Skies were clear and the ‘seeing’ was fantastic for our first public stargazing event of 2015. Club members shared detailed views of the Moon & Jupiter with passersby and visitors who came to the Niagara Gateway Tourism Centre.

Jim Wamsley had his telescope connected to the HAA’s video cam and flat screen. This is a great way to point out various lunar features to guests.

Bernie offered views of Comet Lovejoy through his refractor. Lise managed to find M42 in spite of the light pollution and mechanical problems with her scope’s mount.

I was impressed by spectacular views of the Moon & Jupiter through Tony’s & Mike’s refractors. It’s a treat to peer through a well made refractor.

My 6″ Skywatcher Dobsonian reflector is an excellent beginner’s scope and always a hit with people looking for their first telescope. I spent the evening showing several budding amateur astronomers how it works and what excellent views it provides.

I only managed to stay for a couple of hours before the cold wind got to me, but I enjoyed speaking to all the folks who came out to see us.
Continue Reading

The Waxing Crescent Moon and Venus in the Western Sky

Here is a shot of the Moon and Venus together in the western sky, as promised in the previous post (well, my previous post). Enjoy! (tripod mounted camera with zoom lens set at 200mm)
Continue Reading

Here’s a shot I took of the Moon and Mars last night. They presented a lovely pairing low in the west just at dusk, while Venus shone brightly high above them. Go outside tonight and see how the Moon has traveled up much closer to Venus.  (photo is hand held with 200mm lens)

Continue Reading

Fantastic auroral display tonight. These images were taken northwest of Hamilton, near Westover. The aurora was visible naked eye, but I couldn’t see colour.

Continue Reading

Comet C/2014 Q2 (Lovejoy) passed within about a degree of open cluster NGC 457, the E.T. Cluster, the week of March 9, 2015.  This image is from Monday March 9, 2015, approx. 9:00 pm to 9:55 pm from Caledonia ON.

M103, another open cluster, is visible at far right.  The bright star Delta Cassiopeiae is near lower right.  The red emission nebula, Sh2-188, is faintly visible near the comet.  North is towards the lower right.

This is a stack of 33 1-minute exposures at ISO 1600 and f/2.8.

I used my Canon 40D DSLR with an Astronomik CLS light pollution clip-filter and my Tamron 300mm f/2.8 telephoto lens on my SP EQ mount.

This was a lot of hard work processing this image; about a dozen iterations of layering and masking….. not including the gradient blending I had to do to flatten the field from side to side a bit better.

Last night’s full moon was the smallest full moon of the year. We’ve heard it called the micro-moon ormini-moon. This March 5, 2015 full moon lies about 50,000 kilometers (30,000 miles) farther away from Earth than will the year’s closest full moon – the full supermoon and Northern Hemisphere’s Harvest Moon – on September 28. The March 5 moon is the year’s farthest full moon because full moon and lunar apogee – the moon’s farthest point in its monthly orbit – both fall on the same date.
Continue Reading

A 22° halo is a halo, one type of optical phenomenon, forming a circle with a radius of approximately 22° around the Sun, or occasionally the Moon (also called a moon ring or winter halo).  It forms as sunlight is refracted in millions of randomly oriented hexagonal ice crystals suspended in the atmosphere.  The halo is large; the radius is roughly the size of an outstretched hand at arms length.  As light passes through the 60° apex angle of the hexagonal ice prisms it is deflected twice resulting in deviation angles ranging from 22° to 50°.  The angle of minimum deviation is almost 22° (or more specifically 21.84° on average; 21.54° for red light and 22.37° for blue light).  This wavelength-dependent variation in refraction causes the inner edge of the circle to be reddish while the outer edge is bluish.  As no light is refracted at angles smaller than 22° the sky is darker inside the halo.  A 22° halo may be visible on as many as 100 days per year—much more frequently than rainbows.

My entire neighbourhood is surrounded by 80+ foot trees, so Tonight’s Spectacular Triple-play Conjunction is partially hidden by trees, however, I love the effect that I was able to achieve!

The Moon, Venus and Mars formed a beautiful grouping in the western sky above Hamilton tonight. It was well worth the risk of frostbite to view. I snapped this photo with a point & shoot camera from our driveway.

I turned to face north just before 7:00 pm to catch a very bright pass overhead by the International Space Station. I snapped a photo of the ISS (it’s the streak in the image below) as it passed Jupiter in the ESE.

Continue Reading