Non-Astro post

Strange title isn't it?  Well, I thought I'd post a picture of our Christmas tree here in Maryland.  After thinking about what might be in my future if I set up the 6' tree with all the trimmings having a very rambunctious 7 month old puppy around to notice all the cool new toys hanging just where she could get them, I decided that just a smaller tree on a table would suffice for this year.  And what could be better than a Star Trek tree??

So here it is, with the complete Hallmark Star Trek system.  The ornaments are based on the "Mirror Mirror" episode.  Each figurine has a specific sound track, the Enterprise has multiple lighting effects, and when the command insignia on the Star Trek emblem ornament is pressed a complete segment of the episode is voiced.

Hardware fixed; Imaging - not so much :)

Last evening we had a rather nice, clear and crisp night, which would generally be a great time to image nebulae. Only problem - the nearly full moon. So, rather than waste the opportunity I decided to mount my ZS61 wide field telescope and experiment with determining why I was getting such awful star images about the edges of the frame. 

This problem occurred last month when I was trying to photograph some wide-field nebulae. I thought it was just incorrect back focus adjustment, but then after a few hours of adjusting and readjusting I sent a note off to William Optics claiming that I may have a defective field flattener/focal reducer. I had heard that there were a number of units that had a defect, and since I got mine for a Christmas present from my wife last year (only got around to getting it configured this year!) I thought maybe I received a defective unit. WO told me that I may need to mount the camera on the flattener while the telescope was upside down to eliminate any tilt.

So I installed the ZS61 on top of my two other telescopes and when attaching the camera to it I realized that all this time I was setting the back focus incorrectly (I attribute this to old age!). Instead of measuring from the camera sensor back to the flattener (as WO tried to explain in their instructions - which weren't very clear) and then adding in spacers to make the total distance 56mm, I was assuming that the total spacing from the flattener side needed to be 56mm. I was about 20-25mm too long! Once the proper spacing was determined and the correct spacer installed I was ready to test the ZS61 with my ASI2600 camera.

Initial tests confirmed that indeed there was no defect in the flattener and the system behaved wonderfully. I still need to fine tune the spacing but I'm really close and pleased with the results.

Not desiring to waste the rest of the evening I set up to image the flaming star nebula, IC 405, in Ha light. I figured that my Ha filter was narrow enough to work even though the moon was only about 20 degrees to the east of the nebula. I took a 180 sec, 300 sec and 600 sec exposure. My normal process is to image the stars in RGB at 60sec and the narrowband data at 300sec. However, I've been thinking that I need to increase my exposure times to 10 minutes to gather more signal. The results of the three runs showed significant improvement using the 600sec time. This, of course, has its drawbacks - if anything goes wrong during that long exposure (plane or satellite crossing, wind, etc.) 10 minutes of precious imaging time is wasted. And you need to spend a lot more time to get the 30+ images to reduce the noise and increase signal-to-noise ratio. But the result seems to indicate its worth it.

So I set the sequence to run forty 10min subs of IC 405. 

Today I started to process the Ha data from the run last night. As soon as I ran the Subframe Selector process on the images to reject the poor ones (stars that trailed; any dim image due to possible clouds; etc.) I realized that I was in trouble. ALL the subs were bad - yep, all 40! I had totally miscalculated the ability of my mount to track, unguided, for the long exposure time. Now my mount is certainly capable of doing so provided I run a sky model prior to the imaging run. Without that I would need active guiding. Well I didn't create the model, didn't use active guiding and so the images suffered for it. The trailing was too great. Argh. So be it; I'll set up again early next week when the skies should be clear with much reduced moon interference. At least I got the ZS61 working well.

Upcoming occultation of Mars

On the evening of December 7-8, 2022, those of us in the mid and western US will get a great opportunity to view a somewhat rare occultation of Mars by the moon.  For us in the east-southeast it will be a near miss. But it will be very close and definitively worth viewing.

During the month of December, Mars reaches opposition - a point that places the Earth directly between the planet and the Sun. And although this opposition wont be as close as the one 2 years ago, the planet is placed in a much. much better location in the sky - high up where atmospheric distortions and dimming are minimized. Most everyone is familiar with the constellation of Orion, the hunter. Mars is located above the hunter and can't be missed as it is glowing a bright red during the month. Its in a great location for anyone wanting to image the red planet. I may try myself later in the month if the weather cooperates.

