M30 is a globular cluster (NGC 7099), in Capricornus.
with modified Canon T1i and TEC 140, by Mark Bailey
Best 10 of 12 2 minute eposures = 20 minutes. Stacked in DSS. Processed in PS. Taken at Alpenglow Torrey House Observatory in dark sky community of Torrey, Utah 9/23/2022. Continue reading
This group or asterism of 4 stars M73 (NGC 6994) is also in Aquarius like M72 and M2.
The observatory is mostly working. It has a pointing problem that is fixed by plate solving. Plate solving is the magic where it takes a picture and compares it to where it thinks it’s supposed to be and moves the telescope to where it is supposed to be. So I just tell it to point to M73 and the system does the rest. Continue reading
M72 is a globular cluster, (NGC 6981), in the constellation Aquarius.
modified Canon Rebel / TEC 140 / September 18, 2022
(best 10 of 12) X 120 seconds (20 minutes) Continue reading
There is a waning moon and no clouds so I’m getting a couple quick pictures.
My photo of M2 is below.
Charles Messier- source Wikipedia
Charles Messier was born in 1730. Messier was a comet hunter which led him to continually come across fixed fuzzy objects in the night sky which could be mistaken for comets. He made a list of them so that he and other comet hunters would not be misled by the objects. Continue reading
M10 in Ophiuchus, June 14, 2021
The Antares – Rho Ophiuchus is low enough in the southern sky that I have to catch it while it is as high as possible but before it creeps behind the wall of my windbreak. It is a wide field area so instead of using the camera and scope in the observatory, I set up my modified Canon Rebel with a Canon L zoom lens on my Losmandy G-11 mount on the outdoor cement pier. Almost a year earlier I had set myself a tickler to look for an opportunity to capture this image while it was in the right part of the sky. I really should have just set up in the driveway on the tripod, like I did in the good old days, where I would have had a much longer view without obstruction. But I keep coming up with low objects I want to shoot and I keep having to use the tripod to find a place where I can reach them. Since I didn’t build the outside pier and windbreak for nothing, I used it this time, dammit.
The big surprise was the coma effect on the stars in the corners. I didn’t expect that from an L lens. Makes me appreciate the quality of the glass and configurations of the telescopes I use more. Next time I will stop down at least one stop. I also tried to use a nifty piece of freeware in processing called Dark Master which matches the temperatures of the dark calibration frames with the temperature of the light frames. But instead of helping, it introduced some serious artifacts. I was doing something wrong so I just skipped the darks and used flat and bias calibrations.
It is a crazy gorgeous region in the sky and while I may not have done it complete justice, I’m glad to have it in my gallery.
• Location: Torrey, UT
• Exposure: 2 hours 45 minutes, 5 minute subs
• Lens: Canon EF 24-105mm f/4 L IS USM at f/4
• Mount: Losmandy G11
• Autoguider: Orion Starshoot
• Guide-scope: ShortTube 80mm f/5.0 refractor telescope
• Camera: Gary Honis full-spectrum modified Canon T1i (500D)
• White Balance: Daylight
• Mode: Raw
• ISO: 800
• Acquisition and guiding software: BackyardEOS, PHD2 Guiding
• Calibration: Deep Sky Stacker (no darks)
• Processing: Photoshop CS5
“Republicans are laying the groundwork to refuse to certify a 2024 Democratic presidential victory . . .”
– Opinion by Perry Bacon Jr., Washington Post 5/20/2021
I have a bet with my wife about the Senate filibuster. My bet is that the Biden Administration cannot or will not modify the filibuster enough to allow passage of the pending voting rights acts. Without these acts to stop them, Republicans have all but finished laying the groundwork to overturn the next presidential election. The radical right has been brilliantly working on the statehouses for several decades. This work has been done quietly and effectively. Conversely, the anti-democratic radicals have loudly and egregiously warped the U.S. Supreme Court in their favor. They flagrantly did this right in the Democrat’s face even though they represented a minority of the population. The Republican statehouses have learned they can refuse to certify presidential elections that run in favor of Democrats. When they refuse to certify, the election, as dictated by the Constitution, is thrown to the U.S. House where the election decision is made by one state one vote. Republican states represent a minority of the population but they are the majority of the states and so the democratically decided election will be overturned in favor of a Republican.
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Spring is galaxy season. The Milky Way winds low around the horizon leaving the thin part of the galaxy overhead making the best time to look up and out through our galaxy to other galaxies millions of light years away. The larger galaxies in this image range from 15 million to 40 million light years away. Our galaxy is estimated to be between 150,000 to 200,000 light-years in diameter making these galaxies well beyond the stars and objects inside the neighborhood of our Milky Way.
The two brightest, fuzzy objects in the right center of the screen are the elliptical galaxies M86 and M84. The two galaxies in the upper left are known as “The Eyes.”
Speaking of eyes, in 1823 Wilhelm Olbers used his to look up at night and wondered why it is dark at all.
The following is an excerpt from my upcoming book, Dark Sky, A Portal into Mind and Meaning.
The observatory is fifty feet to the south of the two story house. An eight-foot round dome sits on top of a square ten feet by ten feet building. The walls are stuccoed the same color as the house. The roof is sealed with a color the same as the house roof. The door and trim is near the trim colors of the house although a bit more grey. To the west of the dome twenty feet away is a prow shaped wind barrier made of cement seven feet high protecting a fourteen inch diameter cement telescope pier. All the cement is the same color as the cement foundation of the house which is satisfyingly close to the color of the red rocks and dirt it rests upon. They are simple constructions but somehow at the same time they are complexly attractive icons presenting a standing invitation.
I have called the observatory a “portal to the heavens” and that description is often enthusiastically accepted. From friends to the public, people express eagerness to see it. A couple of times I have been photographed and interviewed by Utah’s newspapers and was featured in a short film.
I wonder what exactly that attraction is. What do people expect to see? What do they want from it? Why do they ask me to come and see it? The location has to be part of it. Just outside of Capitol Reef National Park the area was originally considered to be part of the Park. In almost any other place it would be a monument or a park. Surrounded by red rock cliffs and high alpine plateaus in a rural area where dark skies at night still rule, a lot of people want to come here anyway. Getting away from the city and into the country with a chance to see the stars and Milky Way is a natural attraction, something I think that is similar to an instinct. It is, after all, what we were presented for the vast majority of our human history. Until just a hundred years ago there were no electric lights anywhere to light up the night sky and hide the stars.
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