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This Archive contains "What's New" information from 09/20/05 back to the grand opening in 2004.
9/20/05 Electrical Storm:
The first big electrical storm of the season came on 9/20/05. This image was shot with the Nikon D70 mounted on a tripod. This is a 20 second exposure at f/3.5 with an 18mm lens at ISO 320. This Image is cropped down to abut one quarter of its original field of view and post processed with Neat Image Pro V3.17.
Recent Hydrogen-Alpha Imaging (each about 1.4 MB):
NGC 6888 The Crescent Nebula: 9 x 1200 sec, 9/3/05 from Courtright, CA.
The Pelican Nebula: 9 x 1200 sec, 9/2/05 from Courtright, CA.
M16 The Eagle Nebula: 4 x 1200 sec, 8/12/05 from Glacier Point, CA.
NGC 6334 The Cat's Paw Nebula: 4 x 1200 sec, 8/9/05 from Clovis, CA.
The four images above were taken with the Nikon 150mm aperture, 600mm focal length lens at f/4. The images were taken through the Steve Mandel Nikon adapter, SBIG CFW-8A filter wheel, SBIG ST-10XME CCD camera, Schuler 10nm Hydrogen-Alpha filter, 1x1 binning and at -15 degrees C. All images were shot on the Losmandy G-11 Gemini mount. The dates, exposure times and location are noted next to each image.
New Hardware Configuration, Summer 2005:
Shown above:
Losmandy G-11 with Gemini Goto
Nikon 150mm aperture 600mm focal length f/4 with attached SBIG CFW-8A and ST-10XME
Losmandy Dovetail Side by Side mounting plate and additional counter weights
Meade 10-inch f/6.3 SCT OTA with attached Optec TCF-S focuser and a SBIG Self Guiding Spectrograph with attached ST-7XE CCD camera (Property of CSU Fresno Physics Department).
The New Pier, Completed June 12, 2005:
The Pier is constructed from 6-inch schedule 40 black-pipe with a welded steel cap. Ken Lehman fabricated the laser-cut round 5/16 inch steel cap piece, thanks Ken! The concrete base is isolated from the rest of the patio. The base is made from 650 pounds (dry) of concrete and 39 feet of concrete reinforcing bar (rebar). The pier is filled with concrete and rebar and extends two feet below the slab surface. A Losmandy Meade Field Tripod Adapter is bolted to the steae cap on top of the pier. The pier has been painted black. Construction was completed on June 12, 2005.
7/3/05 Deep Impact Light Curve:
This light curve shows comet 9P/ Tempel 1 brightening after impact. Note that the brightening was almost linear for the first 28 minutes. The inner coma reached a maximum delta magnitude of -0.5, in the V band, within 30 minutes of impact and was followed by some small scale, <5%, flickering. Each image is a 1 minute exposure. The series of images were collected with a Losmandy G-11, Meade 10" SCT at f/5.2, SBIG ST-10XME CCD camera, 2x2 binning, Schuler photometric V filter with a field scale of 2.14 arc seconds per pixel by Greg Morgan and Fred Ringwald from Clovis, California.
7/3/05 Deep Impact Movie:
To start the *.avi animation, click here, 906KB.
This is a series of images that spans 1.5 hours. The animation starts 20 minutes prior to impact and ends 70 minutes after impact. There are a total of 78 frames displayed at 30 fps. Each image is a 1 minute exposure. The series of images were collected with a Losmandy G-11, Meade 10" SCT at f/5.2, SBIG ST-10XME CCD camera, 2x2 binning, Schuler photometric V filter with a field scale of 2.14 arc seconds per pixel by Greg Morgan and Fred Ringwald from Clovis, California.
7/3/05 Deep Impact Mission, Pre and Post Impact Images:
Pre and post impact images of Comet 9P/ Tempel 1 are shown here in false color. Note the outer coma stays about the same while the inner coma brightens. Each image is 111 arc seconds wide. These are part of a series of images collected with a Losmandy G-11, Meade 10" SCT at f/5.2, SBIG ST-10XME CCD camera, 2x2 binning, Schuler photometric V filter with a field scale of 2.14 arc seconds per pixel by Greg Morgan and Fred Ringwald from Clovis, California.
7/3/05 Deep Impact Party:
The notebook on the left shows comet 9P/ Tempel 1 just after impact via a live NASA TV webcast. The notebook on the right shows raw data images as they were being collected live from my telescope outside.
6/13/05 Comet 9P/ Tempel 1:
This is a single 30 second cropped image taken through a 150 mm aperture 600 mm focal length lens @ f/4 with the ST-10XME unfiltered, 1x1 binning. The field is about 1/2 degree wide, North is up and East is to the left.
