Milky Way Star Clouds

A few weeks ago my wife and I were visiting family in rural Iowa. The population is pretty thin in this farming area so they have fairly dark skies. I was fortunate to have a couple of clear nights and took this picture on that second night. The picture is looking across a hayfield to the south with the Milky Way arcing up into the sky. Sagittarius is near the horizon, with stars of Scutum, Aquila, Sagitta, Serpens and Ophiuchus visible. Many Messier objects are also visible.

This image is a stack of 25 one minute exposures taken with a Canon 40D. I used a Canon 17-85 EF-S zoom lens set to the 17mm position (28mm equivalent). That gave me a very wide field of view. Star tracking was done with a small unguided tabletop GEM with a battery powered RA drive motor attached. I carried all this equipment with me on the airplane. It kept the TSA inspectors busy. Processing was done with ImagesPlus and Photoshop.

"IT'S OFFICIAL !!!" Here's our New Club Logo ...

Show and wear it proudly!

M33 Pinwheel Galaxy

M33 is commonly called the Pinwheel Galaxy in Triangulum. The reason is obvious! It’s 2.5 million light year distance is actually pretty close for a galaxy and it’s quite large in the sky. Unfortunately, even though it’s larger than a full moon, it’s difficult to view due to its very low surface brightness. Viewed with a C8 from my house it’s barely visible. If you’re in fairly dark skies give it a try though. It’s nearly overhead in the early AM right now but it’s moving to the late evening skies quickly.

For this image I combined 34 subs of 2-minutes each for a total exposure time of 68 minutes. I used a Canon 40D DSLR with the Televue NP101is 4” refractor. Guiding was done with an M8C CCD camera through an ETX-90. Image capture and most of the processing was done with ImagesPlus with a little help from Photoshop.

M27 Dumbbell Nebula

This is a picture I took of planetary nebula M27, the Dumbell Nebula, a few hours after the night-time launch of Discovery. The cloulds blew away after the launch to provide me with a very clear sky. I really enjoy the color and symmetry of planetaries. The image is a stack of fourteen 2-minute subs for a total exposure of 28 minutes. It was taken with an unmodified Canon 40D DSLR through a Televue NP101is refractor. Guiding was done with a Starlight Xpress M8C through an ETX90.

Banner Design

I want to combine some of the features of Ron's entry with some right-sized lettering to make the banner. After all, the logo won't stand alone, unless we are making T-shirts (not a bad idea). Here's a rough draft of a banner format:

...Phil

Sept 4th Apollo Moon Party

Save the date, Friday Sept 4th 2009! For a special Apollo Landing Site Moon Party immediately following the NEW Space and Astronomy Public Lecture Series hosted by Dr. Fiorella Terenzi.

http://www.brevardcc.edu/astrolectures

What: Apollo Landing Site Moon Party (full moon)
Who: BAS/MAS/SAS
Set-up Time: 7:00pm
Moon Party: 8:30-10:30
Location: BCC Cocoa Planetarium & Observatory
Refreshments will be served

Lecture Info:
Sept. 4 '09 "Moon, Mars, and the Stars: The Constellation Program and the Future of Space Exploration". Panelists: Robert D. Cabana, NASA KSC Director and Astronaut; Russell Romanella, Director, International Space and Spacecraft Processing Directorate, NASA KSC; Jon Cowart, Manager Exploration Systems, NASA KSC.

My Final Idea

Please compare the 2 I've posted - and then "create your own" to present @ the next meeting. We need to vote on one to include on the banner we'll be having made.

Thanx

SGR

Club Logo

Here's my first attempt ... Hope others are working on some of their own to submit

Here we are - wait'n and wait'n ...at the stadium Rain Fest! (notice the wrapped up scope .....)

July 3rd Rain Fest

WOW - clouds everywhere - and there at the last ~ some were "leaking!"

7 scopeshow'd up at the Space Coast Stadium - and 6 set up. (There was ONE real smart astronomer among us!!! lol)
THANX TO ALL WHO CAME OUT - 'your effort was appreciated!'