Random Musings: Visual or Astroimaging, my conundrum and where the future is heading

The Conundrum

I think I am having a mid astronomy life crisis. I am sure every astronomer goes through this at some stage. I am still pretty much a grassroots astro dabbler, abeilt a very advanced one. Its funny how things can change. I am now a full on astro imager, with the occasional dabble in visual (more like casual perusing after I finish imaging). I am still not sure what has changed since for the longest time, I never even had the urge to image. I think there are many reasons to this. The move from my beloved southern skies in Australia was a bit catalyst. For one all those glorious southern sky gems are no longer accessible in the northern hemisphere. I remember the first time I got under truly dark skies here in California. That was at Mount Pinos, Los Padres National Park and while the first trip there was magical (there was snow on the ground the first time I got up there!!!!), the northern milky way was not as enticing as its southern counterpart. In fact as soon as I got there, I started looking in the direction of my good old friends, Sagittarius and Scorpius! And till this day, whenever summer comes around, I still point my scopes towards those southern wonders!

Also living in an apartment building for almost 5 years made a difference to the usage of my once frequently used 10" GS dobsonian. We shared a carport with our neighbors and hence I could not store my big scope in the garage for quick trips out to dark skies. Having to lug that beast in two trips meant the scope was getting less and less use. I ended up using my small scopes more, and ultimately replaced my beloved 10" f/5 with a Celestron C8 SCT OTA, one of the best decisions I ever made so far. Now that I have an Orion VersaGo III, this incredible set up gets used heaps. I can easily carry the whole shebang from one location to the other. Also I am not sacrificing that much in terms of aperture (had both scopes side by side and the the 8" went head to head with the 10"...views were consisently just as bright...even on globulars!).

The third factor was the ease in getting quality gear for cheap here in the USA. "Embarrassment of riches" is an understatement. I would have never dreamed of owning a GOTO scope, partly due to my cheap arse mentality. So when I chanced upon a Celestron NexStar 102GT for under $200 in a local Costco, I literally threw my money at them. That was a good thing too since I have not seen such a good deal surface after that fateful Christmas! A similar scope from other vendors go for at least $350 or more! So what if there is only 4,000 objects in its database as opposed to 40,000! I can always upgrade my hand paddle to a more advanced one later on.

Also since I am now in Continental USA (CONUS for short!), buying used gear from Astromart is a whole lot cheaper (postage cost next to nothing so most sellers absorb postage!)! I quickly found used CCD imagers for cheap on Astromart, progressing from a Meade DSI I OSC, to an Orion DSI OSC and currently my Meade DSI II OSC. While these are not top of the line CCD images with big arse chips, the images they throw up are good enough for me, and are pretty much inline with my grassroots imaging thinking. My current basic astro-imaging set up is a lowly Celestron Travelscope 70mm ST OTA, riding on the Celestron NexStar GT mount (similar to the Celestron SLT and Orion StarSeeker II series of mounts!). With this OTA mount combo, I can go for wider fields without the use of a focal reducer, and have an exposure time of up to 30 second without star trails for my subs!

The Future

"Orion Telescopes SkyViewPro mount"

"Orion Telescopes Sirius Mount"

Now that I have moved from my apartment dwelling into a house with a humongous yard, I have started to re-evaluate my equipment yet again. I have come to the realisation that I really love astro imaging and have been having visions of acquiring a much more precise mount for my lil and not so lil scopes. The criteria for the mount would be that it would have to have full GOTO capability with that 40,000++ object database, and be able to handle at least my C8 OTA(12.5lb) for deeper sky imaging. Several mounts spring to mind, an EQ5 class mount (Orion Sky View Pro with a 20 lb load capacity), or better yet an Orion Sirius Mount (30 lb load capacity), if I go by the two times load capacity rule! I am leaning more towards the latter since the next step up is the monstrosity of a mount, the Synta EQ6 or Orion Atlas mount, that is almost twice the weight of the Sirius mount! If I were to acquire such a mount, I would probably start imaging from home more, and would probably have to invest in a autoguider (shouldn't be to hard to get a used one) and some narrowband imaging filters.

