The Scruffy Astronomer

I'm not a good planetary photographer, but I might be a fast learner. I've been playing with our new QHY cameras in order to help customers. That's my excuse, at least. I started with the QHY5III 178C. The small sensor and tiny pixels makes it a very useful planetary camera. The fact that it's a colour camera helps too. And unlike a deep sky camera, it's not terribly expensive. But it involved learning. My normal targets are nebulas: big, dark creatures that hide in the darkness of space. Planets are the opposite. Anyone who has bought a telescope and looked at one will agree: they're tiny bright creatures that dazzle us from a distance. So I got FireCapture for getting the images (there are other programs too), and then had to learn some new tricks. "Debayering" untangles the red, green and blue images the colour camera records simultaneously. It's not as simple as with a mono camera. Related to this, the colour balance has to be set. My firs

I'm what's known as an introvert. That doesn't mean, as some people think, that I'm a shy, quiet person - anybody who's ever met me will confirm that I'm not. I think it means I prefer quiet situations, without a lot of human interaction. Lots of dealing with people leaves me a bit drained, and I need to have periods of calm and introspection to recharge. Astronomy, for me at least, is very suitable therapy. It's a chance to physically separate myself from others. Far from the madding crowd, I can sit in darkness while my equipment quietly does its thing.  Birding does the same for me during the day. The images I capture in both can provide me with their own, more lasting mental escape. Being the astrophotographer, I sit in front of my computer screen for long periods, watching a thin wiggly line march from left to right. This shows how well my mount is tracking the stars, and I try to help correct every deviation from the target by force of will. Even with

I had to do a bit of rearrangement in the showroom with an eye to social distancing.    These powertanks are now quite safe, and so are we.  

It's planet season! Jupiter is blazing away in the evening, pretty much unmissable high in the East just after dinner, and Saturn isn't far behind it. If you're up much later you'll see Mars approaching opposition. I had a good look the other night using a saxon 909AZ3 and Mars is about the same apparent size as Saturn without its rings. My mate Paul just got this shot of Neptune, which is difficult, but a beautiful blue. There are plenty of bright clusters like 47 Tuc, and dimmer objects like the Helix Nebula. or the Sculptor Galaxy. Far into the North, the Ring Nebula will challenge you. Here’s the  list of springtime objects. It spans 12 to 20 hours in RA, and is biased to the southern objects. Because we're locked down in Melbourne, it won't be easy for you to see the dimmer objects. The list is ordered by the time targets pass the meridian – that is, their highest point of the night. The Omega Nebula is past the zenith before 7pm, so go for that one first.

More than anything else, people ask me about polar alignment of beginner equatorial mounts. To be honest, I'm not really sure that beginners need equatorial mounts at all, but that's how a lot of telescopes come. The process seems intimidating and hard to understand, but once you get the idea, it takes about five minutes and you're up and running - especially if you're putting the scope up where you had it last. In this rather lengthy blog (that goes with a video ) I go through the stuff you need to know to get your equatorial mount set up, as well as a load of details you don't need to know, but might be helpful. Before you start Just to keep you on your toes - or maybe to balance the information coming from elsewhere, I live in Australia, which is in the Southern Hemisphere. I can't see Polaris, meaning the procedure might be a little different if you're up North. Some people say that polar alignment is easier in the North, I'm not entirely convinc

Melbourne seems to be making progress in getting the Coronavirus outbreak under some control, finally. However, for the moment we're still in lockdown and can't get out of the city for astronomy. Light pollution plays havoc with astronomy, and especially astrophotography. Light pollution is when light from street lights, house lights, sports stadiums, outdoor advertising and all those other reasons for turning lights on gets reflected off any dust in the air above us. It turns into a barrier separating us and the sky, effectively blotting out all the dim and interesting things out there. But that doesn't mean we can't see anything. Right now, even if the Moon isn't in the right spot (it changes all the time, of course) Jupiter and Saturn are nicely available. They're both high overhead soon after sunset. If you stay up much later, Mars will rise in the East, and because it's near opposition, it'll look good in a long focal-length telescope like an Novo 9

