Chris Howard's Blog, page 19

The “Cygnus Wall” in the North America Nebula (NGC...

The “Cygnus Wall” in the North America Nebula (NGC 7000, Caldwell 20) in the constellation Cygnus. William Optics GT81 Refractor, Astronomik 6nm Ha filter, ZWO ASI1600MM-Pro monochrome camera. Although not a lot of stars in the field of view, I used StarNet to remove them.

We said goodbye to our beautiful Keia (“Lykeia”)...

We said goodbye to our beautiful Keia (“Lykeia”) today. She was the sweetest German Shepherd on the planet, and she was with us over fourteen years. She was diagnosed with melanoma in 2019, and it slowly crept in, along with age. We’re going to miss you so much. She was seven years old in this pic, and looking pretty damn sharp with one white whisker.

Flying Bat Nebula in Ha (sans squid) - I finally started...

Flying Bat Nebula in Ha (sans squid) - I finally started gathering Hydrogen-alpha data for the Flying Bat nebula (Sh2-129) in the constellation Cepheus. What you do not see in Ha is the large, squidlike structure of oxygen that stretches from the top corner of the Bat, through those bright stars, to about the middle of the nebula  For the “Squid Nebula” (OU4) I need to come back on another night to capture the OIII. The small circular reflection nebula at the top left is vdB-140. The dark nebula on the right is Barnard 152.

Notes: 67 x 300 second subs, stacked in DSS. Gear: William Optics SpaceCat51 Apo Refractor, ZWO ASI1600MM-Pro mono camera, Antlia Pro 3nm Ha filter, Sky-Watcher EQ6R Pro equatorial mount.

There’s a beautiful moon out there tonight! This is from...

There’s a beautiful moon out there tonight! This is from my first set of test shots with my Sony A7s on the 1350mm f/9 Astro-Tech AT6RC.

IC 1396 is a large circular emission nebula and star cluster in...

IC 1396 is a large circular emission nebula and star cluster in the constellation Cepheus. (If this general shape looks familiar, compare IC 1396 to the Rosette Nebula in Monoceros in terms of the roughly circular structure and that central bowl being carved out by the radiation from a batch of overenthusiastic core stars). The brightest star in the frame, on the right, is the Garnet Star (mu Cephei), which is actually farther away than most of the gas, dust, and other material in the frame, and is one of the largest known stars (1,650 times the size of the Sun). The bright star in the center of IC 1396 is HD 206267, a variable double star. It is the intense radiation and stellar wind from the core star cluster, including HD 206267, that drives the expansion of the circular shell of dust and ionized hydrogen. This bright circular structure on is over a hundred lightyears across. The “Elephant’s Trunk Nebula” (VdB 142, Van den Bergh 142, IC 1396A) is the towering structure running up the center from the bottom of IC1396. There are a bunch of Barnard Catalogue dark nebulae in the region, including Barnard 161, above and to the right of the Elephant’s Trunk, with B 163, 160, and 365 along the left. To give you a sense of the size of IC 1396, you’re looking at roughly 600 trillion miles from top to bottom (965 trillion kilometers).

Imaging Notes: 64 x 240 second subs in Hydrogen-alpha, stacked in DSS, over 4 hours of data. Gear: William Optics SpaceCat51 Apo Refractor, ZWO ASI1600MM-Pro mono camera, Antlia Pro 3nm Ha filter, Sky-Watcher EQ6R Pro equatorial mount.

My William Optics GT81 Apochromatic triplet refractor, the day...

My William Optics GT81 Apochromatic triplet refractor, the day it arrived (left) and today (right)–that’s FPL-53 glass, 81mm aperture, 478mm focal length, 382mm at f/4.7 with the field flattener. I’ve been capturing the beautiful night sky with this awesome piece of hardware for nearly seven years. I bought it August 2015 and here we are in May 2022. I have captured hundreds of nebulae, galaxies, supernova remnants, and various phases of our moon. Over the last seven years I’ve captured the distant light of stars and emission nebulae in thousands of one, two, five, and ten-minute sub-exposures. Here’s to seven more. Thank you, William Optics!

Another one of the North America Nebula (NGC 7000, left) and...

Another one of the North America Nebula (NGC 7000, left) and Pelican Nebula (IC 5070, top right) in the constellation Cygnus. Narrowband in the SHO palette. 68 x 240 second subs in Ha, OIII, SII. I kept the Hydrogen (green) levels pretty even.

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All Sky Cam with solar charging–testing the new continuous...

All Sky Cam with solar charging–testing the new continuous operation system, charge batteries during the day, take pics all night: ZWO ASI120MC camera, 6mm lens, Raspberry Pi 3b, 12v lithium battery, 10 amp solar controller. Astro blog: https://SaltwaterWitch.com

A shot from last night with the iPhone, a 22° halo around the...

A shot from last night with the iPhone, a 22° halo around the moon–sometimes called a “winter halo”, formed by reflected sunlight (moonlight) passing through ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere.