Dark sky weekend getaway....Mount Pinos it is!!!!

I am trying to be more consistent with my dark sky observing runs. SoCal residents living near the coast get hit hard during the summer months as the marine layer pretty much comes in every other night, and this is not just restricted to the June Gloom month! My observing buddy and fellow Los Angeleno Terry Nakazono has been observing from SoCal since he came back to the hobby in 2010. His experiences with observing in the summer months has been bad. So bad that he has to resort to making trips to the desert and basically anywhere away from the coastline to get clearer skies. Since I have been observing a lot more lately from Malibu, I started to feel the need to get to a place where I could escape the marine layer. Mount Pinos is one of these places that is high enough to escape the marine layer. Another added advantage is that it is only about 1 1/2 hours from where I live, making it a doable single night trip. Plus this summer has been rather warm (well warmer to me than last year at least!). If my last trip there was pleasant, the session on Saturday night was even better! The temps were a balmy 20 degrees celcius (about 60 degrees farenheigh). To make it better, transparency was pretty good and the skies were steady too!

Got the car packed up pretty early at shortly after lunch. This time I had planned to not do any comparison observation. It was going to be a strictly observing trip. I even had a short list of objects, which I culled from a larger list I made way back when I was still making observing list in Brisbane for my sessions at Leyburn. I had some northern sky DSO's that I had noted that would have been impossible from my southerly declination back in oz. Alas good intentions do not always bear fruit. This time of the year Virgo sets pretty early, slightly after astronomical twilight. Also the galaxy zoo in the direction of Coma Berenices-Canes Venatici also sank fast after twilight. Oh well there is always the brighter stuff I can revisit, plus some of the fall constellations to look out for later in the night.

After a shower and a light dinner, I called Terry up and we were on our way by about 10 past 6 pm. Surprisingly the drive up there went pretty quick. I guess that's what happens when you are all fired up to observe and there is someone who is equally as enthusiastic as you in the car. When we pulled up into the parking lot up on Pinos, we were greeted by a throng of cars and people. Geeze we had to park practically at the mouth of the entrance into the parking lot. I have never seen Pinos this crowded before. Must be the good weather conditions! I later also learned that there was a class being conducted that night.

As we had some time to kill, after checking the collimation of our scopes (I was armed with my Celestron/Vixen C6 on Vixen Porta mount and my Orion Skyscanner table top on my Orion Paragon FD2 photo tripod), we decided to wander around and talk to our fellow astronomers. Some of the more hardcore folk have been up there since last night with their RV's. There were some big Obsession and Obsession type scopes up there. The biggest scope was probably the 25" Obsession, followed by a 22" and a 20" monster. There might be another 25 incher but I could not locate the owner. The field also played host to several astrophotographers. My other Pinos buddy Dave, who was supposed to be there unfortunately did not make it.

I started off the night in my usual astrophotography tinkering. I had with me new/old Meade DSI one shot color CCD camera. This cam is definately more light sensitive than the Orion Starshoot Color Solar System Imager IV, which I returned (and there will be a write up on the cams as soon as I get some half decent shots to post!). I had the same problem with not having enough backfocus!!!!! Sheesh looks like the cams are not going to work with my short focal length newtonians. Will have to see if I can get it to work with my 10" dob. If not I might need to get a short focal length  refractor to image. What I did accomplish though is get some defocussed stars in the FOV. At least I know the cam is sensitive enough for deeper fair. All I need to work out now is the backfocus issue! There is no easy remedy for this, save moving the whole primary mirror cell forward.

With the tinkering out of the way, it was time to get down to some serious visual observing. I started off my "not so dark adapted" eyes on some easy objects like open clusters and globular clusters. First up was the rich starfields in Sagittarius and Scorpius. Unfortunately due to our position close to the entrance of the parking lot, there wasn't that much room to move around (well until later when the non hardcore astronomers started to leave at about 11pm!). Scorpius was hiding behind a tree so I could only manage M80 at the head of the scorpion. The nebulous puffs that was M8, the Lagoon Nebula, M20, the Trifid Nebula, the small Sagittarius starcloud, M17, the Swan Nebula and M16, the Eagle Nebula were all easy fare so I started with those, this time mostly focused on using the OIII filter to observe the darker features. With these observations, I can confirm that there is definately less nebulosity visible in these objects (well the extent of the nebula anyway) using this filter. I spent a good amount of time scrutinizing each object and then moved onto M22, the crackerjack cluster in Sagittarius. Again I got the impression of this object resembling Omega Centauri at high power as it is just such a loose globular! I also had high power looks with the C6 at M28, two other globulars close to M8 and M10 and M12 in Ophiuchus! Then I panned to M11, the Wild Duck cluster in Scutum. This object actually looks better at low to medium magnification as it keeps the cluster compact, showcasing its flock of wild ducks in arrow formation.