I’m sure you heard about NEOWISE, the comet that dazzled viewers in the Northern Hemisphere. I received several amazing photos from my friends in the US. Sadly, by the time it got to the Southern Hemisphere it had dimmed off considerably. Yes, it was visible from Melbourne – but how visible is “visible”...? What's worse, Melbourne was in lockdown for the Coronavirus, so people like me couldn't get out from under the dome of light pollution. The whole thing was a bit of a bust, really. Comets are unpredictable. They regularly brighten when far distant, something that gets astronomers jumping up and down. But just as often they fizzle out – or even break up – before getting close. Once (well, in my memory at least) a comet even crashed into Jupiter. Let’s call that a bad day. This is NASA's daily pick from back in July. Comet C/2020 F3 (NEOWISE) What's going on here? Why does the comet have two tails? Nearly all comets develop a twin tail. It's because they leave be

Star registries are ways that you can "buy" or "name" a star. There are several reasons why you'd want to do this, but in nearly every case, people want to know if they can actually see their star with a telescope. In most cases you can - depending on your location and time of year, of course. In this blog I'll show you how you can find yours. Buying your own star For a while now, star registry companies have been selling limited naming rights or limited name association to stars. This doesn't mean you own the star, of course, and any name you give it isn't official in any way. But sometimes, that isn't important. People have very valid, personal reasons for associating their name, or more often, someone else's name, to a star. Many people have found that there are star registry companies out there. But I'm not going to show you how to get or name your own star here, because I don't want to advertise these companies. What'

For the past several weeks now - it feels like an eternity - Melbourne has been in what authorities call "Stage 4 lockdown". We are allowed out for one hour per day for exercise, and can go shopping at the local supermarket, but only one at a time. One thing that's not permitted is travelling to a bird watching area and strolling around with camera or binoculars. That's not considered "exercise" and neither is it on the way to the shop. Legally, the only birding I can do is at home. My garden is mostly native, meaning it does attract a number of birds. Numerically, however, visitors are largely Common Mynas and Spotted Dove. At least the Dove is a native. So for something to do during lockdown, I rigged a feeding table in a White Cedar we have.    The White Cedar is beautiful, and has grown very large in the decade we've had it. The disadvantage is that it's severely impinging on my view of the sky, and I can't see to the south-west any longer fo

This is the story of an asteroid, a challenge and a video. It describes why I decided to catch the dwarf planet Ceres, how I found it, how I photographed it, how I watched it make its way through the dark, and how it reminded me how little we are. Astronomy in the time of the Coronavirus The other night was the first night in weeks where it wasn't cloudy. Of course, there was a mad scramble when Melbourne-based astrophotographers were all running outside to take photos. Naturally, I was one of them. We couldn't run far though. The Melbourne Coronavirus lockdown prevented anyone from leaving their homes. The Moon was about three quarters full (waxing gibbous, if you're into that sort of thing), and not far from Jupiter and Saturn. Mars was up later. The Helix Nebula was around half way between Saturn. and Mars, and the Sculptor Galaxy followed. The asteroid formally known as... So I didn't go for the Helix or Sculptor. I decided to go for the dwarf planet Cer

The other night was the first night in weeks where it wasn't cloudy. Of course, there was a mad scramble when Melbourne-based astrophotographers were all running outside to take photos. Naturally, I was one of them. We couldn't run far though. The Melbourne Coronavirus lockdown prevented anyone from leaving their homes. On the night in question, the Moon was about three quarters full (waxing gibbous, if you're into that sort of thing), and not far from Jupiter and Saturn. Mars was up later. The Helix Nebula was around half way between Saturn. and Mars, and the Sculptor Galaxy followed. But imaging under moonlight is challenging, especially if you're after deep-sky targets like nebulas or galaxies. Moonlight washes out the really faint light from these targets, meaning the signal (nebula light) to noise (moonlight) ratio is really low. You can drag out these details using many subexposures, or use light pollution or narrowband filters, but at best you'll get an image