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I feel a bit of a fraud. I think most astronomers must do. Over the years I’ve published many images of wondrous heavenly objects, yet in reality if you were to have looked through my telescope eye-piece it would have been difficult to have seen most of them. When they have been very faint I’ve taken pictures, lots and lots of them and overlaid them to bring out the very faint image. Even then each of these pictures have been exposed longer than any eye could see at any one time without blinking. Finding the target in the first place has become easier and easier with computer-controlled telescopes that not only find, but ‘lock-on’ and track, subtracting the movement of the Earth. Even getting a sharp image is now automated! My telescope will simply not take a picture if its big beady eye senses cloud or a blurred image. It is almost totally automated.
The skill now is to make sure that this chain of a complex mixture of astronomy and technology doesn’t fail because if one part doesn’t work, then all of it is useless. Don’t get me wrong…it’s hard!!! I can see how many astronomers may get drawn away from grass-roots observational viewing. The silver lining is when it all works well, you can just look up and marvel at the beautiful night sky! Whilst the image below was being taken I gazed upwards into the moonless sky, whilst what I was capturing on my telecope was far too small and dim to see with my eyes (The Butterfly Nebula), I could see the Andromeda Galaxy, which one of the few galaxies you can see with your unaided eye. I’m glad to say it still feels amazing!
So I hope my picture helps you to see what your eyes cannot and that the articles describe where to look. But there is no substitute for just looking upward.
The Butterfly Nebula
This is an image of the Butterfly Nebula, located very near the star Sadar (the star at the centre of Cygnus (the Swan, see below). The shape is caused by different gases being hit by charged particles (stellar winds), but not by Sadar but other close-by sun/s. This image has been created by combining 10x300sec images.
https://daveandtelescope.wordpress.com/tag/ic-1318/
Whole Sky View looking north from Embsay.
The Milky Way galaxy stretches overhead from east to west. Cygnus (the swan) flying towards the west. Cassiopeia now looking like the number 3 almost north. Jupiter follows the red curve (ecliptic) low in the east.
Saturn is low in the south and above it is the great Square of Pegasus. Early in the month try to see if you can spot the Andromeda Galaxy unaided. Find the big square and from the top left corner follow the line of stars, go two stars along the line and then to the right there will be a smudge.
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/W74-URI4s0Y
Planets, Supermoon and a Comet!
Look out for the comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS as the sun just drops below the horizon on 13th October. Although it is 70 million km away we should get a glimpse low in the West with Venus just to its left, if we are lucky. If you are going to use binoculars PLEASE WAIT UNTIL THE SUN SETS.
https://theskylive.com/c2023a3-info
The following day October 14th the Moon will appear to be right under Saturn. On October 20th Jupiter will appear be below the moon. (A good way of locating the two planets).
We have the largest of the supermoon events this year on 17th October, and you won’t need a telescope!
27th October heralds the end of British Summer Time….did we get any?
Clear skies.
Milan Davidovic