So, with the combination of a fully illuminated Mars and a bright full moon, this year's occultation should be a real interesting event. Get those binoculars out and take a look. How long can you see Mars with the naked eye as the moon slowly encroaches on the planet before the moon's bright glow overpowers Mars' dimmer rusty red appearance? In areas where the planet will be completely covered, can you see it right up to disappearance? Mars makes it's closest approach to the Moon at about 10:50pm on December 7, 2022. Unlike star occultations where the star blinks out instantaneously (since stars are effectively just points of light due to their immense distance from us), planetary occultations take much longer as the moon gradually hides more and more of the planet's disk. 

I've provided a sample view of what Mars and the moon may look like from Baltimore, Maryland, as well as a graphic of the path Mars takes behind the moon for various locations.

Mars and Moon from Baltimore - approximatly 10:50pm Dec 7, 2022

2022, Sky and Telescope

For details on the opposition of Mars, and additional info on the occultation, head on over to Sky and Telescope. 

Artemis 1 cubesat has a problem

Artemis 1, the first mission of the Artemis program to return astronauts to the moon was launched successfully November 16, 2022, at 01:47:44 EST. It's mission - to test the Orion spacecraft, especially its heat shield. The Orion capsule is currently in orbit around the moon. Secondary missions include ten CubeSats, also on a trajectory to the Moon. 

One of those sats, the LunaH-Map spacecraft, failed to ignite it's engine, probably due to a stuck valve (how many times have we heard that one before). Read the complete story at Space.com.

Total Lunar Eclipse of Nov 8, 2022

The last total lunar eclipse until March of 2025 is now in the past.  At first, I didn't expect to see it let alone photograph it as the weather forecasts were all calling for high cirrus clouds from 3:00am to 7:00am. The partial would phases would be OK, but if the moon goes really dark during the total phase, the clouds may have made it near impossible to see.

I prayed before I left the house for the skies to clear. I was planning to drive to my church in Westminster MD since the tree line surrounding my house where the permanent scope is set up doesn't allow any views of objects lower than 25 degrees and most of the event would occur at 20 degrees or less, with mid eclipse at 10.

Arriving at the church around 3:15am the western sky was covered with cirrus clouds, some fairly thick. I decided to setup my portable WO GT102 refractor with my Canon 50D as the imaging camera. Once I had everything ready to go I started taking a few exposures and soon after first contact with the umbra the skies cleared and remained so for the whole event - praise the Lord!

There were, however, a couple of issues. One was I forgot to pack the cable for my remote shutter release, so I had to trigger it by hand, which would potentially cause some vibration of the scope during exposures greater than 1/100 second. Second, was the wind, typical for the location at my church which is at the top of a hill - great 360 degree views, but usually has a breeze. At first it was manageable, but when totality was about to commence (requiring the longest exposures) it really picked up, with gusts reaching 20MPH.

But I was still able to get a few good shots. The first image is a montage of subs from first contact to full phase.

Details of the exposures are as follows:

              Time             Exposure

Image   (EST)   ISO  (sec)

  1          4:06    400  1/1000

  2          4:17    400  1/1000

  3          4:26    400  1/1000

  4          4:55    400  1/200

  5          5:06    400  1/60

  6          5:14    400  1/10

  7          5:17    800  1/20

  8          5:18    800  1

The second image is the moon near mid-eclipse. Time: 5:50am, 2 sec, ISO800.

I did take one other photo. That was my setup, at 5:49, that I took with my iPhone. Considering I had to hold it as steady as I could for 3 seconds it came out pretty good. You can even see the Pleaides just above the moon.  All in all, a great evening (or should I say, morning!).

Upcoming Lunar Eclipse - November 8

The last Total Lunar Eclipse until 2025 will be coming our way on early Tuesday morning, November 8, 2022.  And I mean 'early'. The partial phase starts at 4:09 EST, with total starting at 5:16 EST, lasting until 6:42 EST. 

Not only is this an early morning event, but the moon will be quite low in the western horizon. When the total phase starts the moon will only be about 15 degrees high in the western sky for us here in the Maryland/Washington DC area. So you'll need to find a clear view to see it. The moon will set while it's still total, so we can only watch the first half of the event.

Right now, as I post this, the weather is so-so, with clear skies up to the start of the event and high, cirrus clouds getting in the way during the event. Depending on the thickness of the clouds and how dark the moon will be you may loose it from view. Dusk will really make things worse around 5:50.

Lunar eclipses are can easily be observed with the naked eye, but binoculars will really enhance the view.

Full details on the eclipse can be found at Sky and Telescope.

More from the JWST - Fingerprints in Space

A new image from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope reveals a remarkable cosmic sight: at least 17 concentric dust rings emanating from a pair of stars. Located just over 5,000 light-years from Earth, the duo is collectively known as Wolf-Rayet 140 (NASA).