My now better dark adapted eyes were ready for some galaxy action. With the galaxy fields fast sinking, I had to work fast if I wanted to see anything. I started off with Ursa Major's M101 and M51. This time I tried the Orion Skyglow broadband filter to see if it enhanced the view of the galaxies. To my amazement (well I half expected it to work), the galaxies looked much better with the filter in place. The galaxies looked "contrastier" and gave up their details a little easier. I later used this filter to observe the dark lanes in M31, the Andromeda Galaxy and the spiral arms and the star forming region in M33, the Triangulum Galaxy! Other scrutinized galaxies included M106, M63, the Sunflower galaxy and M?? in Canes Venatici.

After oogling the galaxy zoo, I decided to go back to some nebula observing, staring with some stellar graveyards. M57, the Ring Nebula is my fave planetary nebula. With or without the filter, this object is a stunner in even small scopes. My best views of this object have been with my 10" when it really does resemble a celestial smoke ring! But the C6 does a darn good job too. M27, the dumbbell nebula is no slouch either and this curious football shaped (well with the narrowband filter in place. Without the filter, the apple core visage is easier to descern) object was strutting its stuff. With the OIII filter screwed in, all three portions was visible. Again the views were nice in both my smaller scopes. But this view is marred by the wonderful views I got with my 10", with the NPB filter in place . I will never forget that night in Leyburn when the Veil Nebula looked striated and braided, looking much like a black and white photograph! I also hit the North American Nebula with the C6, but the best views of this expansive nebula came with the Skyscanner at very low power. Again the Pelican Nebula was easily visible.

With Andromeda now up and most of Pegasus, I decided to swing over to M31 and its companions, M32 and M110. All three looked very good. This turned to great when I decided to give the Orion Skyglow broadband filter a go. Wow oh wow, the dust lanes jumped out and M31 seemed to stretch on forever. I wonder if this was coupled with the fact that M31 was still not super high in the sky. M33 pulled the same trick with the Skyglow filter in place . I though I could just make out its spiral arms with the filter in place!

It was now getting late and I was starting to tire. I figured I take a quick break from standing up and observing , and shoot some wide field shots with my Kodak Z990. I retired the Skyscanner from its perch on the Paragon photo tripod so I could mount the camera. Pushing the ISO all the way to 6400 and using its maximum exposure of 16 seconds, I look some shots of the southern milky way (M8 and up, as well as the region around M11, M31 the Andromeda Galaxy and the double cluster in Perseus, Lyra the constellation and even the head of Cygnus, around the bright star Deneb).

Now that I was rested, I went back to bright and easy stuff again, My final objects of the night was the double cluster in Perseus, M13 the great Hercules cluster and M30 in Capricorn. Terry also showed me Banard's Galaxy in Capricornus. It was faint but definately there. By then the clouds started moving in from the east. It was the end of yet another perfect night up at the temple of the stars. Next trip up would probably be in September or October.....

My many visits to Orion Telescopes in Cupertino.....one of my dreams growing up in Malaysia

I know this sounds dorky but I have always held a fascination for the stars, ever since I received my Celestron Cometron CO40 as a gift, and since I discovered Astronomy Magazine (and later Sky and Telescope). It was through reading these magazines (and I still read them today!), that my fascination for Orion Telescopes and Binoculars began. I would peruse over their then black and white ad's in the magazines, and even wrote to them for some of their information packed catalogs (back then they used to mail internationally...ah the good old days). While I acquired catalogs from Celestron, Edmund Scientific and Orion, the one I always read over and over again was Orion's. In fact it became sort of like a collectors item for me and I would try to acquire "back issues" over the years through Astromart (and I acquired quite a few thanks to a fellow astronomer from Canada!)! As I flipped through its hallowed pages, I would drool over the ad's of Celestron/Vixen's C6 (which I now own...well the OTA anyway), Edmund's Astroscan and some of the smaller scope fare (I recently purchased a used Celestron Cometron CO60...but then sold it off!). Remember that Orion is a importer/exporter. However it would not be till years later that I would acquire my first Orion scope, and a used one too, a Orion 80ST OTA. More on this later.....

