This comet will reach its brightest point a couple of weeks from now, but the skies were clear this morning so I figured I should go for it while I can! The tail’s not as pronounced as I hoped, and processing is a bit sloppy in a couple of spots. But hey, it’s a comet. Pretty.
This year, I revisited M51, the “Whirlpool Galaxy.” Having seem some images of this with hundreds of hours of exposure time that pulled out features I never knew were there, I wanted to give it a go myself. This image incorporates over 139 hours of exposure time – but honestly, it doesn’t look much different…
Another revisit of an old target, with better gear and better conditions. This is the Pelican Nebula in the constellation Cygnus. Shot in narrowband over one night, and presented in the “Hubble palette”. Two takes – one wider field, and one close-up with the stars removed. In both cases the image is rotated and mirrored…
Yeah, it’s been a couple of months since we’ve done a live star party online, or posted any new pictures. That’s just summertime in Central Florida for you – it’s been too cloudy to do any imaging or observing. The skies should start clearing up more in a couple of months, and we have every…
This is my first “dark nebula” – a cloud of dark dust obscuring the Milky Way behind it. You need dark skies to capture these things, which my remote setup in central Texas now provides. Well, at least when the moon isn’t up. Formally LDN1235, this is actually a much larger object that extends further…
Hoag’s Object is the weirdest galaxy I know of; it is a “ring galaxy” – a very rare galaxy type that’s just a galactic core of stars, surrounded by a ring of stars that’s seemingly disconnected from its core. This galaxy has always captured my imagination. Just look at this image from the Hubble Space…
The “Flaming Skull Nebula” (SH2-68) is an old, dim planetary nebula that’s about 40,000 years old. What makes it unique is its structure; it is the fastest-moving planetary nebula measured, and as it moves through the intersteller medium, its gases are getting mixed into the galaxy – leaving a trail behind. Not to brag, but…