Category: Nebulae

Big Binocular Orion Nebula

Subject: big binocular M42

Hello Artists,all o.k.?I’m depressed about the weather..i hope in 4 of January for the partial Eclipse of Sun.
I made only one sketch,M42 made with my big bino Astrotech 25×100 behind my home.The night was very icely but the sky was great,the Nebula in the bino was spectacular , in one full field of stars….I hope,next day to continue my sketch with the stars of belt and Flame Nebula.At the end i made one “poster”of Orion!
Happy New Year at all.
Ciao,Giorgio.
.
Location:Pergola,10 December 2010 at 11,45 p.m. l.t.
Instrument: Big bino 25×100 (straight vision)on wood heavi trypod in steady mount
Seeing.Excelent
Temperature:Icely,no wind.
Technics:withe pastel and penn on black paper Fabriano 3.

Revisiting Two Old friends

Hi all,

Tonight I received one of my biggest and most pleasant surprises at the eyepiece. It wasn’t using a half metre + monster, nor from an especially dark site. Rather, it was using my nearly 30 year old 2” f/12 Tasco refractor, and from my home in Sydney!

Over a year ago I purchased an adaptor to allow me to use 1.25” eyepieces with this little refractor, with the idea of one day making it into a finder scope. Tonight I finally got to try it out, and dust off the little refractor after many years of being unused. What I didn’t expect was the image I was to see of M42. Even the eyepiece used was a modest Super Plossl 25mm.

When I first used this little telescope, all I could see of M42 was the inner core nebulosity that surrounds the Trapesium. Tonight, despite the extra light pollution, but with 30 years experience, and I guess better eyepieces than the original, DIDN’T I SEE DETAIL!!

I even managed to see the faint, nebulous glow that makes up the Running Man nebula too.

This is the first sketch I managed to do at the eyepiece, since my meeting with Scott Mellish, nearly 2 months ago!

Scott, many thanks again for showing me your amazing technique. It has changed the way I sketch DSO’s with a pencil, paper and a dry paint brush!

Gear: 2” f/12 thirty year old refractor
Eyepiece: 25mm Super Plossl, 24X
Filter: OIII
Media: white pastel, white and black charcoal on black paper
Date: 30th December 2010
Location: my backyard, Sydney

Alex M.

Head of the Seagull Nebula

Van den Berg 93
aka Sh2-292, RCW 2, Gum 1, the head of the Seagull nebula
emission and reflexion nebula
20’ x 20’ in Monoceros

Date of observation:

14 déc. 2010 02:58 UT

Length of observation:

30 min

Object position:

Alt: 30.1°, Az: 210.5°

Weather conditions:

V0/R10kmh t-4.6° hu56%

Observation conditions:

SQMZ 21.25(MW) SQML 21.11 (?!), FWMH 3.5″, mvl(UMi) 6.4 VI2, 6.6 VI4, T0.5 P1 S5/100 !

Observing site:

Observatoire des Baronnies Provençales (Southern French Alps)

Instrument:

TN 635 Dobson Obsession

Main eyepiece:

Televue Panoptic 24mm / Deepsky filter

Magnification:

130x

Observing notes:
Although my SQM and SQML gave rather low values, the sky was remarquably transparent. Light pollution is totally absent from the Observatoire des Baronnies Provençales, overall excellent conditions to observe a large and faint target.
vdB 93 is an interesting nebula because of its dark lanes from each part of its lighting star. With patience, they can be analysed and sketched with a lot of details.
Numerous stars are scattered in the halo, which presents a beautiful light blue, enhanced by the Deepsky filter.

Clear skies

Bertrand

Gazing at Medusa

Abell 21
PK 205+14.1
SH2-274
Planetary Nebula
Gemini
12/12/10
Ilford NSW Australia
56cm f5 dobsonian telescope
Field: 29′
Magnification: 166x with Oxy III filter
Sky quality meter reading: 21:55

Black Canford paper
White pastel chalk
White oil pencil
Soft white pencil
Paint brush
Blending stump

After three months of dismal wet new moon periods I finally scored two nights of decent conditions. My observing site was quite damp from all the rain and the days were humid, so this conspired to bring out a plague of mosquitoes of biblical proportions, hence I had to put on some repellent whilst out observing. The far northern constellation of Gemini was well placed so I decided to observe a few objects that I had listed. The so called “Medusa Nebula” was one of my first targets and it proved most interesting in the 56cm dob at 166x magnification. This diffuse nebula was visible without an Oxy III filter, but it improved slightly when the filter was inserted. Abell 21 was once thought to be a supernova remnant until Soviet astronomers in the 1970’s proved otherwise. It is a rather large planetary and visually shows no sign in the eyepiece of the braid like filamentary structure evident in images.