In 2007, after completion of my PhD, me and my significant half made plans to visit California to check out the many UC's for postdoctoral opportunities. This meant that I would have an opportunity to finally visit some of the telescope stores in CA. I immediately though of Orion. Now I know they have two stores in NorCal, one in Cupertino, and one in Watsonville. I made it to both stores and have not been disappointed!!!!! It was like a dream come true as I walked through the doors of the Cupertino store. I even got to experience their legendary customer service firsthand when I wanted to purchase a Orion StarBlast 4.5" minidob and was told that it was out of stock. Now I only had 2 weeks in CA so there was no way I could have waited for their stock to arrive. Buying the scope through a dealer back in oz was not an option as their prices were through the roof! Fortunately they had a floor model which was in immaculate condition. After explaining my situation to the store salesperson, he made a call to the manager and they agreed to sell me that model! They even threw in a free eyepiece for a lower price!

Fast forward to 2012. Yet another brilliant example of Orion's legendary after sales service. I now live in SoCal so getting to an Orion is way easier than having to fly thousands of miles and then driving to the Orion store. In fact I visit their store every time I drive up to NorCal to visit close friends. We hope to eventually move up to NorCal for jobs and such so we can be close to our childhood friends. Anyways back to the story. The following are two instances where Orion's staff members went out of their way to make sure things were right! You know the story where the StarBlast was out of stock...well it happened to me again when I decided to get their SkyScanner mini dob. I got the floor model again for a lower price (booyah!) as they were once again out of stock for this model (what is wrong with my timing ;).

The other more recent incident on my last trip up north I purchased a Orion StarShoot Color Solar System Imager, during a web sale. Due to the awful June/July marine layer weather here in SoCal, I only got to try the camera out about a month after receiving it. The cam worked fine for terrestrial objects, but stubbornly refused to come to focus in all my newtonian telescopes. And this was with the bright moon as a test subject! It seems the imaged was formed inside the focuser tube. Therefore there was no easy way to solve this problem, save moving the primary mirror forward (which would necessitate moving the whole mirror cell forward!). I wish the problem was the other way around. That way all I needed to do was to add an extension tube, or a barlow lens (I did try the barlow in the focuser trick but it did not work!). Now Orion now has a superb website and has several options for contacting them. One was the traditional method of calling their hot line. the other was a live chat over the internet (and it is sooo convenient!). I chose the latter. Talking to tech support, we ran through the problem I faced with the cam. Not being able to come up with a simple solution, I decided to return the item for a full refund. I asked if it was possible to return the item seeing how I was a few days off the 30 day return window. The person on the other side said that that was not an issue, and told me to send it in. That's what I call customer satisfaction!

Technology has come a long way and there are now many different avenues for purchasing items from brick and mortar stores, as well as online stores. While in many countries, buying online is still at its infancy, the avenue of shopping is very much alive and heavily utilized in the US. In fact most good deals can be had by purchasing online, more so than buying from a store!!! Seeing how Orion specialized in mail order, their brilliant online store is just another feather in their cap. They pride themselves on educating the masses, and have done so through their print catalog for many years (and they still do!). They now have a different avenue, via their online store. I find their articles, their monthly sky write ups and their educational videos on how to setup and use astronomical equipment very helpful. Making their product instruction manual's available as pdf's for download is definitely a plus plus. Many of the larger companies are now following in Orion's footsteps and adding articles and how to video's for their scopes. Also although they are an importer/exporter, Orion continues to innovate and work closely with their manufacturer's to produce original designs that set them apart from their competition (i.e. everyone loves their mini dobs and they are currently the first company to offer camera holders for smart phones!!!!!!). Also quality control is pretty tight and QC on their scopes seems to be very good. All Orion scopes I have owned have been pretty close to perfect, starting with the Orion 80ST, the Orion StarBlast and now the Orion SkyScanner! Kudos to Orion for servicing the amateur astronomy community for so many years.....happy 37th anniversary!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Its summertime...lets all go to Pinos!!!!

