I am sitting here in noosa - 150km from my scope - watching the clearest crispest nightfall i have seen for several months. Not to mention that it is the newest of new moons!!
I hope you all are making good use of it. Can you post some reports so I can at least enjoy it vicariously??
Well, what can you say but crikey? The cloud held back until about 1.30 when you could see dark banks rising on the horizon and thin high stuff moved in. The view softened and then it was gone. But we had great clear sky for about 7 hours and made good use of it despite the cold coming in with a vengeance about 9 p.m.. By the time we packed it in, the grass temp would have been little more than 2 or 3.
Robin's new EM-200 was out with his F3.8 astrograph and made an early hit with some M51 that barely peaked at 15degrees above the northern horizon.
We had Ric doing some abolutely stunning widefield's using another baby Tak mount. Geoff and Matt were here clicking away although Matt was also doing some star trails around the SCP until bis batteries passed into mhistory. After that he was less than convinging when he insisted he was awake despite being bundled up in his bunk under a mountain of woolies.
I had a good run of 3 hours on the snake neb (B 72) and before that 3579 again (I'm determined to beat that one) and finally, even though it was still in Brisbane's glow, the Helix. That's another target for later in the year for me.
Thanks very much for your hospitality, Peter! It was great to meet you all and the skies were fantastic. I'm looking forward to doing it again next month.
Hey Rick, how about posting one of your Saggitarius widefields from last night.
Here's a B72 snake and a Helix both of which would profit from some flats which I didn't take, and the Helix was taken low in the east through a fair amount of Brisbane's best. But enjoy anyway.
Peter
Looks like you guys did ok. I ended up with a directory full of blurry noisey rubbish
Bummer - I was looking forward to seeing what you got on M51 Robin
Plenty of engineering issues for you to sort out for quite some time I should imagine.....!
It's pretty low in the sky Rob, about 15degrees, not far above the tree line but I shot 5minute subs at 1x1.
The single 15minute L I shot looks a lot better I had PC trouble as well And I won't mention the cold
It's pretty low in the sky Rob, about 15degrees, not far above the tree line but I shot 5minute subs at 1x1.
The single 15minute L I shot looks a lot better I had PC trouble as well And I won't mention the cold
It looks like this so far.
Hey! That's very decent for such a low one with new gear. Perfectionist!
Look pretty good to me Geoff. Because I'm a child of the 60's and officially don't remember a thing about those years, it follows that my taste is for more lurid colours. I'd have cranked up those reds 'till they looked the colour of Tony Abbot's lycra budgie smugglers. But hey, that's me.
Peter.
Sorry I couldn't join you all (family committments over the W/E), however because of Peter's strong intuition, I managed to talk the HM into driving south a day later and squeezed in a few hours of visual Sat night until those cloud banks to the SE reflected the city glow.
What's all the complaining about being cold? Did you run out of coffee and medicine early? LOL
Was a bit cool here too but I had warm hands & EPs Peter
Wasn't it a gorgeous night last night!!!
I packed it in around 2am. clouds were building up to the south east.
Hey there Nettie. How did you go with the rest of the night at Cambroon. It was a great night and I just wish I had brought those freezer suits. Is this night a monthly event?
After the half-moon went down a bit after midnight, it was a really dark night and stayed as clear as a bell until sunrise. There was/is some jetstream action right above us so I've yet to see how if affected the seeing on the CCDs but I'm hopeful. I did some Coalsack, NGC7424 and from about 1.30 some M31 and M110. Stacking it now but I think sleep will come before any further processing.
Peter
It's good to get a full clear night for a change. I moved the focuser and primary on the newt again this week so I spent most of last night trying to tune it up. It was looking a lot better by the end of the night but FWHM still seems high to me.
but I had warm hands & EPs Peter 
