Reports

Report from Binbrook observing Sept. 19

The clear sky chart promised fabulous clear skies at Binbrook Conservation Area this past Saturday night. When I arrived, the sun was setting and the colours were spectacular. I couldn't resist taking a few quick shots before setting up!

Steve continued his sequential Messier Marathon by spotting at least one more object: M74. Joe, Vince, Doug and Darrell were also doing some visual observing with scopes and binoculars. Doug Black has put together a very respectable binocular stand and I had a chance to use it to look at the Andromeda Galaxy through his binoculars.

I’m afraid I didn’t do much observing (or socializing) because I was concentrating on guiding some astrophotos using a KWIQ autoguider, my CG-5 mount and an 80 mm refractor. I gathered images of M8 (Lagoon Nebula), NGC7000 (North America Nebula) and M31 (Andromeda Galaxy). While I was imaging M31, I encountered problems with the mount not tracking and that’s when I discovered that my battery packs were not up to the night’s demands – they were just as exhausted as I was!

Don was also imaging and had some pretty impressive shots of M45. I hope he posts them here. (hint, hint).

I’ve done some basic processing of the M8 images (stacking in Deep Sky Stacker, basic Photoshop stuff). The image consists of 5 three minute images at ISO400.

Ann

Lagoon Nebula (M8)