What a blast last weekend was. The weather finally cooperated and we could go up to Pinos (first trip of the year!) for a great night of summer stargazing. Nothing gets better than this. While Malibu is nice, observing in Pinos is a whole different animal. Its like observing from Perrin Park, Toowong versus Leyburn back in good old oz. There is just no comparison, no substitute. Not to knock my current fave observing site at Solstice Canyon, Malibu as it is just so convenient, but sometimes you just need to get out under truly dark skies. Only Pinos, with its high elevation can provide this. And what better time to visit than the start of summer! Last year my maiden voyage to SoCal's temple of the stars was in May when it was still cold and snowy. This year it was much warmer and there was no snow. Hurrah. The place was packed when we got there and it really did feel like a star party. Both previous trips up there have been rather quiet.

Anyways I did not have any real plans to hunt new quarry. My objective this time round was to just get out under dark velvety skies and drink in the views of some of my fave DSO's. I also wanted to compare and contrast the views through my DGM NPB and my newly acquired OIII filter, try out my $30 retro 80's "Made in Japan" Meade 60mm 700mm focal length refractor and to give the SkyScanner its first dark sky sprint as this also happened its maiden dark sky trip! So much to see and do!

The night started off rather frustratingly, much like my last trip to Pinos. Me and my lofty ideas of doing afocal photography using my Kodak Z990 and the Orion SteadyPix Camera holder. Its funny how the SteadyPix never wants to cooperate everytime I am at some dark sky site. Its either the SteadyPix eyepiece clamp coming loose or the old EQ3-2 not wanting to cooperate (and there I was thinking that the Vixen Porta would solve this problem...well the Porta did perform rather exceptionally.......it was the fault of the SteadyPix this time). After farting around with the setup and my C6 on Vixen Porta for what seemed like eternity, I threw in the towel and just decided to do what I do best, observe visually. I had my starcharts with me, as well as my iTouch, but decided to rely solely on my memory this time to revisit some of old friends and acquaintances.

I decided right there and then to ease myself into the observing session by looking at some of the brighter solar system fare on offer earlier in the night, namely Mars, Saturn and the moon. Some curious folk came over and asked what everyone was up to. Not wanting to be unfriendly, I decided to show them the rings of Saturn at 250x through the C6. The SkyScanner was aimed at moon so they got some quick peeks at old luna. Terry Nakazono, my Malibu observing buddy who came along with me to hunt down some faint fuzzies also took a quick peek at Saturn. The skies were transparent and steady! Plus the temperatures were pretty mild and there was no wind!!! It was the perfect start to the night!

Continuing with the trend of looking at bright and easy stuff, at least till my eyes dark adapt better, I then moseyed over to Lyra to look at M57, the ring nebula. Spent some time gazing at the ring through all my scopes, comparing the views. I was surprised by the views of the ring in the 60mm Meade. It gave quite a nice view for such a small scope! It goes to show what can be accomplished with minimal aperture if you have good enough skies, although I could not really see the hole in the celestial donut. Its looked pretty much like the bloated out of focus star I spied in my CO40 all those years ago. It was kind of silly of me to forget to pack the 9mm MA eyepiece. Wonder if the hole would have been visible at a higher mag. Bummer.

Seeing how Ursa Major was slowly starting to dip below the tree line, I next turned my scopes towards M81 and M82. All three scopes gave a nice image, with the best of course coming from the C6. Extended "arms" were visible radiating from the intense core of M81. M82 showed nice mottling, indicating its star forming regions. The galaxies were visible, abeilt dimly in the 60mm scope. What I really liked though were the views the SkyScanner threw up. They were not as bright as in the 6 incher, but they were bright enough to show detail. The same went for M101, the large low surface brightness galaxy in the great bear. Again I though the SkyScanner gave a better view of this galaxy. Maybe the light was more concentrated in a smaller space due to its extremely wide FOV (400mm vs 750mm focal length). One other object that appeared very nice in the C6 was M97, the owl nebula. With the OIII in place, me and Terry though we could make out the "eyes" of the owl. This feature was not visible in the SkyScanner. I did not even bother trying for it in the 60mm scope, although I am sure it would have been visible.