Scott Mellish

The Great Gas Nebula in Orion

Hey!

I send you the central part of M. 42, “The great gas nebula in Orion”.
The greenish filaments of gas that surrounds the four stars. Theta Orionis is the most beautiful object you can see in the sky in both small and big telescopes! The central part of the nebula is so bright that it is easily seen with naked eyes in the middle of Orion’s sword.

I made this sketch with crayons (watercolours) on black paper.
The observation from outside Trondheim city, Norway.

Best wishes and dark sky to all artists!! MERRY CHRISTMAS !!

From Per-Jonny Bremseth.

Open Cluster with Heart and Soul Nebulae

The data of the drawing:
NGC 1027

Telescope: 7×50 binocular
Date: 11.25.2010

Observing Location: Zakany – Hungary, 46° 15′ N 16° 57’E elev.: 129m
This digital drawing preparated GIMP 2.6 programs.

Thank you for it!

Clear Sky !

Tamas Bognar

http://tamasasztro.haminfo.hu/

New Necklace Nebula

The Necklace nebula

On 2010 November 3th, Astronomy picture of the day displayed a attractive image of a new discovered nebula called Necklace nebula.
All details can be found at:
http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap101103.html

According to me, nobody had published a drawing of it before.
Therefore, some days after, I tried to have a look at it… and I suceeded, more easely than I thought.

Through my T635 mm dobson Obsession with an Ethos 13mm (240x) and, moreover, an extra-thin OIII filter Astrodon with a 5 nanometers band pass, the nebula was supprisingly analysable, magnitude 14 – 15v estimated.
The shape was elongated, a/b about 1.75, and west part was a bit brighter than opposite, but no bright knot could be identified !
My drawing has been carried out, as usual, from a annotated sketch done under the sky, first with pencil and china ink on an A4 white Canson paper, then inverted and improved through Paint Shop Pro.
See details and notes at www.deepsky-drawings.com.

Regards

Bertrand

P.S. Details of observation:

Object name:

IRAS 19417+1701

Object type:

Unknown

Magnitude:

99.99

RA:

19h 44m 29s

Dec:

17° 10′ 49″ N

Constellation:

SGE

Observation details

Date of observation:

04 nov. 2010 19:33 UT

Length of observation:

62 min

Object position:

Alt: 42.5°, Az: 250.3°

Weather conditions:

14h: J+++ V~0 t19° hu52% T2(?) 20h: N++ V0 t11° hu83% QZ(Cyg)21.22 L60°21.20

Observation conditions:

FWMH1.5″ mvl UMi6.4:VI3, 6.6:VI4! T1.5 P2 S2-3/240 5/519 good conditions.

Observing site:

Mas des Gres (Southern French Alps)

Instrument:

TN 635 Dobson Obsession

Main eyepiece:

Televue Ethos 6mm

Barlow:

(None)

Magnification:

519x

Beauty of the Helix

NGC 7293
Planetary Nebula
The “Helix” Nebula
Aquarius
09/08/10
Ilford NSW Australia
56cm f5 Dobsonian telescope
Field: 29′
Magnification: 166x with Oxy-III filter
Sky Quality Meter reading: 21:52

Black Canford paper
White pastel chalk
White pen
Soft white pen
Cotton bud and paint brush for smudging

I have observed the Helix nebula a number of times over the years but have neglected it since I got my 56cm dob up and running.

I placed a 17mm Nagler in with an Oxy-III filter to give a reasonable field of view.
The Helix was an altogether different observing experience than I last remember, it dominated the eyepiece field and was impressive.

I was glad I called in for the visit.

Scott Mellish.