Tag Archives: astronomy

Hind’s Crimson Star

Posted on by January 15, 2020

Lovejoy-chartI wondered what C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy would look like through a 400mm lens on a fixed tripod. Funny how I choose nights with a glorious gibbous Moon to become inspired! At first I was not impressed with the results. All the stars look like smarties with an orange one thrown in the box as well. Failed experiment but what intrigued me was why the camera had picked up that distinct orange star? Hot pixel?

“Pleased to meet you
Hope you guessed my name,
But what’s puzzling you
Is the nature of my game”

Hind’s Crimson Star ( R Lepus) is too faint to see with the eye alone but my camera and 400mm lens had picked up its colour – the colour of a dying star. Eventually, the star’s puffed up outer layers will all blow out into space, forming a glowing bubble.

Wikipedia: It is a carbon star which appears distinctly red. It is named after famous British astronomer J. R. Hind, who observed it in 1845. Its apparent magnitude varies from +5.5 to +11.7 with a period of 418–441 days; recent measurements give a period of 427.07 days. There may be a secondary period of 40 years.

Oh what Joy it was to find while chasing a comet through the sky.

Morning Person, Evening Person or Night Owl

Posted on by May 16, 2015
April 2014

IMG_7584-bSo often when I ask people whether they have seen a specific bright star, I get the answer oh no, I am not a morning person or oh no, that is long past my bedtime. Well I am afraid you have no excuse now. Jupiter is shining bright towards the north after sunset with Mars, the Moon and then Saturn following from the east. I would say three planets and the Moon before bedtime is very good going. Even though Jupiter sets just around midnight, Saturn, Mars and the Moon are putting on a splendid display to entertain night owls until the early hours of the morning when dazzling Venus comes gliding in from the east to herald the day. For the next week or so even Mercury will be visible low on the eastern horison at dawn. Continue reading →

Lightbox for Deep Sky Sketching

Posted on by May 16, 2015

lightbox-completeAs I developed a passion for sketching deep sky objects, it became inevitable that I would start thinking about more practical ways to do so than with a clipboard and red LEDs that were always too bright or too dim and shining all over the show except on the circle where the action was supposed to happen.

I tried a number of tricks but all were unsatisfactory. Eventually I started thinking of a hands-free, fully adjustable red LED lightbox.

My husband was ecstatic when I showed him the plan because it gave him an excuse to buy a new Weller soldering station. Our old soldering gun would have done the job just as well.

For the next few days I played the dutiful wife as I have not mastered the art of TIG welding and needed my husband to construct a lightweight A4 sized aluminum casing. I’m sure there are other ways of constructing the casing. The main thing is to keep it as light as possible.

The bottom looks like a baking tin. The inside has been sprayed white to help with reflection. The top is framed red perspex.

I have used two red wide-angle LEDs each attached to its own battery pack housing two AA batteries. The lights can be switched on individually. Using one LED at a time will give sufficient lighting most of the time, the second is mainly for backup.

The LEDS have been glued to the “baking tin” with hot glue. The LEDs need to be lifted off the bottom slightly otherwise they cause bright red spots. A thick blob of hot glue will do the trick but before fixing permanently experiment with prestik.

The lightbox is attached to a fully adjustable tripod by means of a quick release bracket which will make transporting easy.

Since designing my light box I have made a few very necessary adjustments:

  • With just the one sheet of red perspex, the LEDS were far too bright when I became dark adapted. I covered the LEDS with an extra red plastic lid with a strip of aluminum foil lining the inside rim. This helped to contain the light to almost the size of my sketching circle and toned down the brightness considerably
  • I have cut a circle (size of my sketching circle ) in a piece of cardboard (size of the lightbox frame) and put this in place before replacing the red perspex cover. I did not like the whole frame being lit up.
  • As most papers have fibres which become visible when using up-lighting, I sketch on firm tracing paper which is nice and smooth and diffuses the light as well.
  • An adapter to clamp an external red LED to the lightbox comes in handy for when I log my obs before sketching.
  • I have added a removable tray to the tripod for pencils, erasers, eyepieces and spectacles.

ConstructionLayoutTwo-red LEDSaluminum-rim

Red plastic lidcardboard layerQuick release bracketSet up with tray

Two little Clouds

Posted on by June 11, 2020

Feb 2009

There are two little clouds that can only be seen from southern latitudes. Even on cloudless summer nights these two clouds are ever persistent. If you face south to southwest and slowly gaze slightly upward, you will notice them – one a bit larger than the other but night after night always taking on the same form. These two clouds do not belong to the Earth’s weather pattern at all but are actually two, very far away irregular dwarf galaxies called the Large and Small Magellanic clouds.

At a distance of 179,000 light years away, they were known as the Earth ‘s closest neighbouring galaxies until another galaxy, the Sagittarius Dwarf Elliptical Galaxy, which is 80,0000 light years away, was discovered in 1994.

However, not to be upstaged by the new discovery, the Magellanic Clouds will always hold appeal because of the fact that they both are clearly visible to the naked eye as well as being south circumpolar objects, sometimes a bit higher in the sky and sometimes dipping low towards the horizon. If you own binoculars, take a closer look at these two clouds. You are not going to see rain there but I can assure you that a pretty picture will unfold.

When I am at Betty’s Bay I gaze up at the sky regularly just to confirm that they can actually still be seen with the naked eye  I am always relieved that although I have new neighbours who tend to leave on outside lights throughout the night, I am still able to find the galaxies without the aid of my telescope.
A note to all Betty’s Bay residents: From where I live near city lights I cannot see the Magellanic Clouds at all. Like so much else that is precious about Betty’s Bay, the night skies also need to be preserved.