Category: interacting

Magnitude 13.4 and Rising

Object names: SN2011by, NGC 3972, NGC 3977
Object types: supernova, galaxy, galaxy pair
Location: Cherry Springs Dark Sky Park, Pennsylvania
Date: May 5, 2011
Media: digital

Notes
16” Dobsonian, 75-300x. The supernova SN2011by is the brightest star in the field. It is superimposed on the NE edge of the elongated galaxy NGC 3972, just to the left of the galaxy’s core in the drawing. The round galaxy is NGC 3977, in which recorded supernovae occurred in 1946 and 2006.

As of this writing, supernova 2011by is still the brightest currently in the sky, and still rising at magnitude 12.5. The magnitude in the sketch title refers to the time of my observation. It is in NGC 3972 right next to Gamma Ursae Majoris. This is very nice intermediate-inclination spiral that I saw last year with my 4”. I still retain the mental image of a nicely elongated blob. It can now serve me as something that supernova photographers would call the “pre-discovery image.” SN2011by was discovered at the end of April. At the redshift distance of NGC 3972 (46 Mly) it should become mag. 11.5, according to my rough calculations, and at the mean Tully-Fisher distance from NED (18 Mpc) it should still become 12.0. I.e. it might become a worthy target for “department-store scopes.”

I was curious about the structure in the host galaxy, which is featured in The de Vaucouleurs Atlas as a paradigmatic SA(s)bc. The southwest edge, which is opposite the supernova, is the one closest to us, judging by the photos. I thought that with some appropriate effort expended, the arm running along this edge and even some enhancements in it could potentially be visible in a 16”. But, somewhat disappointingly, all I could see was this edge being sharper than the one with the supernova. The view was essentially identical under a range of magnifications from 100 to 300x. On the other hand, this means that my “post-discovery image” (the view through the 16″) is only subtly different from my “pre-discovery image” (last year’s view throught the 4″), as far as the galaxy itself is concerned.

The field overall is very impressive. Not to mention the supernova, the elongation and asymmetry of NGC 3972 have their counterpoint in the perfect roundness of its apparent companion, NGC 3977. Unlike NGC 3972, this face-on spiral could not be just casually swept up last year with the 4”, and I did not stop to look for it then. NGC 3977 itself was host to two recorded supernovae, 1946A and 2006gs. About them I can only find that 2006gs reached mag 17. The only distance for NGC 3977 in NED is by redshift, 263 Mly. This is far indeed – 5 times farther than NGC 3972, adding to the perceived depth of this remarkable field.

At the eyepiece, I make a schematic in ball pen that records the essential information about positions, sizes, and the contrast, and concentrate on preserving my dark adaptation and building the mental image instead of detailed sketching. Subsequently I use a pressure- and tilt-sensitive digital pen tablet to simulate pencil, blender, and other traditional tools, to create the clean digital drawing, concentrating on conveying the visual appearance of stars and nebulosity.

Well Tuned Antennae

Object Name: NGC 4038/9
Also Known As: H.IV.28, Arp 244, the Antennae, Ring Tail Galaxies
Object Type: Interacting Galaxy Pair
Constellation: Corvus
Right Ascension (2000.0): 12h 01m 53.2s
Declination (2000.0): –18° 52′ 38″
Magnitude: 10.7
Dimensions: 4.5′ x 3.6′
Hubble Class: S?/pec
Distance: 63 million light years
Discovery: William Herschel on 7 February 1785 with 18.7-inch reflector
NGC Description: 4038 – pB, cL, R, vgbM; 4039 – pF, pL

Telescope: Parks Astrolight EQ6 • 6″ f/6 Newtonian Reflector
Eyepiece/Magnification: 7.5mm Parks Gold Series Plössl • 120x • 26′ Field of View
Filter: None
Date/Time: 30 April 2011 • 04:15-05:00 UT
Observing Location: Oakzanita Springs, Descanso, San Diego Co., California, USA
Transparency: NELM 6.2; TLM 14.2
Seeing: Pickering 7-8
Conditions: Clear, calm, cold, humid

This interacting galaxy pair is best located about 50 arc minutes NNE of the fifth magnitude star HD 104337, the brightest star on the western border of Corvus. While you are in the area you might do well to look for NGC 4027 30′ NW of HD 104337 and NGC 3981 68′ WSW of that star. The Antennae would be a challenging target for binocular observers.

At 30x magnification, this galaxy pair appears as a soft asymmetric patch of nebulosity, larger and brighter toward the north, smaller and fainter toward the south, but with no other details readily visible. Another soft, featureless patch of nebulosity may be glimpsed in the same field of view, 42′ away to the SW; this is NGC 4027, an 11th magnitude barred spiral galaxy and a fine target in its own right.