"Meade LightBridge 16"

That said, I have always dreamed of owning that big dob that would let me go really deep. A few years ago, the 10" was doing wonders for me, as I had more free time and darker skies in the outback in Australia. However my lust for more faint light has led me to this conclusion, I would have to make a substantial jump in aperture to take my views of dim fuzzy's with little or no detail (The jump from 10" to 12.5" side by side convinced me of this. A good example is galaxies, in this case NGC 1365 in Fornax. Detail in the spiral arms were "detectable" in the 10" and 8", but looked more like a photograph with averted vision in my buddy's 12.5"!) to details jumping out at you! My dream scope would have to be in the 14" to 16" range. Budget for this would have to be between $1600 and $2000 for a 16" class scope. These would also have to be truss, and since I am still pretty much a cheapskate, I will be looking at purchasing a mass produced scope (i.e. they will be heavy in comparison to the premium dobs out there). One of the strikes against this is I can see myself finding excuses to not use the scope as set up and takedown would be increased! So for the price would I get one of them heavy SkyWatcher or Meade Truss tube dobs, or pay a little bit more for a light weight Hubble optics scope. Only time will tell!

"Hubble Optics 16" UL"

The galaxies of Sextan's, from the red zone 10th April 2015

"Spiral Galaxy NGC 2967 (mag 11.6) Sextan's"

Imaging galaxies is possible from less than perfect skies. All you need is a little patience and a Orion SkyGlow imaging filter :) It also helps when the galaxies are of the small elliptical kind. I had the idea of trawling Sextan's for galaxies after reading an article on Sextan galaxies in Astronomy Magazine's Stars and Galaxies. Most of them are dim'ish but due to their high surface brightness, they were easier to bag.

"NGC 2974 (mag 11), in case you were wondering, the galaxy is on the top left hand corner next to a bright star, Sextan's"

Anyway enjoy these till I get out to dark skies again and try for the fainter ones in the Virgo-Coma region! Exposures are 8x30sec using the Meade DSI II OSC, Celestron Travelscope 70 OTA and Celestron NexStar GOTO mount.

"Spiral Galaxies NGC 3166 and 3169 (mag 10.3), Sextan's"

"Spiral galaxy NGC 3423 (Mag 11.6) Sextan's"

and a special bonus, Leo ellipticals:

"Ellipticals NGC 3607 (mag 10.8) , 3608 (mag 10.8) , with two other smaller galaxies 3605 and 3599"

I have galaxies pouring out of my ears. Another realm of galaxies imaging run. Saratoga Gap 28th March 2015

"NGC 4214 a dwarf barren irregular galaxy in Canes Venatici, Mag10.2"

The title says it all. I have gone stark galaxy raving mad. My current list of targets are all galaxies. Well this is what happens when you have done all the brighter DSO's and can now fully concentrate on the dimmer fare. It also helps that this is galaxy season as we turn away from the spiral arms of our home galaxy and can peer deep into the void where other island universes roam. Its not such a bad thing. There are so many galaxies in the Leo-Virgo-Coma-Canes and Ursa Major regions that making up an imaging list is child's play. I am really digging my current imaging schedule. Also I have learnt so much about my set up that I can now routinely bag dimmer fare. The familliarity with the stacking and processing software make a big difference too! My main problem now is my images are too red. Might have to use the Orion Skyglow imaging filter to tone down on the reds.

"NGC 4244 an edge on loose spiral galaxy in Canes Venatici, mag 10.2"

Having done most of the Messiers, the bulk of the galaxies on my list are now NGC's. This time round I had some fave's that I had seen and sketched in the past from Australia. These included NGC 4656, the Hockey Stick Galaxy and NGC 4631, The Whale Galaxy and its baby, both found in the constellation of Canes Venatici. I am very much in imaging mode at the moment so its imaging from the get go. Somewhere along the way, I lost my visual observing mojo. My plans are to image all that I can and then if there is some left over down time, I do some visual. I am also loving my new high capacity laptop battery as it has such a long life span. Haven't tested it full yet but after almost 3 hours of imaging, the battery was only half used! Nice.