5/30/05 The Milky Way Galaxy Central Bulge in Hydrogen Alpha Light:
This image was taken through a 20mm Nikon lens at f/3.5, 10nm Hydrogen Alpha filter and with the SBIG ST-10XME CCD camera. This is a stack of 36x300 second frames for a total exposure time of 3 hours. This is a fully calibrated image with 5 each of darks, bias and flats. The image spans a full 42 degrees in width showing nearly all of Sagittarius and all but a few stars of Scorpio. A last quarter moon was not far from the left edge of this image. This was my first extended test run with my new Losmandy G-11 Gemini mount.
5/11/05 Extrasolar Planet Transit TrES-1b Photometric Observations:
This graph shows brightness v.s. time. There is a 0.027 magnitude drop in brightness as the planet TrES-1b crosses in front of it's parent star. Data were collected with a 10-inch SCT at f/5.2 through a V filter by Greg Morgan from Clovis, CA. Data were simultaneously collected with the California State University, Fresno Observatory's 16-inch SCT unfiltered by Fred Ringwald. The blue data points are a running median of 20 data sets and clearly show the transit ingress, egress and duration of 2.4 hours.
5/9/05 Time Lapse Moonrise:
To start the animation, click here or on the image, 3.6 MB.
This time lapse movie is of the moonrise on 4/28/05. The sequence was shot with a tripod mounted Nikon D70 DSLR with a 18mm lens at f/3.5. Each frame is a 30 second exposure with a 3 second delay between each image. I used the DigiSnap 2100 intervalometer made by Harbortronics as an external shutter trigger. The series of images covers about 1 hour. The individual frames were converted to an avi movie file displayed at 15 fps. Jupiter dominates the upper right part of the movie while Arcturus is in the upper left. Spica is the bright star below Jupiter.
5/1/05 Satellite Imagery:
To see your local visible, infrared or water vapor satellite animation, click here to go to the National Weather Service NOAA site. This link has also been placed on the Resources page.
4/23/05 Visiting with Don Machholz:
Don Machholz (right) and myself after Don gave a presentation entitled "My Life as a Comet Hunter" to the Central Valley Astronomers on 4/23/05 at California State University, Fresno. Don has discovered 10 comets over a very disciplined and dedicated 30 year time window. He discovered his first comet in 1978 at the age of 26 and his tenth and most recent comet in August of 2004. Don has visually discovered more comets than any other person in the Northern Hemisphere. Don's shear knowledge of the sky and contributions to astronomy are awe inspiring.
3/12/05 M81:
3/12/05 M81: 10" LX200>Optec TCF>AO-7>0.63x>CFW-8A>ST-10XME at f/5.16, clear filter, 18x300 second stacked images, 1x1 binning, -15C, self guiding at 2 Hz, dark frame subtraction only, no deblooming applied, North is up and East is to the left, the field is 39.0 arc minutes wide, taken from Hensley Lake. All images were slightly out of focus, I will hope for better luck next time.
2/28/05 The Horsehead and Flame Nebula Complex:
2/28/05 The Horsehead and Flame Nebula Complex: 107mm aperture, 300mm focal length (Nikon f/2.8 @ f/4), ST-10XME, 10nm Hydrogen-alpha filter, 6x600 second stacked images, 1x1 binning, -15C, self guiding was done on magnitude 6.69 SAO 132274, fully calibrated with bias, dark, flat and darks for the flats of 3 each. The star in the upper left corner is Epsilon Orionis at magnitude 1.7 and is the center star of Orion's belt. North is to the left and East is down. The field is 114.7 arc minutes (1.9 degrees) tall. The distinctive red emission nebula (IC 434) forms a "curtain" behind an obscuring cloud of non-luminous mass called the Horsehead (B33). IC 434 glows red as a result of the interaction of ultraviolet radiation from Sigma Orionis, the left most star of Orion’s belt. The Flame Nebula, NGC 2024, glows like a flickering candle in the wind just below Sigma Orionis.
2/28/05 The Great Nebula of Orion:
M42, M43 and NGC 1977: Nikon 300mm at f/2.8, ST-10XME, LRGB L=3x10, R=3x10, G=3x10 and B=6x10 second exposures (wow, only 2.5 minutes!), 1x1 binning, -15C. No calibration images were taken, i.e. no darks, no flats, no self guiding.
2/7/05 The Rosette Nebula:
Click on the image to enlarge.
NGC 2244, The Rosette Nebula: 2/7/05, Nikon 300mm at f/2.8, ST-10XME, 7x300 seconds, clear filter, 1x1 binning. Clouds moved in and made collecting color data impossible. No calibration images were taken, i.e. no darks, no flats. North is to the left and East is down. Self guiding was done on GSC 141:662, a very bright guide star at magnitude 4.5 two degrees West of the center of the nebula.
1/12/05 Comet C/2004 Q2 Machholz:
Click on the image to enlarge.
This is a stack of 60x60 second exposures registered on the comet. North is up and East is to the left, the image is 114.7 arc minutes (1.9 degrees) wide. This is 1/2 frame of the ST-10XME with the Nikon 300mm at f/2.8 through the blue filter.