At 60x magnification, the Antennae or Ringtail galaxies are clearly resolved as two separate (though attached) objects. Together they look like a lopsided heart or a bloated “V”, with occasional glimpses of mottling across the face of the nebulosity. At 120x magnification the western rim (shaped like a backward “S”) of the pair is clearly brighter and more distinct than the rest of the object. During moments of good seeing this bright rim breaks into several distinct knots. The central region of NGC 4038 appears almost hollow by comparison; perhaps this is why Herschel catalogued this object as a planetary nebula. Averted vision revealed occasional glimpses of the base of the southern tail.

At 120x magnification NGC 4038 and NGC 4039 share the 26′ field of view with 9th-magnitude TYC 6097-326-1, white, about 6.5′ NW, 10th-magnitude TYC 6097-415-1, orange-red, about 9.5′ S, 11th-magnitude TYC 6097-619-1, yellow-white, about 10.8′ NE, 11th-magnitude TYC 6097-288-1, yellow-orange, about 13′ NNW, and 11th-magnitude TYC 6097-629-1, yellow, about 12.5′ NW. The remaining field stars are in the 12-14 magnitude range.

The sketch presented here depicts the view at high magnification (120x). The sketch has been rotated so that north is up and west is to the right. The sketch was executed with a No. 2 mechanical pencil with 0.5 mm lead, and two blending stumps (8948B, 8941B) on 100 lb. white card stock. The original drawing measures 7½ inches across.

This observation was made from a reasonably dark site (borderline blue-green on LP maps) at an elevation above 4,000 feet. The NELM was estimated at 6.2, the TLM at 14.2 in the vicinity of the target. The seeing conditions were above average (Pickering 7-8), but the humidity was quite high and care had to be taken to prevent dew from accumulating on optics and sketching materials. The temperature was 37°F. The air was very still and the high magnification views very steady.

Connecting the Two Galaxies

Object Name (M51)
Object Type (Galaxy)
Naxxar, Malta
April 2nd, 2011 @ 22:38UT
Graphite pencil, charcoal, blenders, white paper, scanned and inverted using GIMP)

M51 under averted vision.
200mm SCT, f/10, 25mm, eyepiece, 81x, binoviewer, light pollution filter.

On April 2nd, 2011 I spent an hour observing this magnificent Messier object. I have produced the sketch using graphite pencils and blenders on white paper, scanned and inverted the digital image using GIMP. It is based on the intensity sketch shown below drawn at the eyepiece under averted vision.

I wanted to portray the ‘ghostly’ appearence of the two galaxies to mimic the actual eyepiece view. Most of the observing time was spent detecting under averted vision the very faint streak that connects the two galaxies as well as the spiral arms.

Somewhere in Big Bear

Hi,

In attachment you can find sketch of famous pair of galaxies M81 & M82

Short description:

Object Name M81 – spiral galaxy & M82 – spiral galaxy with bar. Both in Ursa Major
Object Type galaxies
Location Budy Dłutowskie – small village in central Poland
Date 08.02.2011
Media graphite pencil, white paper, color invert
Telescope ATM ATROBINO (two Newtonians 165/650) + two TV Plossl 20mm eyepieces
Seeing 5/5
Transparency 4/5
NELM 6 mag

This time I have some kind of classic 🙂 Famous galaxies M81 & M82 in Ursa Major.
I observed it through the ATM ASTROBINO (two connected newtonians 165/650). It is great instrument for this kind of objects under dark sky.
Both galaxies were clearly visible with some details in Cigar (some “shadows” in the structure) . M81 – disk with brighter core, no more details observed.

Clear sky
Łukasz

Exploding with Detail

M82 is also cataloged as Arp 337, which is a good indication that there’s something unusual about its shape and means that interesting things are going on here. Indeed, it’s an especially vigorous starburst galaxy and has a bi-polar outflow from it core region that’s clearly depicted in many high quality images. This galaxy has a high surface brightness and is well seen in almost (any) size telescope, but the outflow is difficult to see except in silhouette to the brighter galaxy in the background. I was fortunate to have a particularly nice view of this energetic galaxy on February 25, 2011, and what follows is an account of my observation and sketch:

A rare clear February night – on a Friday no less – graced Oregon skies on the 25th so I headed out to my good friend Chuck’s place in the Coast Range mountains west of Portland for a few hours of observing. When I got there I was treated to a pristine, unspoiled and completely overcast sky – what?! It was perfectly clear when I left home for crying out loud! A solitary cloud sprang up right over Chuck’s place late in the day, and even though I saw it forming I was sure it would clear off by dark. Nope.

