Mars Occulted by the Moon

 Stack of the Moon passing in front of Mars (occultation) Starting the first stack at 1:46 UTC (6:46 PM MST) and the final stack at 3:06 UTC (8:06 PM MST) The Moon was in front of Mars from my location for approximately 59 minutes and 20 seconds. You can see there are 8 layers and each layer is comprised of 50 stacks (400 photos stacked on top of each other to diminish blurriness from temperature waves in the atmosphere).

Christmas Tree Nebula (NGC 2264 & my new Favorite)

The Christmas Tree Nebula is very aptly named. NGC 2264 is the location where the Cone Nebula, the Stellar Snowflake Cluster and the Christmas Tree Cluster have formed in this emission nebula. The Snowflake Cluster was granted its name due to its unmistakable pinwheel-like shape and its assortment of bright colors. The Christmas Tree star formation consists of young stars obscured by heavy layers of dust clouds. These dust clouds, along with hydrogen and helium are producing luminous new stars. The combination of dense clouds and an array of colors creates a color map filled with varying wavelengths. Of course I have to reveal it's distance from my telescope and camera, 2,350 light years. 228 FITS (RAW) and 189 stacked with 60 FLATS for photo below.

 

Soul Nebula (IC1848)

The Soul nebula (IC 1848)The Soul Nebula is approximately 6,500 light-years away and spans about 100 light-years in size. It is a star-forming region containing several small open clusters. I took 82 photos each of 30 second duration and kept 73 for stacking (105 Gain, 60 Flats for imperfection elimination and zero darks).

 

Seagull Nebula (Seagull's Head)

This interesting reflection nebula is under 2000 light years from my camera. The worm like dust lane kind of outlines a gull winged bird. If I had gotten the entire nebula you could barely see a head and set of wings. 2025-01-03 I captured 206 frames and kept 156 for the stack, with 60 flat frames and zero darks at 30 seconds each and a gain of 105 at 12 bits

 

The Golden Hour in New York for a Cruise Departure

In photography, the golden hour is the period of daytime shortly after sunrise or just before sunset, during which daylight is redder and softer than when the sun is higher in the sky. The golden hour is also sometimes called the magic hour, by photographers. Our cruise was delayed and that pushed the departure right in the Golden Hour for New York City's skyline and of course the Statue of Liberty. Having a waxing Moon hanging in the sky just above the skyline did not hurt either... Taking the photos from a rocking boat presented some challenges. However, challenges are what make successes sweeter. The moment was incredible. Sit back and hopefully you enjoy it at least half as much as we did.

The sunset in the west is reflecting perfectly off the windows of the buildings...

The new World Trade Center giving us a peak of the last bit of sunset.

Hello Moon and last bit of sunset

Hello Moon, Lady Liberty and tiniest touch of sunset

They warned us the torch did not light up very well... wrong tonight!

Goodbye Golden Hour and New York City

The Seven Sisters Star Cluster - Pleiades Nebula

 Messier 45 the Seven Sisters star cluster and Pleiades Nebula (NGC 1432) is the best know star cluster in the world, with much folk lore surrounding it. It is said it can be used as an eye test or light pollution test. If you can see seven (realistically five or six) individual stars your eyes are good, and the light pollution is not that bad. The cluster is only 444 light years away, however the radius of the cluster is 20 light years. 

In this one purposely left the stars in and processed them together - I wanted them big and brilliant. Normally I grab out the stars from the nebula, so they don't get overexposed as I stretch out the nebula in the histogram. Then I would normally process the stars separately and finally put them back in for the final photograph.

Bonus tip the starburst pattern you see in the stars is caused by the starlight getting diffracted as it strikes both the power cable and the USB cable of my astro-camera getting concentrated into spikes. If I had done a better job of curving the cables the light would have dispersed instead of "spiked".