When I first saw this I though for sure it was a test of the optics. Complete story can be found at: NASA

The Coathanger

Seems like this year has been an interesting one for astrophotography. Either the skies are cloudy, or they are very clear but during the full moon. What to do. 

Well, when the sky is bright and deep sky imaging is not ideal, it is an opportunity for imaging some of the brighter objects the universe has to offer. In this case the Coathanger.

The Coathanger
September 10, 2022 - WO GT102/ASI2600mm
f/5.6 107 minutes

The Coathanger is not a constellation, but a pattern of stars that is not one of the traditionally established, named constellations.  These collections are known as asterisms. It is a small collection of physically unrelated stars, also known as Brocchi’s cluster and Collinder 399. Although It looks very much like its namesake, and easy to make out with a pair of binoculars, you will need a dark sky and know just where to look.

DART Hits Dimorphos

Certainly not of the level of technology that Captain Kirk discovered on Miramanee's planet, which was ultimately used to save her planet from doom (that was science fiction of course) but impressive nonetheless was the successful impact of DART – the Double Asteroid Redirect Test on Dimorphos, a small asteroid moon of Didymos. DART struck the little asteroid – hoping to nudge it slightly off-orbit – at 7:14 p.m. ET (23:14 UTC) on Monday, September 26, 2022.

Didymos-B aka Dimorphos

I remember back in the day discussing the unlikelihood of anything that could redirect an asteroid, but here we are, a first test of doing that very thing. Now this asteroid is very, very small compared to the one on that Star Trek Episode (The Paradise Syndrome, which aired Oct 4, 1968) but it is a first ever to test the viability of redirecting an asteroid impact threat to Earth. 

NASA has a number of images and videos of the impact. 

Here is the series of stills taken as DART approaches Dimorphos.

And here is a actual view from the Asteroid Terrestrial-impact Last Alert System (ATLAS): A NASA and University of Hawaii project to patrol the sky every night in search of incoming asteroids as DART hits the asteroid.

EarthSky has a good writeup on the mission. We won't know for sure yet if the mission was a complete success. We need to wait for data to come in on the change in Dimorphos' orbit. 

The Eastern Veil and the 'Bat'

Yikes.  It's been almost two months since my last post. Have I been that busy on other things? Why, YES. Work, gardening, my retirement business, church activities and a new puppy. Now that's a lot of things keeping me busy.

Cloudy skies for most of the time made imaging a real challenge. But I did get in a few objects; just took awhile to find the time to process them. Turns out that a recent image run is what I processed first. So here it is: the Eastern Veil nebula and a starless cropped close up of the section known as the 'Bat'.

The Eastern Veil Nebula is part of the larger Veil Nebula, a cloud of ionized gas and dust. It is located in the constellation Cygnus the Swan.  This object is actually the visible portion of the much larger Cygnus Loop, which itself is a supernova remnant.

Eastern Veil - GT102/ASI2600 - f/5.6
August 19, 30 and 31, 2022
46x300sec Ha; 46x300sec Oiii; 20x60sec RGB

The star that was the source of the supernova weighed in at 20 times more massive than the Sun and exploded some 10,000 to 20,000 years ago. If you were living at that time you would have seen an object in the daytime sky that would have been brighter than the planet Venus. During the 20,000 years since the explosion the remnants of that star have now expanded to an area roughly 3 degrees in diameter (six times the size of the Moon). It is estimated to be about 2,400 light-years distant.

This rendition is a combination of the Ha and Oiii narrowband (HOO) palette combined with RGB stars.  A total of 8 hours integration of the narrowband and 1 hour for the stars.

The lower section of the nebula is known as the 'Bat'. I cropped the original NB image to capture just the Bat and removed the stars to produce a starless version. I generally don't like starless astrophotos but this nebula looks pretty good when portrayed starless.

The "Bat"

First full color image from the James Webb telescope

Well here it is. The first full color infrared image released from the James Webb telescope. And it’s awesome! This is a region of the sky that represents an area the size of a grain of sand held at arm’s length.

Each of those colorful ellipses and oblong objects are distant galaxies. Only the bright objects with the diffraction spikes are local stars from our own galaxy. And the curved sections around the middle is a even more distant galaxy whose light is being gravitationally bent by a foreground galaxy allowing it's faint light to be magnified and made visible. 

Wow - can't wait for more - and there is more to come for sure!

Full details can be read at NASA and here at SkyandRockets.