"NGC 4274 spiral galaxy in Coma Berenices, mag 10.4"

The aims for my next imaging run at Saratoga Gap are to mine the galaxy fields of Leo and Sextan's. Stay tuned!!

"NGC 4414, an unbarred spiral galaxy in Coma Berenices, mag 11"

"NGC 4449, irregular galaxy in Canes Venatici, mag 10"

"NGC 4490, the cocoon galaxy and NGC 4485 in Canes Venatici, mag 9.8"

"NGC 4535 barren spiral galaxy and NGC 4519 in Virgo, mag 10.7"

"NGC 4559 spiral galaxy in Coma Berenices, mag 10.4"

"NGC 4631 Whale Galaxy in Canes Venatici with its baby elliptical NGC 4627; Mag 9.8; Edge on spiral galaxy"

"NGC4656 Hockey Stick Galaxy in Canes Venatici, mag 11"

"NGC 4699 Spiral Galaxy in Virgo, mag 11.9"

"NGC 4725 in Coma Berenices. Intermediate barren spiral, mag 10.1"

"NGC 4762, barren lenticular galaxy in Virgo, mag 11.3"

Note all images taken with a Meade DSI II OSC with a Celestron Travelscope 70mm OTA on a NexStar Alt Az GOTO mount, no focal reducers and no filters from an orange zone site. Subs for all are 8x30 seconds unless indicated and captured using Meade Envisage Software.

Enter the realm of the galaxies Part 1.....Saratoga Gap Deep Sky Imaging Report 14th Feb 2015

"NGC 4567/4568 Siamese Twins Virgo"

As winter gives way to spring, the weather warms up and the bright constellations of winter begin to fade into the west, while a different set of constellations emerge from the east. Winter is great for visual observing as it holds some of the brightest and most interesting DSO's (M42, the great nebula in Orion; M45, the Pleiades Cluster, and the double cluster in Perseus immediately spring to mind). That and plus the longer nights and clearer and steadier skies. Now that I have imaged most of the brighter fare, and re-imaged a lot of the more popular objects with my Meade DSI II OSC camera, it was back to the books time for me to do research on some of the other DSO's I have not imaged, which are attainable with my equipment. The advantage of imaging over visual is that a lot of the minute detail that is lost with observing with smaller apertures from less than perfect skies become an easy catch. Therefor my plan was to make a list of bright (relatively speaking!) spiral galaxies, seeing that we are now just about ready to make the hyperspace jump into the realm of galaxies. Leo, the lion rises earlier and earlier in the night and can now be comfortably observed at about 10.30 pm. The forest of galaxies in Virgo-Coma Berenices comes up a little later. By 12 midnight, most of these galaxies are high in the sky!

"M58 Virgo"

"M61 Virgo"

For this purpose, I needed a reference that had black and white images of galaxies and technical data on the objects. Maps wasn't a pre-requisite as I was going to use the GOTO on my NexStar mount anyways. The book I pulled from my DSO library was Robert Allen Thompson's Illustrated Guide to Astronomical Wonders. This book was reviewed in my last blog so I will not go into the details. This book fulfilled all my requirements. With that I set out to make a list. I focused mostly on the constellations covered by the realm of galaxies, namely Virgo, Coma Berenices and Canes Venatici. As I had imaged some of the galaxies in this region, I had to go back and forth with my list to make sure there were no overlaps and if these galaxies have been imaged with the DSI II. My plan is to image the brighter Messier's before delving into the NGC and IC galaxies. The list I came up with for phase 1 included M58, M61, M88, M90, M91, M98, M99, M100, and at the last minute I added the Siamese Twins NGC 4567. Seeing I had just procured a brand new high capacity battery for my HP Pavillion DV2000 laptop, I have now effectively stretched my mobile imaging time by double (meaning at minimum, if the battery works as promised, I should get about 5 hours worth of imaging!). That's plenty seeing how the last battery only lasted at max 2 1/2 hours.

