Charcoal – Astronomy Sketch of the Day

Posidonius Area

Hi all,

Friday evening just before the altocumulus clouds of the approaching depression covered the sky, I could do another sketch of the moon: This time it was crater Posidonius and its surroundings.

Ah, by the way, this time I tried a new pen: For the bright areas (e. g. the western rims of Posidonius A and J), I took a whitecoal pen instead of chalk pen. That provided much brighter contrast.

Another novelty for me: I didn’t use a diagonal but an Amici prism, so that the view in the eyepiece wasn’t mirrored at all. The view was a bit less bright, but for the moon it’s still bright enough.

Object Name: Posidonius
Object Type: Lunar Crater
Location: Germany, Dusseldorf area
Date: 2015-04-24, 2130-2205 CEST
Media: chalk pastel pencil, whitecoal pencil and charcoal pencil on black sketching cardbox
Telescope: Celestron Nexstar 127 SLT
Eyepiece: TS HR Planetary 7mm

Clear skies

Achim

Sirsalis & Damoiseau Craters

Aloha,

I submit my most recent lunar sketch of Sirsalis & Damoiseau Craters at the western limb of the moon. What a wonderful area to explore with interesting concentric craters of Damoiseau & the double crater of Sirsalis at this angle of light. Unseen Grimaldi is in the darkness to the west.

Object: Lunar craters Sirsalis & Damoiseau @ ~13 days lunation
Telescope: 12.5” Portaball 9mm Nagler 169X
Location: Maui Hawaii, 4000 ft elevation
Date: 2/4/12 7:45pm
Medium: Black art paper, white & black charcoal

Thia Krach

Solar Serpent

Solar Filament & Prominence - 26 April 2015 — Solar Filament & Prominence – 26 April 2015

Aloha!

I was delighted this morning to find this dark and large filament at the north-eastern limb of our Sun. It had the appearance of a large serpent with foot like projections anchoring it to the solar surface and then visible curving around the limb. The filament is magnetic curtains of plasma hovering over the Sun’s surface, this an especially large and detailed one. I read on the Spaceweather site that the length of the filament would measure the distance from the Earth to the Moon. That’s one big serpent!

Solar Filament & Prominence
h-alpha 60mm Lunt 35x
Maui, Hawaii
4/26/15 0800-0845 HST
Black Strathmore Artagain Paper
White Conte’ Crayon & charcoal pencils, black & white
Photoscape Software to colorize, Photoshop Software to reduce size

Cindy L. Krach
Haleakala Amateur Astronomers

Copernicus Crater

Object Name: Copernicus Crater
Object Type: Lunar Crater
Location: Ottawa, ON, Canada
Date: 2 May 15
Media: Vine charcoal background, graphite pencil for the crater

I am very new at sketching, this being the first one I’d consider worthy of uploading. It was drawn from a photo of Copernicus crater I brought up on my computer screen as practice for the sketching course I’m currently taking. I’m still struggling to convey a sense of depth, as well as develop a rapid technique that I will need when I am at the eyepiece of my telescope.

Lunar Crater Gassendi

Crater Gassendi - 31 January 2015 — Crater Gassendi – 31 January 2015

Hi all,

tonight I had a look outside and – yeah, no clouds and clear skies.

So I took out the 10″ f/5 truss dobsonian and prepared for lunar sketching: Today the floor-fractured crater Gassendi attracted me and presented nice central peaks and its rimae on its ground.

Telescope: 10″ f/5 Martini Dobsonian

Eyepiece: Skywatcher Planetary 5mm

Date & Time: Jan 31st, 2015 / 1925-2015 CET

Place: home terrace, Dusseldorf region, Germany

Technique: chalk, charcoal and white pastel on black sketching cardbox paper

Hope you like the sketch.

Clear skies!

Achim

Flaming Star Nebula

C31 IC 405 Flaing Star Nebulawordssmaller

Aloha,

IC 405, Caldwell 31 or the Flaming Star Nebula is an emission/reflection nebula that requires darkness and patience to pull details out. A 12.5” reflector was used here to observe and a NPB filter from DMG optics helpful. I observed & sketched the same object 3 years ago and didn’t see the details visible this time around. I would partly account this to gaining greater ability from sketching the object again with more patience this time around.

Proper motion studies of AE Auriga show it to be an ejected star from the Orion Belt region. Its chance passage through this nebulous region of gas & dust give it a “Flaming Star” appearance.

Heavyweight white paper, 2B pencil, charcoal and brush.
Photoscape to invert
12.5” Portaball 80X
NPB DMG Optics Filter

Cindy (Thia) Krach
Maui, Hawaii

The Horsehead Area with a RFT

Object name: IC434, B33, Horsehead Nebula
Object type: dark nebula
Location: Cottage Grove Lake, Oregon
Date: Feb 21, 2015
Media: charcoal and graphite pencils on drawing paper, scanned to jpg

Telescope: 13.2 inch [34cm] f/3.0 on a night of incredible transparency
Eyepiece: 21mm Ethos giving a 1.8 degree field of view
Filter: H-Beta

Mel Bartels

Comparison of Two Sketches of Atlas and Hercules

Yesterday evening I could sketch the wonderful pair of craters Atlas and Hercules with charcoal and chalk on black cardbox. This was the second sketch I did of these craters. I had a look into my archive and compared the current sketch with the one done on May last year.

Both sketches have been done with my 5” Celestron MAK. What we can see is the different lighting conditions based on moon age and libration. Furthermore, the seeing conditions last time have been much better than yesterday – I could not go up to 300x yesterday but had to leave it with the 7mm EP.

Clear skies!

Achim

Thor’s Helmet – a Magnificent Apparition

Thor's Helmet - NGC 2359 — Thor’s Helmet – NGC 2359

Hello all,

One thing all astronomers chase is ideal atmospheric conditions. An apparently clear night can present poor transparency or poor seeing due to thermal energy high up in the atmosphere. But every now and then, ideal or even very close to ideal conditions do present themselves, and it gives us the finest view of the heavens.

Such conditions presented themselves to me on the night of January 18.

My first view of Thor’s Helmet, NGC 2359, was four years ago during the Ice In Space Astro Camp. My view of it seemed to me to be a fine one. So much so it inspired me to sketch it straight away! Four years later, presented with a night of exceptional transparency, I revisited Thor’s Helmet as it was right on zenith for me.

WOW! What an image! This night Thor’s Helmet had nebulosity extending in four different directions, not just the two from my first view. So much more structure was apparent, and the nebulosity extended so much further, and so many more stars were visible too.

I’ve also included an image of the sketch I did of Thor’s Helmet in 2011 for comparison. It is this way that the full impact of the differences in conditions between the two nights can be appreciated.

I hope you enjoy this sketch.

Alex.

Object: Thor’s Helmet, NGC 2359
Scope: 17.5” push-pull Karee dob
Gear: 30mm 82° Explore Scientific, 91X, OIII filter
Date: 18th January, 2015
Location: Katoomba Airfield, Australia
Media: White soft pastel, charcoal and white ink on A4 size black paper
Duration: approx. 1hr.

Craters Ptolemaeus, Alphonsus and Arzachel

Hi,

Here’s my lunar sketch of today.
Object Name: Ptolemaeus, Alphonsus and Arzachel
Object Type Lunar Craters
Location: Home terrace, Dusseldorf region, Germany
Date: Oct 1st, 2014, 1930-2000 CEST
Media: charcoal and white pastel on black cardbox
Clear skies!

Achim