Vern’s Weblog

Seyfert’s Sextet (Hickson 79) located in the constellation Serpens is one of the densest known galaxy groups.  Four of the galaxies are believed to be interacting  (NGC 6027, and NGC 6027a-c). Component “d” is not part of a group, it is further distant and just happens to be in line of sight. Component “e” is thought to be a tidal tail thrown out from gravitational interaction.

Images taken from Louisville, CO June 26, 2006 at 11:59 MDT with Celestron Nexstar11, F3.3 focal reducer, and Astrovid Stellacam II video camera. Camera settings: integrate 128, gain 9/14, medium gamma. Images were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected with ImagePlus. Aligned and stacked 150 images with Registax3. Brightness enhanced with ImagePlus, cropped with Photoshop Elements. Sky was clear, temperature 57°F, transparency very good, turbulence 6/10.

Located in the constellation Serpens is a dark star forming nebula region that somewhat resembles an eagle in flight. After reading Andews article about this object, I couldn’t resist paying it a visit using the Stellacam II even though it was nearly 2am. I could see the faint dark outline of the bird on the notebook monitor so I tweaked focus a bit, and then took about 150 images before shutting down for the evening.

Image taken from the light polluted skies in Louisville, CO with Celestorn Nexstar11, F3.3 focal reducer, and Stellacam II video camera set at 9/14 gain, medium gamma, and integration at 128 (4 sec). Images were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected with ImagePlus. Registax3 used to align and stack the images. ImagePlus and Photoshop used to enhance, crop etc. The sky was clear, no wind, temperature was 55°F, transparency was very good, and turblence was 6/14.

I was playing with my star chart program yesterday and noted that the planet Pluto moved enough over about an hour or so to be noticable. Since I’ve never even tried to find it before, I thought it might be fun to try.  I was a bit careless aligning the scope and so I missed getting Pluto in the center of the frame by about 10 arc-min. When I’m carefull, I can usually get with 3 or 4 (should have used precision goto as well). I compared the frames this morning, identified some of the brighter stars in the field, and confirmed that it is indeed Pluto on the left side of the frame. First frame was taken around 22:55 MDT and the other at 00:49 MDT.

Equipment was my usual deep sky setup, Celestron Nexstar11, F3.3 focal reducer, and Stellacam II video camera (gain 9/14, integrate 128, medium gamma).  Dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected. Aligned and stacked two sets of 10 minute video with Registax3. Sky was clear, temperature

NGC 6894 is small (40 arc-sec), fairly dim (vmag 12.3) planetary nebula in the constellation Cygnus. A magnitude 14 star is visible in the northwest. Its central (vmag 17.6) star is just barely visible in the image below.

Image was taken June 20, 2006 at 07:07 UT from Louisville, CO with Celestron Nexstar11 telescope, F3.3 focal reducer, and Stellacam II video camera at 9/14 gain, integrate 128, gamma medium.  Aprox 150 images acquired in 10 minutes were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected. Aligned and stacked with Registax3. Sky was partly cloudy, temperature was 64°F, 40% humidty, transparency was good, turbulence was 5/10.

The cat’s eye nebula, NGC 6543,  is a small, bright, bluish-green planetary nebula in the constellation Draco.

Image taken on June 20, 2006 at 06:51 UT from Louisville, CO with a Celestron Nexstar11 telescope, Meade F3.3 focal reducer, and Astrovid Stellacam II video camera. Camera settings were 9/14 gain, integrate 128 (4.2 sec), and medium gamma. The 10 minute video images were dark subtracted, flat field and bias corrected with ImagesPlus, stacked and aligned with Registax3. Weather conditions were partly cloudy, turbulence 5/10, transparency good, no wind, temperature was 64°F, 40% humidity.