Since I was in the "realm of galaxies", I thought I should look at the usual suspects and compare them in my different scopes. Next up M51, the whirlpool galaxy. Again aperture reigned supreme. The C6 won hands down, with the SkyScanner coming in a close second, throwing up a lovely image of a lop sided, pear shaped fuzzy. For some strange reason I could not for the life of me get it in the FOV of the 60mm Meade. The 5x25 stopped down finder was a bear to use!!!!!! I think I might have to replace this with a red dot finder since they are more suited to scopes of this aperture. For the remainder of the galaxies, I stopped using the 60mm altogether and just focused on comparing the images between the C6 and SkyScanner. Galaxies observed included NGC 4565, the edge on galaxy with a nice dark lane running through it, M64, the black eye galaxy (the dark region visible in the C6), M104, the sombrero galaxy (best views again at high mag where the dust lane is clearly visible), M106 (extent of the spiral arms were much wider in the C6), the M94, M63, the sunflower galaxy.

After viewing the galaxy fields, I decided to do some summer stargazing, i.e bright nebulae and globular clusters. With the glorious northern and southern milky way stretching from one horizon to the next, who could resist. Started out at the head of the scorpion. The "star-bar (or cats eye whichever way you want to see this) was clearly resolved in the C6, as it was in the SkyScanner. The 60mm also showed this feature, although it was not as obvious. M80 was nice too. I must have been in some weird compartmentalization mode (carry on from my work with brain clones in the lab probably lol) as I decided to look at all the globulars whose locations I had imprinted at the back of my mind. Hit M53 in Coma, then the big and bright globs, M13 in Hercules (very nice propellor effect easily visible), M22, the crackerjack cluster in Sagittarius (M22 always reminds me of Omega Centauri at high power, appearing more like a open cluster than a concentrated globular!), M10 and M12 in Ophiuchus (both very nicely resolved in the C6 too at high mag). The odd one out in this list was M11, the wild duck cluster in Scutum. The is not a globular but a open cluster, but since it is so packed, it appears like a weird shaped glob in small scopes. Again this cluster appeared its best when viewed at in high mag.

As I was perusing, or rather surfing close to the heart of our home galaxy, the milky way, I decided it was finally time for the glorious nebulae filled part of my night, probably the most exciting segment ;) It was also a good time to compare and contrast the effects of the DGM NPB and OIII filters on these nebulae. I manually slewed my scope over to the puff of smoke at the apex of the teapot sprout. Peering into the eyepiece, lo and behold there was M8, the lagoon nebula, and M20, the trifid nebula, just narrowly squeezing into the FOV in the 24.5mm Meade SWA in the C6. Screwing in the NPB filter first and then swapping it for the OIII filter, I had the impression that there was more extended nebulosity with the NPB. The OIII's views did look more contrasty though, but with less overall nebulosity. I think I liked the look with the NPB a whole lot better. The dark lanes in the lagoon and in the trifid did stand out better with the OIII though. Using M20 as a jumping off point, its easy to starhop over to the small Sagittarius starcloud and then move onto one of my fave objects in the sky, M17, the swan nebula and M16, the eagle (or lil ghost nebula as Stephen O'Meara calls it). Did the same thing as with M8 and M20. This time I preferred the views of both objects with the OIII filter. Both the swan and the eagle just looked better with the OIII, especially the swan...the nebulosity looks distinctly more "feathery". After admiring those southern sky gems, it was time to go over and scrutinize some northern sky nebulae in Cygnus.

The north american nebula was nicely framed by the C6, but a more expansive view was required to fully drink in and appreciate the object in its entirety. For this the SkyScanner came up tops. Again the NPB showed more nebulosity. On this extremely transparent night, the pelican nebula was easily visible too. For the veil nebula, however, the OIII views were markedly better than the NPB. The nebula displayed its intricate beaded look with the OIII in place. This was not so obvious with the NPB.

