Tropo-Bob
01-04-2018, 07:54 PM
I have been in this game for over 50 years now and there are still some significant gaps in my knowledge. Its time I covered these before I get too old!
So, inspired by Joe & Eugene's methodological approach of looking at doubles, I am developing an organised approach for looking at each Constellation. Everyone is invited to tag along and contribute to the threads.
I will look at two aspects of each Constellation. First, I wish to identify the brighter stars from Alpha to Epsilon. My working memory slows down after five, so that will do. I will not only be visually locating them in the sky, but will also be looking to see if any colours are visible to the unaided eye and also through the scope. Furthermore, I will carefully examine each of these stars in the vain hope that a previously unknown double may have widened enough to come into view.
Secondly, I will identify the main objects of interest in each Constellation. These could be anything from doubles to galaxies. However, I will not cover Messier Objects. I will list them separately as a footnote at the end, but I will not observe these, as they are well known and I have already seen them all. Again though, I will limit myself to only 5 objects.
My reference books will mainly be, Burnham's Celestial Handbook, The Collins Guide to Stars and Planets, Hartung's Astronomical Objects for Southern Telescopes, Wil Triton's Bright Star Atlas, Haas's Double Stars for small telescopes and Stepen O"Meara's The Caldwell Objects. I will also list any unexamined Caldwell Objects with the Messier objects at the end of the thread's opening post.
I plan to attach websites along side of the objects to view so as to provide easy access to further information. I will check and reference previous threads re these objects that have already appeared on Ice in Space. Those who followed my recent observations know that I already check for websites. The difference this time is that I intend to pick the objects for viewing and read the Websites before viewing. I wonder if this will alter my judgement, but it is good to know and appreciate what I am about to view. (To now, I have only looked up websites after my observations.)
My first Constellation will be Pyxis. My threads will appear in Observation Reports, which is a subsection of the Observation & Visual Astronomer segment.
So, inspired by Joe & Eugene's methodological approach of looking at doubles, I am developing an organised approach for looking at each Constellation. Everyone is invited to tag along and contribute to the threads.
I will look at two aspects of each Constellation. First, I wish to identify the brighter stars from Alpha to Epsilon. My working memory slows down after five, so that will do. I will not only be visually locating them in the sky, but will also be looking to see if any colours are visible to the unaided eye and also through the scope. Furthermore, I will carefully examine each of these stars in the vain hope that a previously unknown double may have widened enough to come into view.
Secondly, I will identify the main objects of interest in each Constellation. These could be anything from doubles to galaxies. However, I will not cover Messier Objects. I will list them separately as a footnote at the end, but I will not observe these, as they are well known and I have already seen them all. Again though, I will limit myself to only 5 objects.
My reference books will mainly be, Burnham's Celestial Handbook, The Collins Guide to Stars and Planets, Hartung's Astronomical Objects for Southern Telescopes, Wil Triton's Bright Star Atlas, Haas's Double Stars for small telescopes and Stepen O"Meara's The Caldwell Objects. I will also list any unexamined Caldwell Objects with the Messier objects at the end of the thread's opening post.
I plan to attach websites along side of the objects to view so as to provide easy access to further information. I will check and reference previous threads re these objects that have already appeared on Ice in Space. Those who followed my recent observations know that I already check for websites. The difference this time is that I intend to pick the objects for viewing and read the Websites before viewing. I wonder if this will alter my judgement, but it is good to know and appreciate what I am about to view. (To now, I have only looked up websites after my observations.)
My first Constellation will be Pyxis. My threads will appear in Observation Reports, which is a subsection of the Observation & Visual Astronomer segment.