Category: diffuse

The Eagle Has Landed

Messier 16
Messier 16 - The Eagle Nebula

Hi all,

HOORAY! A clear dark sky!

This was my first visit to Wiruna, the dark sky site of the Astronomical Society of New South Wales (many thanks to Alex Comino for organizing my stay there 😉 ). This was the stomping ground of Scott Mellish, and it was such a great experience to meet some of his friends up there. He is so sorely missed.

Conditions started marvelously. Using my 17.5” dob, my first squiz of M16, had me gasping “There it is! There’s the Eagle!” So clear was the dark pillar system. So much so that I could also make out the distinct highlighted leading edge of the pillars! Even with an OIII filter! So cool!

This sketch of the Eagle took around two hours to complete.

It was also my first use of another treasure of an eyepiece, a Unitron 16mm Konig eyepiece. What a marvelous eyepiece! Not as long in eyerelief as newer eyepieces, but the image is one of the brightest I’ve seen, and easily has a 70* FOV.

Object: M16, The Eagle Nebula

Scope: 17.5” f/4.5 dob, push pull

Gear: Unitron 16mm Konig, 125X, + OIII filter, 33.6’ AFOV

Date: 2’nd June, 2011

Location: Wiruna, Ilford, Australia

Materials: White pastel, black & white charcoal pencils and white ink on A4 size black paper

Cheers,

Alex M.

17.5″, 3 Hours, and the Eta Carina Nebulae

Hi all,

Scope time has been very scarce this year. This sketch was done in April.

Encouraged by my attempt at Eta Carina through my 8″ dob, I trained my 17.5″ dobbie at the same target, again from Sydney.

This time, I also used my Grand Daddy of all eyepieces, a 35mm Masuyama. A bit long for this f/4.5 scope, but my only OIII filter was a 1.25″.

Eta Carina is not only huge, it is a very busy place. There are multiple shockwaves within it, masses of star formation both just initiated in the form of dark pillars, of those whose nuclear fires have just kicked in, nebulae within nebulae, and a super massive star about to go supernova.

This magnificent NASA site shows all of these details.

Again, the Homunculus Nebula is too small at 57X, but the supermassive star, Eta Carina, it is associated with is the bright reddish one.

Armed with a battery of sketching implements, the result of 3hrs is below. Ooooohhh, I am going to have soooooo much fun redoing this one at a dark sky site!

Scope: 17.5″ f/4.5 dob
Gear: 35mm Masuyama, 57X, OIII filter
Date: April 8, 2011
Location: Sydney
Media: white pastel, white & black charcoal pencils, white chinagraph, white and coloured ink on black A4 size paper

Cheers,

Alex M.

In the Sword of the Hunter

Inverted by webmaster

M42
Diffuse nebula
I did this sketch in my back yard in Vernon B.C. Canada.I live in red zone light polution.
the sketch was made on Jan 9 2011 at 12:20 amPST
I pre loaded the sketching field with Graphite pencil.I made the Nebula with pencil smudged,as well as a blending stump.I have been using a felt tipped pen for my stars ,I am happy witht the results from it.I also used a kneedable erasor to remove the dark dust lane from between M42 and M43.

Tha sketch was made with an 8″ Dob with a 7mm Pentax XW 171X

Thanks
John Karlsson

Nebula and Open Cluster in the Unicorn

Object Name: NGC 2264
Type: Nebula and Open Cluster
Constellation: Monoceros.
Observing Location: Bonilla. Cuenca. SPAIN.
Date: February 5, 2011
Material used: graphite pencil on white paper. Sketch processed with Photoshop.
Telescope: Celestron S/C 8″ Mount Cgt5
Eyepiece: 13 mm Hyperion (155X).
MALE: 5,7 Temp.: 1ºC

More information about the sketch and NGC 2264 in:
http://astrodibujo.blogspot.com/

M42 and Her Companions

Object Name M42, M43 and NGC1977
Object Type Emission and Reflection Nebulaes
Location Budy Dłutowskie (near Lodz) in Poland
Date 01:00, 13th of November 2010
Media (graphite pencil, white paper, color invert)
Equipment: Binocular Celestron Skymaster 25×100
Observing conditions: Seeing 4/5; low light pollution (naked eye range – 6,2 mag)
Hi !
This is sketch of Messier 42 (Great Orion Nebula) and her companions M43 and ‘The Running Man’ (NGC 1977) in Orion Constellation.
During the observation through this big bino, arms of M42 are clearly visible. Structures inside the nebula are also visible but they are really really faint.
M43 and NGC 1977 are shapeless, lighter areas around nebulas central stars.

Greetings,
Łukasz

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

Barnard’s Loop, IC 434, M 42

Barnards Loop
Barnard’s Loop, IC 434, M 42 (on GUIDE paper)
Sketch by János Gábor Kernya

Object: Barnard’s Loop, IC 434, M 42 (on GUIDE paper)
Date: 2010.03.18/19
UT.: 19h49m – 20h44m
Equipment: 50/200 Stellarvue achromat + amici p. + Thousand Oaks H-Beta filter
Mag.: 6x
S = 5-6 / 10
T = 4 / 5
Observer: János Gábor Kernya
Location: Sükösd, Hungary

The Flame and the Horsehead

IC 434 and Vicinity
IC 434, B 33, NGC 2023 and NGC 2024
Sketch and Details by János Gábor Kernya

Object: B 33 + IC 434 + NGC 2023 + NGC 2024 diffuse nebula (Ori)
Date: 2009. 11. 12/13.
UT.: 22h32m – 02h07m
Equipment: 305/1525 Dobsonian reflector
Mag.: 48x
FOV: 52’ + 52’
S = 2-3 / 10
T = 4 / 5
Observer: János Gábor Kernya
Location: Sükösd, Hungary

Sketch of IC 434.: Thousand Oaks H-Beta filter
Sketch of NGC 2024: without filter

Unsheathing the sword

Orion's Sword

Orion’s Sword: NGC 1980, Messier 42 and 43, NGC 1977, NGC 1981
Sketch and Details by Peter Mayhew
Move cursor over image to view labels.

Location: York, UK
Date: 17th January 2010

How do you do justice to Orion’s sword? Whilst photography can reveal what the eye cannot see, it cannot easily record what the eye does see. Here is my attempt at the winter showpiece of the Northern skies. The more you linger and let the photons work over your retina, the more shades of grey and ripples of dark and light emerge: the scene really sucks you in. The sketch covers two degrees of arc top to bottom, and I viewed through a 25mm eyepiece on my Skywatcher Skyliner 152mm f8 Dobsonian, which gives a field of view of about half the sketch. The sketch was done in graphite pencil on white paper at the eyepiece and then scanned and inverted. Labels added later.