So yeah a great night overall. We finally packed up and drove down the mountain at about 3.30am. By the time we arrived in LA, the sun had started to rise. Geeze. Must remember to leave slightly earlier the next time...or stay overnight if the weather is not too cold. When we left, most people had packed up and either went home or had gone to bed.

Till the next time we meet again, I will look back with fond memories of my 3rd trip to SoCal's temple of the stars.....

A walk on the dark side, a little melancholy.........can music and astronomy save my soul yet again?

I know this may not be the place to write a blog such as this seeing that this is an astro blog. But being kept indoors by the marine layer and being awake at this ungodly hour, plus listening to my fave band and reflecting on life in general, I was moved to pen this. I remember a time, not so long ago when I was down, really down. I did not know where my life was taking me. I was at the crossroads (funny how life always comes full circle and here I am again at the crossroads yet again...maybe I should make a pact with the crossroads demon and seal it with a kiss!). I had my then girlfriend and now beloved wife to keep me afloat and not break down. I also had my music and I had my recently rekindled love for stargazing. It was the year 2003. We had been in Brissie for about a year and a half. I came back when my wife got her scholarship to pursue her grad school, and me, I came back to pursue a dream. Back then I was an idealist, I was untainted and I was not jaded. Life has thrown its fair share of bricks at me. I must admit that I have been pretty fortunate too to be given opportunities to pursue my dreams, firstly my BSc in oz and then grad school with my mentor Dave Merritt. I have also been blessed to be given the chance to work with my current supe Volker. It was a dream and I still feel I live in a dream. Its just like A-ha's song "Living a boys adventure tale". Its funny how I feel my life being interconnected and interwoven so intricately with A-ha's lyrics! I am drifting off again...sorry about that......back to the story.

Listening to A-ha ironically titled album and song Lifelines brought back a whole heap of memories. They were not entirely sad, but then again the feelings were so raw and real. I still feel them now everytime I listen to this album. I had just come out of my research assistant job with Dave. He had run out of funding and found out that he did not have the funds to finance my grad school. We had also put in our permanent residence application a year ago and had not heard back from the aussie government. My only hope lay in getting the PR so I could apply for a local scholarship. There was a real possibility that I would have to leave Brissie and go back home to Malaysia. It was a scary feeling, one of hopelessness and desperation. It was their music and my 6" EQ that kept me company (and my sanity) through this rough patch. I still vividly recall everything. From my times spent out on my balcony facing Stanley Street with my 6" EQ perched precariously facing the northern sky with my 32mm Plossl in the focuser, with Lifelines playing in the background. Back then I also had my 76mm alt az and sometimes used that scope from my second master bedroom balcony. I remember observing right before my wife got home from her lab and before we had dinner.  M6, M7, M4, M22, M8, M17 they were all old friends I had forgotten from my teens. Some new friends, M57 and M27 that I now could see more clearly with my larger scopes. I can still feel the gentle evening breeze on my cheeks, the courseness of the focuser knob, the feeling of the hard bar stool I used as my observing chair, and the soft music drifting in the air. They calmed me, gave my life perspective, allowed me to find and inner strength. I need to rediscover this inner strength once again to battle my current nemesis before it engulfs me whole and eats me alive. The stakes are higher this time, I have to fight to save my family too.......I love them too much to let them go...I have to fight this battle........so my question is, can music and astronomy save my soul yet again?

Total eclipse of the heart (I mean partial eclipse of the sun lol)

Two astronomical extravaganzas in one weekend, how much more can one take! Firstly it was Omega Centauri and now a partial eclipse right in my own front lawn. This was supposed to be an annular eclipse, meaning that the moon is too far to fully obscure the entire disc of the sun, resulting in a ring of fire, rather than a total solar eclipse. However this was only viewable from the northernmost part of CA. From our location in Los Angeles, 86% of the sun would be covered by the moon. According to reports, LA has not had the moon take such a large bite out of the sun in a long time, with the last being an annular eclipse in 1992, that was highly anticipated but ultimately got washed out by clouds. To prepare for the eclipse, I ordered some eclipse shades off amazon.com and was all ready to pony out some cash to NorCal based Orion Telescopes and Binoculars for some Baader mylar filters for my C6. Alas that was not to be as they did not have those filters in stock. I could not justify buying glass solar filters as I don't think I will be using them frequently enough. The mylar ones are good and a tad cheaper! Will have to wait and see if I will eventually get those since they won't be shipping till well after the June 5th transit of Venus.

We were out for the day in Irvine visiting Pretend City (which incidentally is next to Meade Instruments lol) and then getting some groceries. Did not get home till 5pm. Good thing the eclipse started about 5.43pm, with the moon slowly starting to "nibble" away at the sun's disc. I tried shooting the eclipse through my wife's Kodak point and shoot and my eclipse shades without any success. Desperate, I cobbled together my 10x50 binoculars, two pieces of cardboard and my Paragon HD tripod to do solar projection. That too did not work out as well as I had hoped as the image formed was way too small. After fiddling around, I got my Kodak Z990 to take semi decent (albeit shaky) shots of the eclipse. Realizing that the only way I was going to get decent shots was to use the video capture/ photo capture mode, I placed the camera on my Orion Paragon tripod and shot the eclipse through eclipse shades. That was until the marine layer and clouds rolled in and create a natural filter. The end product was quite spectacular, at the peak of the eclipse at 6.38pm.The photos I got were pretty spiffy! Here are some.......

So what's up next....fortunately there will be a Transit of Venus in a couple of weeks time (June the 5th to be precise). This is when the shadow of Venus can be see traversing the disc of the sun! I have seen such a transit before from back home in Malaysia. I got good pictures of this using the solar projection method with my Celestron Cometron CO40. Wish I had my firstscope here.

Night of the Omega

I have been waiting to head back to Solstice Canyon Park in Malibu ever since the last trip there. The main reasons have been to try and see some old southern sky friends such as the good old globby Omega Centauri and radio source/hamburger galaxy NGC 5128 Centaurus A. Got the chance to catch them last Friday night. Terry also happened to be back from his European trip and was itching to try out his Bushnell Ares truss dob on his Orion VersaGo mount. So away we went.

The first stop of the night was of course the above mentioned. Terry got there earlier than I did so he got the first shot at it. We were observing from a small elevated spot inside the park (not my usual next to the car spot).  We both spotted Omega in our scopes (I had with me my Celestron/Vixen C6 6" f/5 on Vixen PortaMount...this setup is much lighter than the C6 on EQ/alt-az mount so it might become my "grab and go" Malibu scope). It looked like a pale ghost of its glory from way up north! Through both our scopes, Omega was barely resolved and appeared faint even. In fact Omega did not look much better than the views I got from back home in my light polluted skies in Malaysia! I guess being this far down, we had to contend with the marine layer and maybe some low level wispy clouds. Best views were at low to intermediate power. While in the region, we also took a sneak peek at Centaurus A, NGC 5128. It was visible, but there was no trace of its dark dust lane. This is so prominent, even in the C6 from southern skies. Oh well at least I can say that I have seen it from way up here in Malibu!

I then went through the "usual suspects", M83 (Hydra), M104 (Sombrero-Corvus), M65/66 (the galaxy pair seemed brighter tonight for some strange reason!), M95/96 (Leo), M94, M81/82 (Ursa Major-same as M65/66, appearing a little brighter), M101 (Ursa Major-looked better tonight in the C6), NGC 4565, M64 (Black Eye Galaxy), M53 (Coma Berenices), the Virgo-Coma Cluster and looked at a few objects that I had previously missed or forgot to look at, such as M63 (Sunflower galaxy) and M106 in Canes Venatici (both bright with some mottling visible in M63); the Corvus Planetary NGC 4361 (nice with the NPB filter in place); NGC 2903 in Leo (another bright galaxy) and NGC 6543 (Cat's Eye Nebula). After looking at M57, the Ring Nebula in Lyra and NGC 6302, the bug nebula in Scorpius later in the night, I was reminded of why I like looking at planetaries. They are just so varied and wonderful, plus they have a high enough surface brightness to render good views at high powers.

Finished off the night with some good old fashion southern sky viewing, perusing the rich starfields close to the heart of our home galaxy. Starting with M4 (nice bar of stars resolved), M80 in Scorpius and then moving onto M8 and M20, the Lagoon and Trifid nebula, onto M17, the swan nebula and finally M16, the eagle nebula. All looked fantabulous with the NPB filter in place with heaps of nebulosity, swirls and dark lanes. Oh and yes did also look at M13. The skies were kinda moist and did not support high magnification. My scope maxed out at 125x with the 6mm TV Radian, with the stars looking blobby. You can't win all the time.......till my next trip there.....

Malibu galaxies on two seperate occasions with two different scopes...niceee

I think I am going to be going to Solstice Canyon Park at Malibu more frequently from now on. I had a chance to go on two separate occasions when the moon was new and out of the way and got heaps of observing done. The site, while not the best dark sky site, offers skies that are dark enough for serious galaxy observation and hunting. The very fact that it is only half an hours drive from where I live makes it a whole lot more accessible than say Mount Pinos. Heck I can even go for in prompto observation sessions during the week! Another plus is that I can easily drive to a nearby ocean site that has clear views of the southern horizon (and therefore I can have access to objects that are otherwise invisible from Pinos). Also it does not get nearly as cold as Pinos (which is pretty much covered in snow for half of the year!). My only gripe with the site is that I cannot drive my car into the park, which pretty much limits which scope I can use. I currently park just outside the barricade that leads into the park and setup my scope there. My weapon of choice is usually my Orion SkyScanner on an Orion HD2F tripod. However my Celestron/Vixen C6 on my newly acquired Vixen PortaMount is just as light and portable, plus it shows more detail in objects (read on to find out), so that setup might get more use in the near future.

Anyways onto the observing sessions. The last time I was there, on a Saturday night, I had with me my C6 on PortaMount configuration, as well as my Celestron Firstscope micro dob (which I used on the bonnet of my car to look at objects which were not that high up in the sky and were skirting the treeline). The first stop, just like on Thursday was M81 and M82. Both galaxies looked better in the C6 (of course with the added aperture advantage) than in the SkyScanner. The main advantage I found using a larger aperture was that I could  increase the magnification to ferret out minute details such as mottling in the main body of the galaxy, etc etc. This was the same for M104, the Sombrero Galaxy in Corvus, as was M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy in Canes Venatici. M104 did not show its dark dust lane or its characteristic somebrero shape in the SkyScanner. This was very evident using the 6mm Radian in the C6. Also I though I could make out the bridge connecting M51 with its companion galaxy, and more of its spiral arms were visible around the nucleus. Other galaxies that showed substantially more detail in the larger scope included M64, the black eye galaxy, NGC 4565 in Coma Berenices (its edge on visage much easier to discern), and M94 in Canes Venatici. All these galaxies benefited from added magnification. The Leo galaxies M65/66/NGC 3628 and M95/96 and M105/NGC 3384/NGC 3389 looked good in both scopes, but again the C6 won out with its greater aperture. I then spent some time just wondering around the Virgo-Coma cluster. This is a superb field to spend some time just surfing from galaxy to galaxy! M83 in Hydra was a disappointment as only the core of the galaxy was visible, even with the C6. I guess this galaxy is southern object and it was not very high in the sky, hence the washed out views. Still better to be able to see it than not at all! The only galaxy that appeared better in the SkyScanner was M101, for some strange reason (go figure). One thing to note though is how spoilt I have become with me using my 10" dob extensively back in Australia. Many of the galaxies looked foreign and even difficult to spot in my smaller scopes. Will have to get used to this until we get a car large enough to transport my 10" dob. Our current Corolla sedan, with the baby seat installed is just not convenient for throw in the back seat observing.

Back to the observing report. As the night progressed, more of the summer constellation started to climb higher into the sky. I got fantastic views of M13, northern hemisphere's best glob (pales in comparison to Omega Centauri and 47 Tuc still...even M22, the crackerjack cluster in Sagittarius). Some of its outer stars showed up in the SkyScanner, although the cluster was cracked wide open with the C6. I noted that the views were very nice even in the Celestron Firstscope! M4 in Scorpius showed its bar of stars in all three scopes, with the brightest views coming from the C6 at high mag. M80 was unresolved in all three scopes. I finished off both nights with M57, the Ring Nebula in Lyra. This still remains my fave planetary nebula as its ghostly annulus is apparent even in the smallest scopes. The ring shape is obvious even in the Celestron Firstscope! Will have to try and image this the next time I am at Malibu!