After waiting a couple of hours the sky started to clear. Feeling optimistic I set up my 28 inch f/4 scope – Chuck’s scope was already patiently waiting under a tarp – and by the time I was ready the sky was 100% clear. Sometimes we get lucky! There was about 4 or 5 inches of snow except on the gravel driveway – fortunately the snow there had melted earlier in the day.
After trying out my new DGM NPB filter on M42 – most excellent – I eventually settled on sketching M82. The conditions were quite nice with surprisingly good transparency and seeing. SQM readings were in the 21.25 to 21.35 range for most of the night. Temperatures fell slowly until a low of 17F at 2am when we called it a night. The Moon was coming up about then and revealed high clouds covering most of the sky, so we had gotten the best part of the night. More good luck.

As soon as I got M82 in the scope it was immediately apparent how good the conditions were because the galaxy was “exploding” with detail. I kept putting on more magnification, and until I got to 816x I kept seeing more internal detail. Most of my sketch was done at 408x and I used higher powers to help confirm some of the smaller and more difficult details. The most pleasing view was at 408x anyway so I really enjoyed the process of making this sketch. Chuck came over and soaked in the view for a while and agreed it was one of the better views he’d had of M82 too.

As always, I saw more than expected simply because I put a good effort into sketching. I don’t recall seeing the small details near the core on either side of the dividing central dark lane before but they sure stood out well tonight. I was also surprised how little the NPB and OIII filters dimmed this galaxy. The filters didn’t reveal other details, M82 just didn’t dim as much as most galaxies do.

The sketch is a result of about 90 minutes active drawing at the eyepiece and then I cleaned it up a bit the next day before inverting it. I used an HB lead pencil and an eraser for the original sketch. I tried a slight variation of my usual technique – I had a piece of stiff cardboard behind the page of my notebook I was drawing in and that gave me a little more control over my sketch. I’m impressed by the result because the raw sketch was much nicer looking in the light of day then normal. It could be a fluke, but I’ll keep at it until I know for sure.

Howard Banich

The Large Magellanic Cloud

The Large Magellanic Cloud
Dorado/Mensa
01/02/11
Ilford NSW Australia
Televue 76mm Apo refractor
Field: 317′
Magnification: 31x
Sky quality meter reading: 21:77

Black Canford paper
White pen
White pencil
Paint brush
White pastel chalk
White pastel pencil

If there is ever an excuse to expound the virtues of a fine quality rich field refractor, then a wide field panorama of the LMC would have to be it.
I have had a number of people just “blown away” by the experience of virtually capturing the entire vista of this magnificent dwarf galaxy in the one field that
I decided whenever the time was right, I will have to attempt a sketch.

The 31mm Nagler I used for this effort was almost as big as the telescope, but the view it gives is a truly noble experience.

At the top of the sketch and very conspicuous is the Tarantula Nebula (NGC 2070).
The rest of the field is strewn with a plethora open clusters and nebulosity to numerous to mention here.

The sketch took quite some time to complete and was very tedious.
However it can never replace the actual visual splendor of this object.

The Large Magellanic Cloud was first mentioned in literature as far back as 964AD.
Amerigo Vespucci recorded observations of it in 1503-04.

Ferdinand Magellan during his voyage in 1519 noted it, and it now bears his name.

The LMC was home to supernova 1987A, the only naked eye supernova visible for over 400 years.

Scott Mellish

The Big Cigar

Hi!
Messier 82 (the Cigar) is the smaller member of the Bode’s Galaxy pair.

About 600 million years ago a Cigar ‘s brother (M81 Galaxy) destroyed
regularity of the galactic-structure, by his strong gravity

Due to their proximity a millions of stars explode as supernovae,
ejecting a huge quantity of matter in the tens of thousands light years
away,
Las night I saw this deformed galaxy with magnification 165 x. The Cigar
like high power and need a good seeing and contrast. So I used 11
“Schmidt – Cassegrain on CGEM mount and the Sky-watcher eyepiece.
This sketch represent more than 40 minutes of staring at the white line
in the dark.

Yours sincerely Robert

Object Name: The Big Cigar
Object Type (Galaxy)
Location (Oborniki, suburbia, Poland)
Date (08-02-2011)
Equipment: 11” Schmidt – Cassegrain on CGEM, SWA SW 17mm
Autor: Ignisdei (Robert Twarogal)