"M88 Coma"

"M90 Virgo"

"M91 Coma"

Fortunately for me, the GOTO worked pretty well right off the bat. I think the trick to getting your GOTO to be more spot on is to select a alignment star that is as close to your targets as possible. That is unless you are targeting objects that cover the entire sky. Thankfully that time has passed for me and I am now narrowing down my imaging window to just the Coma-Virgo region. Things progressed rather smoothy and in a little under 2 1/2 hours I had imaged all my targets, and threw in a few repetitions such as M49, that bright elliptical in Virgo; galactic smiley face M84/M86 group; as well as M60. I was a real happy camper at the end of the night. Having bagged all my objects, plus a couple of others, and even did two hours of visual observing while waiting for Virgo and Coma to rise higher in the sky. So yes the next couple of post you see from me will probably be galaxy images as I slowly, but surely, make my way through the throngs of island universe in this part of the neighborhood. Peace out!

"M98 Coma"

"M99 Coma"

"M100 Coma"

Book Reviews Part 3

Deep Sky Wonders By Sue French

This is yet another book destined to go down history as one of the compediums that is a must have for deep sky aficionados. As the title suggest, this book is a collection of articles from the deep sky column in the Sky and Telescope  magazine. You must be wondering why this book shares the same name as another Sky and Telescope publication of the same moniker. The reasons for this is simple, this book is the modern version of its older counterpart. The column used to be penned by none other than Walter "Scotty" Houston. When he passed on, the heavy burden of writing this column came to fall on the shoulders of Sue French. Fortunately for us, Sue is just as eloquent and experienced as Scotty was. Her column is one of the reasons why I still read Sky and Telescope today. Her pieces are a mix of history, astrophysics and anecdotal notes from her own observing diary, as well as quotes from other astronomers. What I particularly like about her columns is that she uses scopes of different sizes, from small refractors to large dobsonians, so she has descriptions that can be used by observers of all levels. She also includes her own sketches of some of the objects in the article. This book is split into seasons and, unfortunately is printed on glossy paper and is more suitable as a coffee table book, rather than a field guide. It is also not very thick.

Visual Astronomy of the Deep Sky by Roger N Clarke

"Visual Astronomy of the Deep Sky"

One of the very hard to get classics for deep sky collectors, I recently chanced upon a reasonably priced copy on Astromart (I have seen this book go for over a $100!) and got it just in time for Christmas. The hard cover is a fairly nondescript yellow, with a black and white photo and sketch of M51. There is a reason why M51 was chosen as the cover DSO. There is a whole article on visual observing of M51, and the analysis of surface brightness versus optimum magnification for detection of minute details. This book also happens to read a whole lot like Stephen O'Meara's Deep Sky Companion Series. Indeed the format of this book is very similar to Stephen's works, with the focus mostly on visual deep sky observing and ferreting out minute details under different sky conditions and magnifications. The text is not as through as O'Meara's tomes as he does not delve into the astrophysics and lore as much. He also happened to do the bulk of his sketches from Hawaii! The meat and potatoes section of the book are the description and detailed sketches of 90 deep sky objects ranging from open clusters to galaxies and nebula. Some of the more famous objects are given star treatment, meaning they have more than one sketch to depict the effects of differing sky conditions (seeing and transparency) and magnification. Three examples of these include M42, M51 and The Veil Nebula in Cygnus. Overall a great book, and a must for collectors of all things deep sky!

Illustrated Guide to Astronomical Wonders by Robert Bruce Thompson

"Illustrated Guide to Astronomical Wonders"

