Observing session Friday Sept14th, 2007

Dave Lillis · Post by **Dave Lillis** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 7:15 pm

Hi All,
Observing session to be held in Boher as per usual, we'll meet at the pub car park at 8.30, see you then.!

John O'Mahony · Post by **John O'Mahony** » Fri Sep 14, 2007 8:02 pm

Hi Dave

Totally exhausted -wouldn't last long tonight. Have a great night.

Dave Lillis · Post by **Dave Lillis** » Sat Sep 15, 2007 12:16 pm

No worries, We started at around 9 and finished at about 1am,

This time using high power (500x), we were able to see the central star of the ring nebula, its certainly a difficult object.
See more here
http://www.irishastronomy.org/boards/vi ... 1293ca8903

Thanks to all who came along.

Frank Ryan · Post by **Frank Ryan** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 5:43 pm

Another great night is right!
The biggest thrill of the night was to actually see that pesky central star!
Cheers again Dave for allowing us all to have a look through the 20''!

I brought up the clubs 20'' dob on the night.
The mirror unfortunately was in a pathetic state after being left in neglect for a few years
but with a bit of quick surgery by Dave it was some way usable.
The collimation was a mile out and the bird crap on the primary didnt help either so it was really a 12'' acting like an 8 / 10 ''

Here are a few sketches (from memory)
I'm hoping that with a new design and a re-coated mirror I can breathe
some new life back into it as its a grand scope and has the potential to be great.

M13 which in my ETX-125 looks like a smudge of chawk on a black card
jumps to life through the 12''.
With Daves nagler wide field eyepiece it is literally like looking through another scope!
So I learned instantly, the Eyepieces are as if not more important than the socpe you use!!

M57 was much brighter and more defined.
(No central star in this one though

)

M27 definatly showed more than just an 'apple core' shape in the 12''.
Using averted vision I could easily make out the fainter areas.
(the seeing on the night was a huge help also)
This sketch is a bit big...it was in reality about a third smaller in the eyepiece.

Finally

M31 filled the eyepiece. The companions M32 & M110 were obvious as were the main and fainter dust lanes.

I had a look at the Veil Nebula also but it was a bit dissapointing.
Still it was there all the same.
I had a quick scan down through the Milky Way before packing up to just take in some of the dense star fields there...well worth it.

I'm itching to overhaul this scope and see what it can do!

John O'Mahony · Post by **John O'Mahony** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 6:34 pm

Nice drawings Frank! Who needs a CCD camera????

Frank Ryan · Post by **Frank Ryan** » Mon Sep 24, 2007 2:34 am

Thanks John.
It's something I've been meaning to get back into for a very long while.
I think people often underestimate the importance of sketching as a
tool for observation.
I know I kinda yawn sometimes when I see drawings posted up on the web.
It's a different game to photography for sure!

Dave Lillis · Post by **Dave Lillis** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 12:49 am

Frank, Would you have a go at sketching at the eyepiece next time ?

Conn Buckley · Post by **Conn Buckley** » Tue Sep 25, 2007 12:08 pm

Frank, I found your sketches fascinating

. I expect you need to be 'artistically inclined' to be able to do this or is it an acquired skill? The big thing about this is that I think it causes you to concentrate more and you should definitely improve your observing skills.
I remember one great night's observing in Glenstal with Harry and Dave when the pair of them were 'almost competing' as to who could see what in the Eskimo Nebula. From then on I realised that 'quick looks' through the eyepiece are not good enough. With all the talk about scope designs and sizes and eyepieces the technique of quality observing does not get enough attention.
You might tell us sometime how you actually do this. Maybe you could do a quick demo at next observing session.

Frank Ryan · Post by **Frank Ryan** » Wed Sep 26, 2007 11:19 pm

All I can say is I do know you dont need any artistic skill to make
astronomical obsevations.
A few dots here and a shady line there is perfect for recording star positions,
banding on planets and all that.
Even observations of the moon is fine with simple lines and shapes.

But like everything else in this hobby,
the more you get into one aspect of it the more it spiderwebs out into
other areas of learning.

(let me get a little self indulgent)

For me, I've always found it easy to draw
so I never had to really learn much.
I did have a good teachers in art college that thought me a few new tricks
but essentially the key to drawing / sketching is actually observing.
You might find it funny to hear that most of the time spent in the first
year of art college is spent sitting around 'looking' at things.

I can remember our first lesson in drawing techniques from one quirky
teacher that made us just 'look' at the subject (It was a bunch of old
scrap metal and junk in a heap in the middle of the room)
for a full day before letting us attempt to sketch it.

It's like if you ask someone that never really draws or sketches to
draw something you just put in front of them,
say a familiar object like a hat or a teapot.
They will glance once at the object to see what it is and then
spend the rest of the time staring at the page with thier head down
diligantly sketching out their own mental image of what it is.
You may as well have held up a sign with 'hat' or 'teapot' written on it.

Another strange one was when we were doing colour studies.
He brought in this bright red velvet curtain and threw it over a chair.
We all thought it was hilarious, here we were supposed to be doing
'colour' studies and there was just this big ugly red thing for us to work with.
But he made us make a half inch square hole in an A4 white sheet and
then look at various areas of the curtain through this hole with the paper held at arm length and guess what, colours!
Very subtle but there there was reflections of colours everywhere,
they had a redish base but another excellent lesson was learned.
Most of the time the colour you see isn't really the colour at all!

so yes. spend 10 times longer looking than drawing, thats the key.

As for sketching at the eyepiece.
I must get on to Dierdre K to see what materials she recommends.
But I'm well up for it.