| Perseids | | | [13-Aug-2010]
Went outside some for the Perseids, saw 6 in about half and hour before I was driven in by mosquitoes. It was hazy and damp but at least I could see something besides clouds this year. The Milky Way was really visible across the zenith. Half the meteors were nice and large and bright. |
| Leonids 2009 | | | [17-Nov-2009]
Saw the first one at 2:19 on the way home. Lay out in the hammock with the sleeping bad listening to History of Rome. Saw 10 total, but most were from the area of Taurus not Leo. I think the Taurids peaked last week. Clouded over by 3:20, another meteor shower washed out by weather. |
| Eclipse Photos | | [26-Feb-2008]
Watched the eclipse from the parking lot of All Saints. Took some photos with the new 135mm lens. I need to get attachments for the telescope for the new digital camera. The only one of real interest is the time lapse:
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| Eclipse Photos from August | | | [13-Dec-2007]
I was cleaning up my server and found some photos that I never posted. Looking at them I see why. This was the first time i really used the new camera for an eclipse and im not impressed. I dont have the adapter to hook it to the telescope yet so all the photos are just tripod mounted and the moon is pretty small and crappy. |
| Sunset Lunar Eclipse | | | [03-Mar-2007]
Went to St, Marks to catch the total Lunar scplise at sunset. Unfortunatly it was pretty cloudy. Missed all but the last 20 minutes of partiality. Got a few photos of the end, and sunset before the moon rose.
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| Transit of Mercury | | | [08-Nov-2006]
Photos from the transit of mercury. They arnt great because it was partly cloudy couldnt see it half the time and I was trying to work during it. The is a large sunspot also, dont confuse it with the smaller Mercury. |
| Persieds | | | [12-Aug-2005]
Most years trying to watch the Persieds is not practical, its too cloudy in August in Florida. It was finally not overcast this year. Even without clouds the seeing last night was horrible, no Milky Way and the haze caused a horrible glow from Tallahassee.
Got up about 3:45 and watched from my backyard till 5am. Saw 18. I'm sure I missed a few, I was messing with the camera and telescope too. Took a look at Mars, M31 and the double cluster. Both M31 and the cluster are naked eye visible from the new house. The seeing last night was horrible, no Milky Way and the haze caused a horrible glow from Tallahassee but at least there were no clouds.
Observing from the backyard is adaquate, my neighbor George's security light has been off for weeks which is great. I dont know if he turned it off or the buld blew but its nice not having the yard lit up like crazy. The next source of light is the church across the cow pasture. Its far enough away just to be an annoyance. Tallahassee glow in the haze was the worst last night but on nights not so haze its not so bad. |
| 2 bad photos | | | [07-Feb-2005]
I went out last month hopeing to get a comet near the double cluster, unfortunatly becasue of problems with the tripod and clouds all I got was 1 shot of Orion, where the tripod wasn't stead and a lot of the moon. I'm only putting up 1 of the moon since most are identical. All this was with my new zoom lens. |
| A busy day | | | [16-Jan-2005]
Failing to remember exaclty how long a drive it was last year I went to the Brooksville Raid again this year, getting there only about a half hour before the battle started.
It had the same problem as last year, there is no good place to watch. The action takes place in the woods alot and swings around several times so its not clear what is going on. I was on the right flank of the Union this time, and they didn't have ropes up so we had to move several times as the action came too close.
There were also a lot of guys on the field with cameras, big ones on tripods ruining alot of photos. The may have been hidden from the VIP section but they were clear to all of us, and made no attempt to hide, be in period costume (not that that would have mattered with the large cameras), or even stay still. Photos of the raid.
On the way to the raid I stopped to do the cache 7 to 7 at a rest area near Perry. Maybe that is what caused the drive to take so much time?
Having more time on the may back I stopped at Homosassa Springs. I expected only Manatees and was suprised to a small zoo. Including a hippo. Which I just screwed up and deleted the picture of.
Near Cheifland I pulled over to see if Comet Macholtz was visible since it was finally clear, and I was somewhere dark. It is baerly naked eye. I took a bunch of photos with the digital camera. The will be posted later after I get a chance to process them.
Got home about 9:30 12 hours after I left, all for a 1 hour reenactment.
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| Daylight Venus Sighting | | | [31-Mar-2004]
Saw Venus at 6:29pm today. Sunset wasn't until 6:56pm. Used the jeep to block the sun, which was still about 15 degrees above the horizen. Only took me a few minutes to find Venus. since I new where it was was able to pick it up several times after that as I drove down MLK for the next few minutes.