I got this book because I enjoyed Robert's book entitled Astronomy Hacks so much. That book was an excellent book for tinkerer's as it was a compilation of hacks (or shortcuts) from a variety of sources that were directly applicable to astro related gizmos (i.e. improving the smoothness of the azimuth on dobsonian bases using washers fashioned from old CD's and milk jug cutouts!). The book reviewed here is like a hack of sorts, but for visual astronomers. It has a brief intro about equipment (i.e. telescopes, eyepieces, filters), but does not delve too deeply as this topic has already been covered in his previous book. Still what's presented here is sufficiently detailed for a newbie astronomer. What is presented in this book is a rather comprehensive selection of deep sky objects arranged by constellation. While there are no sketches in the book like a lot of the other deep sky guides, this book is very complete in terms of the number of objects covered and the visual description of what can be seen in each (with garden variety 50 mm binoculars, a 50 mm finder and a 10" dobsonian, Robert's scope of choice). In terms of maps, this book has the best I have seen by far for star hoppers. Deep maps are included in the book and the objects are segregated by constellation, a format I prefer over the grouping by season which some guidebooks seem to like. A table also accompanies each constellation with the data on the objects such as the magnitude, size, celestial coordinates. Due to the sheer volume of objects, this is a rather thick book. Pros is that is is printed on rather light paper so the softcover book is rather light in comparison to some of the other books. Cons there are no color pics (but then again the black and white pics are closer to what you might actually see through your eyepiece!) and the paper is not glossy and therefore is not very suitable to be used out in the field. A great book for planning your observations!

The Urban Astronomer's Guide by Rod Mollise

"The Urban Astronomers Guide"

If the name sounds familliar, it is because this book is written by none other than Old Uncle Rod, SCT aficionado and frequent contributor to astronomy magazines. Uncle Rod also writes a weekly blog (updated every Sunday and not to be missed as his writing style is very whimsical and engaging!) and  also another book on SCT's. Here he gives us the run down on what is visible from light polluted skies, with the objects split based on the seasons. Yes urban astronomy is alive and yes you can spot quite a number of deep sky objects from your light polluted playground, quite the contrary to what most people believe! Most city and suburb bound astronomers resort to observing only double stars, open clusters and inner solar system objects. This greatly limits the number of objects to scrutinize. Uncle Rod highlight the objects visible from less than pure skies. As Uncle Rod puts it, better to observe more frequently than to hold out for that one dark sky weekend a month, that sometimes does not even materialize due to the vagaries of the weather. The convenience of being able to stroll outside, set up a scope and just observe cannot be beat. Uncle Rod encourages you to even try some grab and go astronomy on weekday nights, something that is just not possible if you had to drive an hour or more to get to the site. That way you get out more and observe more. Uncle Rod outlines what you need for a successful observing session in the suburbs. I have owned three books now on urban observing, one from Sky and Telescope and this book is by far the most comprehensive of the three. Highly recommended for urban dwellers who don't have the luxury of traveling to darker sites, and for those looking to expand their observing to include backyard astronomy. Detailed notes are accompanied by at the eyepiece sketches from Uncle Rod. Highly recommended!

Books reviews Part 2

Astronomy Magazine Presents:
"Deep Sky Observing with Small Telescopes" by David J Eicher
"The Universe From Your Backyard" by David J Eicher
"Stars and Galaxies" by David J Eicher

I am going to review all three of these books in one fell swoop as they are similar in many ways and were all published in the mid to late 80's by current Astronomy Magazine edition David J. Eicher. David has been a prolific writer and editor, and has been writing for Astronomy since as long as I can remember. He is most famous for his sketches in the early Astronomy Magazine spotlights on deep sky objects, by constellations, and also for his work on Deep Sky Magazine, still viewed by many as the definitive source for all things Deep Sky. I don't have the entire collection, but I tried to get as many of the copies as I could (some of which I got directly from David himself at Astronomy when he was selling extra copies of the magazine!) All three of the books above are collections of articles from the very pages of Astronomy magazine itself, and the now defunct Deep Sky Magazine (which is now available in its entirety in pdf format at Astronomy Magazines Online Store).