1/12/05 Comet C/2004 Q2 Machholz:
To start the animation, click here or on the image, 1.3 MB.
This animation is a series of sixty frames. Each frame is a one minute exposure with the Nikon 300mm at f/2.8 and ST-10XME through the blue filter.
1/6/05, The Pleiades M45 and Comet C/2004 Q2 Machholz:
To start the animation, click here or on the images, 818 KB.
This is a series of six frames of five minutes each. The left full frame sequence shows how far the comet moved in 30 minutes. The right image is a cropped section of just the comet. The optical set-up used is the Nikon 300mm at f/2.8 with the Nikon D-70, ISO 400. The camera and lens were riding piggyback on the 10" LX200, guiding was done with the SBIG ST-10XME through the LX200.
1/5/05, Comet C/2004 Q2 Machholz:
Comet Machholz was imaged on 1/5/5 when it was closest to Earth at a distance of only 0.35 astronomical units (Au's). This is a single three minute exposure with the Nikon 300mm at f/2.8 with the Nikon D-70, ISO 400. The camera and lens were riding piggyback on the 10" LX200, guiding was done on the comet with the SBIG ST-10XME through the LX200. No dark frame subtraction or flat field calibrations were done, North is up and East is to the left in this cropped image. Notice the fine detail in the small tail to the East and the broad glow in a longer tail, more than 100 degrees different, toward the South. Comet Machholz is my 14th observed comet.
1/4/05, Comet C/2004 Q2 Machholz:
Orbital Elements
The following orbital elements are taken from MPC 53304:C/2004 Q2 (Machholz) Epoch 2005 Jan. 30.0 TT = JDT 2453400.5 T 2005 Jan. 24.9127 TT MPC q 1.205035 (2000.0) P Q z +0.000437 Peri. 19.5064 -0.3200553 -0.7141945 +/-0.000003 Node 93.6239 +0.7651114 -0.5823396 e 0.999473 Incl. 38.5894 +0.5587210 +0.3883386 From 781 observations 2004 Aug. 27-Dec. 18, mean residual 0".5.An explanation of the orbital elements is available.
12/24/04, Castor A & B under very high magnification: Tthe effect of the AO-7:
Stacked images without the AO-7 (larger FWHM, left image) and with the AO-7 (smaller FWHM, right image).
The image scale is 0.15 arc seconds / pixel. The stellar FWHM without the AO-7 = 1.8 arc seconds or 12 pixels. The stellar FWHM with the AO-7 = 1.35 arc seconds or 9 pixels. Use of the AO-7 results in about a 25% reduction in overall size of the stellar profile.
Click here, 764 KB for a full description.
12/11/04, Grand Opening of this website!
12/10/04, M 1:
Since there was no moon and this was the first break from rain for the last two weeks, I wanted to get some imaging done. The temperature dropped down to within three degrees of the dew point by around 1:00 AM. This meant shooting through light fog. So I ended up not being able to shoot all four LRGB channels. I only got Luminance data. This is a summation stack of 7x1200 sec (7x20 minute) frames fully calibrated with 6 bias, 3x20 minute darks, 6x3 sec Lum flats and 6x3 sec Flat darks. 10" LX200 > AO-7 ~12 Hz > 0.63x > CFW-8A > ST-10XME, f/5.16, 1x1 binning, -20C, final image is significantly cropped and resampled.
12/4/04, CVA General meeting. Elections for 2005 and Gadget night.
11/6/2004, Advanced Imaging Conference (AIC):
I attended this conference along with Kevin Hansen and Fred Ringwald from the CVA in San Jose, California http://www.galaxyimages.com/AIC.html. I think my image processing techniques fall in line with the "Histogrammers". Sean Walker from Sky&Telescope wrote a very nice article about the Advanced Imaging Conference, http://skyandtelescope.com/news/article_1393_1.asp. Here are a couple of pictures and some "captions" from the conference by Steve Mandel: http://www.galaxyimages.com/AICpictures2004.html
10/27/04 Total Lunar Eclipse:
What a pleasure it was to shoot "instant" color with the Nikon D-70 DSLR, it made life easy compared to doing multiple RGB's with the ST-10XME. The optical configuration was the 10" LX200 > Optec > 0.63x > Nikon D-70. These are full frame images.
7/23/04 Novae V1186 Scorpii and V1187 Scorpii eruptions:
Nova V1186 Sco was imaged on 7/23/04. The nova, marked, was imaged only 27 days after it was discovered from Courtright. This image is a wide field. It was taken with the Nikon 300mm f/2.8 lens at f/4 and the Nikon D-70 DSLR. The above image is a single 30 second exposure and showes a slight tracking error. Shown above and to the right is the light curve data from the AAVSO for the novae V1186 and V1187 Sco. The vertical lines are the days that spectra data were collected for novae and are illustrated below.
Nova V1186 Sco and V1187 Sco Low-Resolution Spectra Data:
Nova V1186 and V1187 Sco High-Resolution Spectra Data:
