And I was just getting used to............

[Harb]

A life with a grey sky

oh man...........I am looking out the window as I speak and no clouds :thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

will our luck hold in.....:shrug:

we will see

:D

[Omaroo]

Yep Harb - miracle huh.

We missed out for a public viewing night on Friday evening, and after that we had it all planned for Saturday to do it all again. Dang. Clouds again.

Tonight...... Stargard... hopefully..... shhhh... the Gods will hear us.....

You should come out - you can't be that far away from The Oaks?

[ving]

the oaks tonight? dang, thought that was yesterday chris...

[Omaroo]

It was David...... :( ...but twas cloudy so twas called off.

I recieved a hushed email from John a while ago (in small type so that the cloud Gods couldn't hear) that we'd do a session tonight.

In fact...... (please hold)....... I just recieved another from John right now that it was definitely on.:thumbsup:

Yeehah!

[Ric]

Hope you have a good one guys, i've got another layer of smoke haze drifting in so thats put paid to any thoughts I had about tonight.
I had a wee session last night but the seeing was woeful, Orion with the naked eye was barely visible. Still it was great to get out and have a look around for a while.

cheers

[iceman]

A real gusty wind came through this afternoon, blew all the haze away and it's the bluest sky i've seen in weeks.

If the wind dies down it will be a very nice clear night.

[Ric]

Blue sky??? whats that??? :D
Go for it Mike, the chances are few and far at the moment.

cheers

[Harb]

I am busting to come to one of your nights...........
But tonight I babysit.........oh well maybe the next one will work in my favor;)
look forward to catching up soon :thumbsup:

John

PS, I'm only a couple of k's out so I wouldn't have to travel to far!!

[Omaroo]

No worries John :)

Well.. it was GREAT out at Stargard tonight. Very nice sky until the moon came up at around 1:00am.

Anyway John - we'll be at the MAS forest field next weekend on Friday & Saturday nights (I'll camp o'nite Saturday) 4k's into Belanglo State Forest if you're interested. PM me for details if you'd like to come. A couple of weeks ago we were down there and th eskies were the darkest I've seen in months if not years. It was a magic night.

Cheers
Chris

[ving]

i bet it was a great night chris! I was in my yard viewing and the seeing at about 10pm was superb!!! it was really a perfect night. :D

my collimation was spot on, my alignment was great and the seeing was the best i had seen for a long time.... I need a camera that can take longer exposures tho and at 16 secs the lpi is full of red hot pixels (and i mean full).

on a positive imaging note, cheryl has given me the go-ahead on a dslr. i am thinking a 350d or maybe go a nikon. not sure yet :D

[Omaroo]

:D :D :D Excellent news David. It's great when go-aheads get given. :D :D :D

I get my "new" 1972 Nikon F bodies from my father this week. Can't wait! Might get one fitted with a Kodak 1/2" CCD...... mmmmmmm....

[ving]

thats doable? fitting a ccd into a slr body?

now thats interesting! you are gunna have to show us when its done.

[Omaroo]

I've heard of it being done before, yes. It's a bit of a fiddle but. The CCD has to sit right on the old film plane behind the shutter....

Here's a piccy from Paul (1ponders) where a bloke has taken an old Pentax and stuffed a ToUcam into it if all else fails. At least this way you can use proper lenses for wide-field.

[ving]

wow, i am impressed... really!:eyepop:

so you put a toucam chip in there and you can use it like a normal camera?
got a link to more info chris?

[Omaroo]

David - it came up in this thread: http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=15302

It's actually from a book: "Digital Astrophotography - The State of the Art" by David Ratledge (Ed) from Patrick Moore's Practical Astronomy Series, published by Springer

PS - Sorry for hijacking your thread Harb... :( My bad.

[erick]

Looks like here:-

http://www.deep-sky.co.uk/webcam/toucam.htm

Interesting - I have two old manual Pentax SLRs and lots of lenses - I think I could sacrifice one.

[Omaroo]

Excellent erick :) I didn't realise that this page existed. Neato!

[Harb]

Thats ok, your subject is more interesting anyway....:thumbsup: :thumbsup:

cheers