"Deep Sky Observing with Small Telescopes"

One of the books that remain as one of the most used books in my visual deep sky observing arsenal is "Deep Sky Observing with Small Telescopes". I first came across this brilliant deep sky guide in the Physical Sciences/ Engineering library at the University of Queensland while doing graduate school. I continued to renew the book over and over again for quite a while. Surprisingly no one else booked the book. I even made copies of some of the more relevant parts of the book. I now finally have a copy of this brilliant book. Got it off amazon.com for an amazingly low price. This book features excerpts from Deep Sky Magazine and basically categorizes deep sky objects by class (open cluster, globular clusters, nebulae, galaxies) and starts off with an introduction into each class. This is then followed up by detailed examples of some of the better members of their groups (complete with eyepiece impressions, black and white photos and descriptions of what you can see at the eyepiece in different sized scopes, up to 6" scopes). All of these usually end with a sampling of the harder objects in their respective classes. The book also comes with a list of objects at the end of the book that list the object's magnitude, size, celestial coordinates and short notes. The one drawback to this guide is the lack of maps, but this can be easily remedied by using this book alongside a chart, say Wil Tirion's Sky Atlas 2000.0.

"Astronomy Magazines: The Universe from Your Backyard "

Astronomy Magazine used to be my definitive source for visual deep sky observing when I first got into the hobby of amateur astronomy in the early 80's, simply because of one column/article, their monthly spotlight on a single constellation and all the interesting objects found in each constellations. This was a good jumping off point for me as they featured brighter (as well as sometimes dimmer) fare. The articles were pretty detailed and provided physical data on these objects (apparent magnitude, size, coordinates) in the form of a table, as well as detailed descriptions on their appearance through different apertures, color astrophoto's of these objects, as well as my absolute fave, eyepiece impressions from Dave himself. This was the main reason I hung onto all the Astronomy magazines I bought throughout the 80's and 90's. The good people at Astronomy magazine probably knew how many people were ardent fans of this column from way back. So what do they do? They compile all their monthly constellation articles into one book entitled "The Universe From Your Backyard". Now I have all the articles in one book booyah. This book does one up on the former in that it also has a simple map showing the relative positions of the objects in relation to the constellation. Unfortunately this is no longer in print and is only available now on the used market. I bagged a excellent copy on Astromart. The book does pops up from time to time on amazon.com.

"Astronomy Magazines: Stars and Galaxies"

Other than the monthly constellation spotlights, Astronomy Magazines also ran observing articles spotlighting different type of deep sky objects by type from time to time. These articles were less predictable as they were not run on a monthly basis. The advantage of these articles however were that they were written by accomplished deep sky observers. These articles usually contained a table of objects covered with physical data. Most of these were very descriptive in nature so they were extremely helpful. Objects covered including observing the local galaxy group, observing galaxies with binoculars (yes it is possible!), observing the planetaries of summer. Occasionally you got articles on observing more obscure fare such as observing summer's dark nebulae. These articles were a lot harder to collect as well due to their random nature. I was so happy that Astronomy Magazine came through again and compiled and published a book featuring all these articles, entitled "Stars And Galaxies". Again this is only available on the used book market but it is worth hunting down in my opinion. A great addition to a deep sky observers library.

"Deep Sky Wonders" by Walter Scott Houston

"Deep Sky Wonders: Scotty Version"

This is one of my all time favourite deep sky books, written by the late Walter Scott Houston. There are two versions of this book now, one published in hardback and the other a paperback version. My observing buddy Andrew Durick was the one who introduced me to this book. After reading it, I knew I had to add this to my library! The book was named after the column in Sky and Telescope. Way back in the day, Scotty, as he was fondly known as used to pen a small column simply entitled Deep Sky Wonder's. It was the one column that held wonder for me as a teenager starting out in the world of amateur astronomy. This article was a like a breath of fresh air in a sea of technical articles, which comprised the old Sky And Telescope magazine. Scotty was here to teach, inspire and even challenge us as deep sky observers to push the boundaries of visual observing. His tools of the trade was a 5" binoscope. This book is a collection of his columns, that in later years blossomed into a full page article. The layout of the book is such. Unlike O'Meara's Deep Sky Companion series, the book is not split by objects, rather by seasons. Due to the nature of the columns/articles, you may sometimes see an object mentioned more than once in different articles. But Scotty always kept it fresh, infusing his articles with extra information, so the overlap was welcomed! Scotty was also not afraid to go against the norm and challenge visual observers to push the boundaries, and then write back to him if they succeeded. A fitting tribute to a great visual observer, this highly readable book is a must for visual deep sky observing enthusiast!

