 27 m above sea level next to Kalo Nero, SE Crete, Greece, EU
Instrument: 60/200 Akr., 20 mm Plossl (10x magn.)
Limiting magnitude: better than 6.5

From 2 to 10 april, 2010 have we three amateur astronomers were at Crete to observe the southern deep-sky objects. This is my best sketch. In the middle is the VdB-23 cluster, and right is the NGC 2546.

Gergő Kovács

An Unexpected Sight Close to Alnasl

An unexpected sight close to Alnasl (gamma sgr) and W sgr:
“Black lines coming out of W sgr.

Object Name: Dark lines and NGC 6528 and NGC 6522 (Globular Clusters and Barnards)
Location: Benacebada, Granada (Spain)
Date: 2010.07.10
Media: graphite pencil, white paper.

Telescope: 16″ Dob. The observing conditions: with new moon, the seeing and transparency excellent.

I hope you enjoy it!
Leonor
—
Visita nuestra web de Leonor y Fernando:
www.astronomadas.com

NGC 404 Galaxy in Andromeda

NGC 404 Galaxy in Andromeda

Sketch and Details by Kiminori Ikebe translation by Eiji Kato

2000.11.04 00:12
32cm at 150x

Quite bright and a second-magnitude star in the same field of view does not interfere with observation. Smallish and circular with some elongation. A compact central condensation. The outlying area is diffuse.

Kiminori Ikebe

Light in the Heart of Darkness

Hi gentlemen,
I propose to day not a showpiece, but a part of it: the dark lane of NGC 5128, Centaurus A, aka The radio galaxy.
Most of the time, when they sketch this galaxy, amateur astronomers resume the dark lane by a black and narrow patch, with one or two details.
But if you can observe it through a big scope, under good skies, and at high power, you will discover a world in itself.
A river with a long and narrow island in the middle, several regions where the depth is strong, and consequently the color of the water in these parts totally dark, but other places with shallow water and the bottom visible in more or less grey color.
There are also some isolated settlements with small lights, and even a village with a hazy spot of non resolved lights on the north shore. A strange thing with this river is its two rivermouths, one at each end!
Of course, this is a rather poetic description, where stars are the lights of settlements, the opacity the consequence of the depth of the water, and so and.
But, really, it’s worth it: you might believe it if you stay a long time at the eyepiece, as I did with a 20” Obsession, at Tivoli Lodge, Namibia.
Have a good dream…
Bertrand Laville, from Marseille / France
www.deepsky-drawings.com