Comet 2023 C3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS

 Took this comet shot last month. The anti-tail is barely visible in front of the comet. The comet at the time of the photos (25 shots of 4.02 seconds, total integration 100.5 seconds stacked) was 0.52 AU (Astronomical Units, 1 AU equals the average distance from the Sun to the Earth, in other words the comet was 46,477,905 miles away). The magnitude or brightness of the comet was 3.53 so technically it was visible to the naked eye but it's proximity to the horizon made really hard to see. This photo(s) was taken with my 9.25 inch diameter lens telescope. Bonus Tip: What is an anti-tail? As the comet speeds away from the Sun dust and ice are burned/fanned off the comet and form the coma and tail opposite the sun. Since the tail is formed directly opposite the Sun and now the comet is travelling away from the Sun the remaining dust is still lit up even though the comet has travelled past it in it's orbital plane.

In this second photo one day later you can no longer see the anti-tail but the ion tail is barely visible in the left-middle of the dust tail

Elephant Trunk Nebula IC 1396

Having been inspired by the Bubble Nebula, I thought I would try for the Elephant Trunk Nebula and again I was very surprised with the results. The Bubble is still my favorite, but this one comes in a nice second. It is about 1,565 light years away from Earth. The entire IC 1396 region is ionized (energized to visible light) by a massive star. I really enjoy the black patches of interstellar dust that is blocking out all background starlight (upper to mid right side of photo). This was a stack of 157 subs frames culled out of 217 frames, each frame lasting 30 seconds (108.5 minutes of integration time).

 

The Bubble Nebula Plus the Salt & Pepper Star Cluster

 The Bubble Nebula is a new one for me and at only 11,091 light years away it is still dim at only 10th magnitude. Down in the left corner is the Salt and Pepper open star cluster. It is only 500 light years away from us and is brighter at 6.9 magnitude. So the two are in light of sight for us but are not especially close to each other.

Saguaro, Great Horned Owl and Comet A3

Check out the great horned owl on the saguaro looking at me, looking at the Comet A3

Venus, Saguaro, and Comet A3

 

September 11th Memorial

 On our most recent visit with our daughter in New York, New York - the September 11th Memorial.

Our Moon (UV/IR Filtered Out)

Our very own satellite the Moon can be very beautiful when Ultraviolet and Infrared are filtered out allowing much more detail to come out. 9.25" F/25 SCT, UV/IR Cut Filter, Barlow 2.5x, ASI533 RGGB, 32°F. 448/700 frames stacked, aligned and wavelet sharpened.

Saturn & Satellites Close to Opposition

Saturn and four of it's many satellites three days (20240905) before opposition. Nothing thrills people more than seeing Saturn live in a eyepiece. The only thing better is solar total eclipse. The satellites are seen as only specks in the photograph so zoom in!

From left to right: Dione, Saturn, Tethys, Rhea and finally the big satellite Titan. 

Real Time Lightning - Not Condensed or Sped-Up

July 25th we had a Monsoon lightning event with what seemed to be never ending lightning...

 

NGC5430 Bumble Bee Galaxy (my name for it)

 NGC 5430 is an Spiral Galaxy located in the constellation of Ursa Major (Big Bear, same as the Big Dipper Constellation). NGC 5430's distance from Earth is 129,989,624.33 light years. It is TINY to try to photograph and is only 12 magnitude in brightness. Immensely dimmer than stars seen with the unaided eye. Could we actually call this the Bumble Bee Galaxy!

The Owl Nebula

 The Owl (face) Nebula is a planetary nebula approximately 2,030 light years away in the constellation Ursa Major - the same constellation that holds the Big Dipper. Estimated to be about 8,000 years old, it is approximately circular in cross-section with a faint internal structure. It was formed from the outflow of material from the stellar wind of the central star. What that means is this little guy is very pretty to look at. To take the photo I had to take 100 45 second light frames while star guiding with guiding software. If I didn't use a separate guide scope the imperfections as tiny as they are, would make the picture look like I took it from a rock invested road.

