Ahhh...

The sun coming over the shoulder of Mt Baker just after six one morning not so long ago. A flock of birds flying through the picture and the mountains shadows on the clouds complete this image for me.

A Different Sort of Glob

Here is a globular cluster. We have already seen M13 a few times, but this one is M2. It is somewhat more faint than M13, but it is just as spectacular. This cluster is about 37,000 light years away and is almost 200 light years across. There are nearly 150,000 stars in the cluster.

This second picture is the result of playing with the levels in the picture to get a more accurate representation of the colors. I have yet to figure out how to do it without completely blowing out the center.

A Dome in Action

I posted a panorama of the dome earlier, but this one is sort of an action shot. Here the telescope is pointing at Jupiter in the early morning sky.

Whirlpool Having a Snack

This is my very first and very grainy picture of M51 - the Whirlpool Galaxy. As you can see there are actually two galaxies here, one large face on spiral, and another small one with no real shape. The small one is in fact being subjected to galactic cannibalism, the larger spiral is eating it. Another cool thing about this is that you can see some of the dark dust lanes in the spiral arms of the galaxy.

I am actually writing this on the 18th, I am way ahead, so if I take a better picture in the meantime I will leave this one here, and add the new one to this post.

Dark Sky

There is nothing special in this picture, it is just a shot of the night sky taken at Goldstream park. The sky is a lot darker there than in the rest of the city.

Sisters in the Sky

While not the most spectacular of photos, this is a picture of the stars in the Pleiades. You can see the main stars form a sort of miniature dipper. At least I think they do. If you do it right you can get some really cool pictures of the Pleiades with all sorts of nebulosity, and I am going to give that a try a little later in the year once they start coming up a bit earlier.

I thoght that picture was a bit dull, so here is another. The Pleiades are just down from the top of the picture on the right. You can see a little bit of the blue reflection nebulosity going on in that one! Also in this picture are Jupiter, the moon, and Venus going down the line there.

Ring Number Two

I posted a picture of the Ring Nebula or M57 a while ago, but it was not nearly as nice as I think this one is. Here you can see the different colors of the planetary nebula and even the white dwarf lying at the center. This planetary nebula was created when a red giant star expelled its outer layers of gas in its dying days, forming a shell of gas expanding away from the star.

The Great Hunter

Although it is blurry and grainy and all, one can clearly see that this is the ever wonderful Orion Nebula. Sitting in the middle of the nebula is the group of stars called the Trapezium. These super bright young stars are in the center of the star forming region.

I took this just a few days ago, and it was already getting light out and it was right down on the horizon so it is not nearly as good as it could be, but I will try again later when it is nice and high in the sky.

The Great Crescent

You can guess what this is a picture of I am sure. I don't think I really need to write anything about this one. I love the moon...

Trails from the Point

I have been waiting for a while to post this one. Here are some fancy startrails from Cattle Point. I took these images during the meteor shower last week, and although they are hard to see, There actually are a couple in this picture.

The most easily seen is in the bottom right. There are two bright startrails, and just a little above the higher one in the center is a little line going a different direction than the rest. That is a meteor.

There are a couple others that I found, but to see them involves a lot of zooming in. Also arcing right across this picture is a nice satellite trail.

I quite like startrails, and I think this is my favourite one yet!

A Happy Family

I have been taking a ton of photos these past few weeks, and I have a huge backlog of them. I though I would do a bit of a different post today and put up a few photos instead of just one. Here are Photos of five of the planets in our solar system.

First up is Venus, the second planet from the sun. I took this picture with my little 4 inch scope on the night of the meteor shower recently. You can clearly see the fact that it is a crescent, being lit from the sun from the left side of the picture.

Next up is Uranus. This is one of the gas giants far out in the outer solar system. You can see a few little dots just to the right of the planet. Those are some of its moons. Most of Uranus' moons are named after characters from Shakespeare and Alexander Pope.

The next planet out is Neptune. Here we can see Neptune and its largest moon Triton. Neptune is the 8th and last planet from the sun.

One in from Uranus is Saturn, the 6th planet, and most peoples favorite. Unfortunately I never had a chance to take a really good photo of Saturn although I did see it looking excellent many times. On a good night you can see storms on the planet, and the gap between the rings and the planet itself!

I have put Jupiter, the 5th planet from the sun last because I think this is the best picture. I took this yesterday morning. You can clearly see the different bands of color on the planet itself, as well as the four moon all on one side at that moment.

To complete the set, we still need Mars, Mercury and Earth, the 4th, 1st and 3rd planets respectively. I have never had a chance to image Mars or Mercury through the telescope, and we are on earth, but I have captured them in pictures.

Here is Mars, the red planet, now with curiosity exploring away on its surface. This is an ancient photo of mine, but it is the only one I could find with Mars in It which is weird. Mars is the reddish dot high in the center of the frame.

And last but not least in any way is Mercury. Saturday morning was in fact the first morning I have actually taken a picture of Mercury. The little rocky planet is hard to capture because it is so small and close to the sun. If you go straight up from the top of the mountain - Mt Baker on planet earth to be exact - and slightly to the left up to just before the sky starts turning blue, you will find a tiny white dot which is Mercury.

Out of all of these planets, I still think that my favourite is a planet we call Earth.

And that concludes todays post. I hope you enjoyed!

A Way Made of Milk

The Milky Way shooting up from the edge of the sky to arc gracefully overhead.