For the first time in a long time (10 months or so I think), I have my telescope seutp and getting acclimated out back. I probably won’t be out long, but I’ve had the itch lately to get back out beneath the stars. If you’re in my area, come on by for a look!
Tag: Astronomy
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Awesome Moon Photos!
Well, not of last night though. But since several local bloggers are putting moon photos up, I figured I would direct people to a couple photos of my own. I’ve even got… a planet!
More can be seen here and here.
Which reminds me, I really need to get the telescope adapter for my 30D. That would be a lot of fun.
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Camping
This weekend I’ll be heading out into the local “wilderness” for some camping. For the event I’ll be getting out my telescope, something that hasn’t happened much in the last year (once actually) so I’m really looking forward to it.
Just last weekend I got the scope out and stayed up late and remembered how much I enjoyed the hobby. That evening I was able to get setup, view, and tear down in well under 2 hours so it proved that I shouldn’t use the excuse of it taking too long. Which is good, because in 7 months time will not be in my favor 🙂
I’ve purchased another filter for my camera (a neutral density one for those interested). Hopefully it’ll arrive before we leave on vacation; it sure would piss me off if it arrives 5 hours after we depart. Anyway, I wonder why my hobbies include high precision optics (astronomy and photography)…. sure isn’t cheap.
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Astronomy Class
The astronomy class I am taking has been going fairly well, even if it’s a little slow at times. Last night we were able to go up to the observatory and take a quick glance at the moon and Saturn. We were up there for probably a total of close to 2 hours, and it was a little cold. I may start bringing my warm Carhart coat with me to class on the chance we’ll be heading outside.
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Saturn
I was able to finally get outside under good skies for the first time in over a month. I grabbed a few shots of Saturn that turned out pretty well, larger than my past pictures of the planet.
Click to go to the gallery for this and a couple other new shots.
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Survey of the Universe
Looks like I’m probably going to attend an astronomy course that the University of Illinois at Springfield is offering this spring. It’s called Survey of the Universe, and meets only once per week, but sounds like something I may really enjoy.
Ana already called around to get the details, all I need to do is call back and give them my cc number. I think she’s trying to get me out of the house!
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Photos
When I want to print some of my astronomy photos, I usually take them to Meijer’s Photo Lab on a memory card and use their photo kiosks to submit them for printing. On Saturday I went online and discovered they now have a Windows client application that allows photos to be submitted from home. I downloaded and installed the app, submitted my photos, and picked them up at the local Meijer just over an hour later. Worked flawlessly and I highly recommend it.
In the past I’ve tried Wal-Mart’s digital photo services, but the astronomy pictures I tried just came out very poorly. I think this was due to Wal-Mart trying to be smart and make adjustments to the submitted digital photo, and it getting aweful confused when the pictures I was printing were 99% black.
Since I’ve been printing them at Meijer, they’ve come to know me and often comment on how much they like printing the ones I send in. Saturday I printed one of my sunspot pictures and, when I picked them up, the lady explained that she was really confused about what the picture was – until she saw and recognized my name. At least I have a fan!
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Long Weekend
It has been a long week at work and I’ve been looking forward to the 3 day weekend. Ana and I don’t really have anything planned, maybe just a project or two around the house.
Earlier in the week I was disappointed to learn that Deep Impact’s collision with comet Tempel 1 will not be visible from Illinois on Monday morning. I was planning on watching it (watching the side-effects I suppose would be a better term – the comet is expected to get noticably brighter) as it happened but I would need to be west of the Mississippi. Instead, I’ll just check it Sunday night and again on Monday night to compare the brightness. I may even setup the camera and see if I can get a photo or two.
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Ring Nebula
Took the telescope out last night, it was a very clear evening. I was able to snap a few shots of M57, The Ring Nebula. I was pretty suprised they came out like they did, this was the first time I’ve used the 15 second exposure option on my digital camera – I had the mount aligned pretty good so there aren’t very long “star trails” from the long exposure.
M57, The Ring Nebula, is a Planetary Nebula 2300 light-years (which google tells us is 1.35205496 × 10^16 miles) away from us. A Planetary Nebula is a “shell” of gas and plasma that is left when some types of stars die/explode. At the center of this is that star, a white dwarf now. Unfortunately you can’t see it in my picture.
The Ring Nebula is the small doughnut looking shape in the center. -
Solar Filter
My anniversary gift from Ana, a new Solar Filter for the new telescope, arrived today. I had to go to FedEx and pick it up after work but tried it out when I got home. It’s amazing what this telescope can do compared to my old one. I didn’t think it would make much difference on the sun, but it surely does.
A neighbor came down to see what I was looking at, but just when he did the sun went behind a think blanket of clouds. Maybe it’ll be clear tomorrow and he’ll get to see it then. I also plan on taking some pictures with the new setup.
The Johnson Blog 