Tomarrow can I find it at lunch time? |
| Observing Log | | | [16-Jan-2004]
I mounted the new finder scope (picture eventually) that I got for Christmas and this was the first chance I'd had to use it. Aligned it with the main scope using Venus. Tested the alignment with Saturn, M42 and M35. It workd well. The field is a little larger than I'm used to with the old finder but I'll get used to it.
Since the finder works tried some harder stuff: M1 which has always taken me forever to find for some reason. Found it pretty quick. Not to a good night no structure just fuzz.
Used finder and charts to star hop to NGC1746 and OC in Taurus. Its fairly big, reminds me of a tick.
Then to NGC 1647. Larger than 1764 but fewer bright stars.
Quickly did M36, M37, M38, M31, M33 (much easier to find than before).
NGC 1664. Small, hard to tell its not just a knot in the Milky Way.
NGC 1582. to big an indistinct to be good. Curved like a tadpole.
NGC 2331. Very few stars.
NGC 2392. The Eskimo. once again it looks like some one forgot to focus a star, except that the star next to it is in focus.
NGC 2264. The Chrstmas Tree. I never liked this one. It structure is thrown off by the bright star next to it and I don't see any nebulosity.
NGC 2261. Hubble's Variable Nebula. almost as small as the Eskimo.
M67. At this point I was talking more than observing so packed up and went home. |
| More Eclipse Photos | | | [15-Nov-2003]
Also uploaded some photos of the partial phases of last weeks eclipse that I forgot to upload last week.
None of the film photos are worth uploading. I really need a zoom lens for that camera. |
| Monsters and an Eclipse | | | [09-Nov-2003]
Saturday didn't look good for the eclipse. The entire southern sky was clouded over in dark meecing thunderclouds as of 4pm. I almost didn't go being afraid it would rain on my scope. Went anyway and it cleared up completly by sunset. The horizen wasnt good so I missed the first half hour of the eclipse before it cleared the trees. It stayed clear through totality until the end of Creature from the Black Lagoon then clouded over almost completly almost instaltly with only a few thin patches of cloud to see through.
Eclipse Photos |
| Mars Photos | | | [23-Aug-2003]
Put up mars photos from Saturday night, including 2 with the C14. Observing was bad. Fog rolled in as I got there and made the field invisible. C14 still has tracking problems. Didnt stay more than an hour and a half.
Mars Photos |
| Mars and the Moon | | | [06-Aug-2003]
Finally a night where I could see something other than clouds. Of course it was not a decent obsering night, the moon was out. Took the scope down to Javaheads. Several people had asked about Mars. Setup, it clouded over as soon as I was done. Waited a while. Saw 2 satillites about 9:30 almost directly overhead (Okean-O, Okean O Rocket). Spent most the time on the moon, Mizar, Antares, and Vega for other people. Mars cleared the trees about 10:30 but wasnt out of the muck till midnight. Even then it faded in and out behind clouds.
Showed a few people Albireo. Couldnt find enough of Hercules to find M13. Globs in Scorpius covered by the moon, not that I could hae found them anyway w the lights in the place.. Leaving at midnight be there before that means before midnight not 15 after. |
| No Mars/Moon Photos | | | [17-Jul-2003]
I got up at 3:30 this morning because Mars was going to be really close to the moon. Less than the moons diameter away. It was beautiful, a bright red mars just barely above a moon a few days away from full. Mars in the scope was even better. A bright white polar cap pointed right at the moon then a thin darker band of highlands and finally the orange-red of the rest of mars. I took a bunch of photos going in about 5am when the camera was almost full.
When I got to work I showed them to Brad so I do have a witness I took them. Then when I got to editing them started to delete the older non-Mars photos and put one to many wildcards in and bam no mars photos. I really need to setup the laptop so I can undelete.
Maybe I'll get up again tomarrow and just do mars without the moon. |
| Eclipse | | [16-May-2003]
Totally Eclipsed Moon
Eclipse started out badly, it rained about 9:00 and was so overcast at 10:00 that I couldn't find the moon. Every couple of minutes it would peek out from behind the clouds. I went to Lake Ella hoping no one would be there and I could go home. No luck. John had set up and the public was there. Joe came by and set up his little 4.5" Orion. We hooked the camera to it till about 10:50. Took some more tripod photos and enough people had gathered to get my scope out. It continued to clear. A faint star showed up and was eventually occulted. It was 5.5-mag. ZC 2217, occulted at 11:57 according to lunar-occulations.com, its just visible on the moons edge in my photo from 11:56, the last one I took. We stayed at Lake Ella till about 12:15 when just about everyone had left. Went to Javaheads and set up again for the conclusion. It started to cloud over again as the ecplise ended leaving the last 15 min or so behind a thin cloud layer.
More Photos
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