"Cambridge Messier Deep Sky Album" by Jack Newton

"Cambridge Deep-Sky Album"

This is one of the books I discovered whilst browsing in the Physical Sciences/Engineering library at the University of Queensland, and it was one of the books that was on constant loan by me for years. I only recently acquired a mint condition used book off amazon.com. I just had to add this to my ever growing collection of books on deep sky objects!  This "old school" hard cover book, published by Cambridge Press and authored by Jack Newton and Philip Teece would probably feel out of place and dated with all the new fangled sophisticated imaging equipment currently available. Most of the current CCD and DSLR images of deep sky objects available on the internet and in magazines now give newbies a false impression of what is actually visible at the eyepiece! Technology has come so far in that astrophoto's captured these days rival those taken by professional observatories! This is the unique part of this book. The photos taken by Jack Newton, a renowned astrophotographer, reflected the level of detail you could see in a smallish scope from dark enough skies (minus the colors of course). To me that was one of main draw cards of this book as I worked my way through all the Messier Objects with my 76mm and 150mm newtonian reflector from suburban and rural skies above Queensland, Australia. It was fun to compare my sketches with Jack's astrophoto's to see if I had detected spiral arms in a brighter galaxy, or even detecting one of the fainter ones in a star spangled starfield! The photos also had accompanying text and physical data about the objects like the size, type and apparent magnitude of the objects. What is even more helpful is that all the objects were imaged with the same gear, and they are all therefore to scale with one another, another plus. What this book will NOT do is help you starhop to the Messier's, so if that is your goal, look up Turn Left at Orion, another very highly recommended guidebook that I might add to my library someday.

"Touring the Universe with Binoculars" by Phil Harrington

"Touring the Universe Through Binoculars"

Another tour de force by veteran astronomy writer Phil Harrington of Star Ware fame, this is one of Phil's classic books. Many beginners are not aware that garden variety binoculars (i.e. 7x50 to 10x50 mm binoculars) can be used for serious observing. In fact a lot of veteran observers suggest starting with binoculars for astronomy, rather than purchasing a christmas trash telescope that comes with inadequate mounts with the consistency of a wet noodle. Phil's love for two eyed observing is very evident throughout the book. There is something to be said about observing with two eyes as opposed to monocular observing through telescopes. Sure for high powered views of planets and the moon, one needs a telescope. However the use of both eyes for observing brings with it added benefits. The comfort factor for one. Also studies have shown that there is a marked increase in how deep one can see using two eyes as opposed to one. In fact it has been shown that there is a 20% improvement. In effect, it is almost like using a larger aperture. For instance using a 80mm giant is akin to using a 100 mm telescope. I have personally compared the two side by side and I can say that the approximation is fairly accurate. The book covers over 1000 objects including inner solar system objects. If there there is a con with this book, it would have to "again" be the lack of finder charts. Its a good book for indoor observing program planning, not so much for in the field use.

So concludes part 2 of my book review. I still have several other deep sky observing books that I will review in upcoming blogs. Stay tuned for more....

Comet Lovejoy Q2 and the Seven Sisters, 19th of Jan 2015

On the 18th and 19th of January, Comet Lovejoy Q2, at its brightest at magnitude 3.5, passed very close to the picturesque Pleiades Cluster (M45), also known as the seven sisters, in the constellation of Taurus. Since the skies were clear from San Jose I though I head out and shoot the comet with my Kodak Z990 bridge camera operating at ISO 1600 f/2.8 on my Orion Paragon HD-F2 photo tripod. With its backlit CMOS chip, I usually get fairly decent shots at the lower end of the zoom range. Even when focused at infinity, the camera sometimes has problems focusing on dim stars. With that in mind I went with the lower end of the zoom range and took 8x16 second shots with the 10 second timer to eliminate camera shake. The images were then resized in photoshop, stacked in MaxIM DL and processed in PS. Here are the results...enjoy..

"Comet Lovejoy Q2 is the fuzzy green object to right side of M45, slightly lower than the seven sisters"