hehehe rain hail or sunshine you won't keep me away
One more sleep Woohooo if I pull an all nighter tonight that means no more sleeps hahahaha see you all soon
I'm leaving poor Johnny home this time as I now finally have my guiding up and running I'm going to be with the crazy imagers on the other side of the field hehehe plus I heard there is much bigger toys there to play with
Photoshop lessons part two here we come are you ready Mr Glossop
Here is hoping it cleans up a bit. I have even managed to jury rig a way to mount binoculars on my azeq mount on alt az mode. SCT and binos aimed at the same target.
Friday night was yuck, Saturday night defied the forecast and was really good, but last night (Sunday) once again defied forecast, providing one of the best skies I have experienced. Absolutely brilliant, particularly for the visual people, please accept my bias, he, he!
Add in the excellent company, splendid venue, relaxed atmosphere and endless discussion on everything imaginable, wow!
A big thanks to Snake Valley Camps, the committee and everyone else. There does remain just one question:
Bang on Wren - I had a great weekend - so thank you all.
Especially to Malcolm, Paul and the SVAC committee a huge thank you for all the effort that went into the planning and organising for the weekend.
Also to Barry for the tour of the Ballarat Observatory with its 'ancient' 'scopes and stained glass windows (loved the latter!), Andy for his AP talk and advice Saturday night and to Pam and Warren for the cheese and bickies late Saturday.
And finally to Patrick, Wren, Darren, Bo, Julian et al for some great conversations on so many different topics - including how to blow up tree stumps! ;-)
As per Wren's final comment is it March yet? Can't wait until next year. What a great camp.
Paul
Last edited by pfitzgerald; 09-11-2015 at 10:51 PM.
Just want to say to you all that I thoroughly enjoyed the weekend, though I would have wanted to stay the extra night if it were not for work commitments! I especially want to thank Malcom and the team for accepting a newbie into the ranks and Marc and Bo for helping me with polar alignment, eventually got there about 10pm, pretty rough though. However I did manage to image the Tarantula. PHD2 + wide field is pretty forgiving
Now I'm not very good with names or reading name tags for that matter, but to the chaps that provided me with a spare LED screen filter my gratitude goes out to you both. All I had was a bodgy selafane thingo I made myself which would have been tragic if put to use and ultimately end in profanities galore. I also enjoyed talking about this, that and the other during the night.
I'll process what I've got, yes with Pixinsight, and yes will use dark subtracted darks hehe. Probably have them up by the end of the week. I must say though that I would not be able to image this target from the Mel burbs so very impressed with rich star fields.
Another great Snake Valley camp. Glad you guys got some good viewing last night. As always, great to meet some new friends and to catch up with the regulars. And at least got some observing on Saturday night and some great solar observing.
Thanks again to Malcolm, Paul, Barry and Nick for running these wonderful events.
Thanks also to Barry for the great tour of the beautiful Ballaarat (not a spelling mistake!) Observatory and to Andrew for his presentation of his beautiful images.
Great to connect faces with names old and new.
Thanks to Paul Fitzgerald for loaning me a dew strap on Sat.
To Malcolm, Paul and everyone for organising it.
Andy for checking my PHD2 drifting
Barry for the Ballaart (I will spell it the original spelling now)
Pam and Warren for Sat Happy Hour
John G for the Sunday morning Image Plus tutorial, and fun banters with Martin, Neal, Nico (too many Nicos...), Jen, John (too many Johns...), Wren, Paddy, David, Jamie and countless others.
Roll on March.
Bo
I to would like to echo everyone's comments and thank everyone for a great weekend. I think learnt more in this weekend than I have in the past year trying to teach myself. Definitely feel like i have more of an idea of what i need and what I want to get out of astronomy now. Everyone was really great at making me feel welcome and putting up with my lack of knowledge. Especially thanks to John and Bo for showing me the basics of astrophotography and also i think it was Patrick (sorry i can be as bad with names as i am with remembering my constellations!) who took me on a tour of the night sky. Saw so much more in his giant scope than my baby dob here in the light polluted suburbs.
Hopefully will see you all in March with my own equipment and maybe even feel confident enough to join in the conversations.
Hi guys
So glad to hear that you are all happy. I thought Sunday night was going to be a cracker. Sad to miss it but maybe will get mire nights in March!!
Well there you go, I decided based on the forecast to head off on Sunday afternoon and get a bit of family time, wrong call it seems (The weather never cleared here at Kilmore) Glad it turned out well for those who stuck it out.
A really enjoyable camp, thanks to the committee for making it happen. More thanks to Malcolm for what turned out effectively to be a loan of your big dob on Saturday night, I ended up observing through it for about half an hour. Makes me quite keen to buy or build one eventually. If I start working on my wife now I might be able to get one in about 20 years!
Here is hoping I can make both camps next year too.
Oh, and Jen, I don't think I have heard "Kitty" in 20 years!
I to would like to echo everyone's comments and thank everyone for a great weekend, a special thanks to Malcolm for the foresight to bring back the camp.
After Missing a lot of camps it was great to see new and old faces I will be back.
+1. It was great to meet everybody. Skies were awesome. Had a lot of fun and a real good time. Thanks to all.
Couple of pics from Balla(a)rat Obs with a pretty spiffy clock drive. Thanks to Barry for the guided tour of the facilities.
And one shot from the new Mewlon 210 I bought off John G. Beaute scope very well kept and looked after. Very happy with first light Sunday night. Good seeing and transparency.