NGC 4565 (IC3543) Edge On Needle Galaxy

NGC 4565 is known as the Needle Galaxy or IC 3543.  It is an edge-on spiral galaxy about 30 to 50 million light-years away in the constellation Coma Berenices. It lies close to the North Galactic Pole and has a visual magnitude of approximately 10. To be seen without optical add magnitude 6 would be necessary. It is known as the Needle Galaxy for its narrow profile. NGC 4565 has at least two satellite galaxies, one of which is interacting with it. Can both satellite galaxies, they are in my picture. It has a population of roughly 240 globular clusters, more than the Milky Way.

Messier 101

Messier 101 (M101) This bad boy face-on galaxy is 170 light years wide and its distance is a mere 21 million light years away. This galaxy is much like the renowned Andromedia Galaxy. You may remember an earlier photo of M101 I posted about a year ago which included an exploding supernova. That supernova is no longer visible as the star is dying and a goner.

My picture this year is at FL1470 as last years was FL 517. This year I took a stack of 109 frames each 30 seconds of exposure. With 30 seconds I include guiding in the process to ensure the scope mount does not drift too far off target. The final stack had the stars removed and several Generalized Hyperbolic Histogram stretches applied. Finally, the stars were standard histogram stretched and accurately placed back on the GHS stretched stack. The results are below:

 

Living in Dr Suess' Whoville - Agava

 Agava plants in the front yard make you feel like you are living in Dr. Suess' Whoville. The Agave plants also called Century Plants (because they were falsely thought to live to 100 years), will bloom after 10 to 20 years. The flowering stalk can grow to 35 feet tall and grow and will bloom for three to four months. After the blooming is complete the plant will die and Whoville will sadly vanish back in to fantasy land...

Desert Ugly - I Don't Think So...

 The Sonoran desert was in full gorgeous bloom today on a 5.4 mile hike in upper 80°F

2024 Solar Eclipse - Arkansas

Here is a timelapse of the 2024 Solar Eclipse as seen from Flippin Arkansas. You can see two sunspots on the sun. The solar prominences were intensely red in color and a gorgeous site to see. Each frame is three minutes apart until the total phase when they are 3 seconds apart. And then operator error occurred and I did not take into account a meridian flip even though no tripod collision was possible. So I was only able to capture about 1/3rd of total. The photos get misaligned until I took over manual control and flipped the axis. Visually this was the most beautiful eclipse I have observed to date.

 

Tadpole Nebula & Bode's & Cigar Galaxy

This beauty is the Tadpole Nebula (IC 410) with a star cluster (NGC 1893) right in front of it. The Tadpole is about mere 12,0100 light years away.

 Bode's Galaxy M81 (lower) and the Cigar Galaxy M82(upper) are gravitationally locked into each other. Both of them are about 11.8 million Light Years away.

NGC0224 M31 Andromeda Rephotographed

Winter Wonderspace

 Some of you may have heard of the Horsehead Nebula. Unlike some nicknames of astro objects this one is completely obvious as to the why part... And as always here you go with the distance - the light from this beauty takes 1,375 years to reach us. The light from the red nebula comes from the bright stars behind it ionizing the hydrogen gas. The star Malach is so bright it is casting quite a halo!

This beautiful blue canvas of planetary nebula should be familiar to alot of us. It is the Pleiades star cluster or sometimes called the Seven Sisters star cluster. You can see it with the naked eye but depending on the light pollution in your area you may be able to only see four or five of the stars. Six is usually the maximum number of stars. This bad girl is only 444 light years of distance between us.

This is Andromeda and I have displayed it in the past but I try to get a better shot every time. This one is also visible to the naked eye if your li8gh pollution isn't too bad. So this one is 152,000 light years wide but only 2.5 million lights distance from us :) It is considered a sister galaxy to our very own galaxy.  By the way can see two smudges in the picture - those two sister galaxies to Andromeda.

Recognize this nighttime dominator. And for distance it is on average 1.2 Light Seconds away!

This NGC 2238 but also very appropriately nicknamed the Rosette Nebula and it is 130 light years in diameter but 5,000 light years away.

This old standby the Orion Nebula M42 I have taken so many times but again I try to do better every time. 1,344 light years distance and 24 light years in diameter.