Telescopes and Stargazing

[technomage]

I am not sure if this is the best place to post this, but I wonder how many people here are amateur astronomers. I've been posting at the astronomy forums, but I'm not going to have discussions of the paranormal there.

I plan on getting a 12" Dobsonian reflector telescope and was wondering if there are other stargazers out there and if they've seen anything unusual with their telescopes.

 

[Oakenwulf]

I use a cheapy CVS reflector telescope (which works pretty good oddly) until i can save up for something really nice, I wish ive seen something crazy, not even a drone flyby

 

[boomerang]

Astronomy is a fantastic hobby. Only thing wrong with it tends to be the cost of that bigger scope or special gizmo you always want.

Perhaps the best website and forum on the net for amateur astronomers is "Cloudy Nights".

Cloudy Nights Home

I used to be heavily into digital planetary photography. Some links to a few of my pics. Be advised that there are others posted that really put mine in the shade !

Saturn 12-14-06 - Planets - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

Jupiiter w/IO and Europa - Planets - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

Saturn in Good Seeing - Planets - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

Mars 10-23-05 - gazerjim's photos - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

The closest thing to something unusual seen was two satellites in sequence, about 30 seconds part. As they vanished towards the north, they appeared to slowly change direction. But--this could also have been an illusion.

 

[technomage]

Astronomy is a fantastic hobby. Only thing wrong with it tends to be the cost of that bigger scope or special gizmo you always want.

Perhaps the best website and forum on the net for amateur astronomers is "Cloudy Nights".

Cloudy Nights Home

I used to be heavily into digital planetary photography. Some links to a few of my pics. Be advised that there are others posted that really put mine in the shade !

Saturn 12-14-06 - Planets - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

Jupiiter w/IO and Europa - Planets - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

Saturn in Good Seeing - Planets - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

Mars 10-23-05 - gazerjim's photos - Photo Gallery - Cloudy Nights

The closest thing to something unusual seen was two satellites in sequence, about 30 seconds part. As they vanished towards the north, they appeared to slowly change direction. But--this could also have been an illusion.

I joined Cloudy Nights and the Astronomy Forums and have gotten a lot of useful responses to my postings at the Astronomy forums. I am planning on getting the Apertura AD12 Dobsonian very soon.

Those are some really nice pictures. I am not into astrophotography (hence the Dobsonian), but I will grab my video camera and see what it does with the Dobsonian out of curiosity.

That's interesting about the satellites. Maybe you'll be able to get a picture of something unusual one of these days.

 

[Wade]

I used to be heavily into digital planetary photography. Some links to a few of my pics. Be advised that there are others posted that really put mine in the shade !

Good Stuff Maynard!

 

[Erno86]

Here around the Baltimore suburbs, it's just too much light pollution, so much that I have to travel to Western Maryland; just to get some decent stargazing in.

I did see Saturn's rings though...with a 30x telescope.

 

[Burnt State]

I used to be heavily into digital planetary photography. Some links to a few of my pics. Be advised that there are others posted that really put mine in the shade !

after seeing your absolutely stunning photography I see just what a real amateur I am. those make my moon shots look like trite little exercises. very impressive work. you never cease to amaze - a man of many talents!

My favourite overhead sighting with the naked eye was of a pair of iridium satellites travelling in parallel paths and locked together but just off by a couple of degrees. I could not find a record for them in the satellite database sightings list for my region - obviously they were a pair of unlisted characters. But they stunningly bright as they arced across about 120 degrees of sky.

 

[boomerang]

after seeing your absolutely stunning photography I see just what a real amateur I am. those make my moon shots look like trite little exercises. very impressive work. you never cease to amaze - a man of many talents!

My favourite overhead sighting with the naked eye was of a pair of iridium satellites travelling in parallel paths and locked together but just off by a couple of degrees. I could not find a record for them in the satellite database sightings list for my region - obviously they were a pair of unlisted characters. But they stunningly bright as they arced across about 120 degrees of sky.

Thanks, Burnt. But planetary is more a matter of empirical attention to detail and willingness to freeze one's extremities for hours than anything else.

My dirty little secret is that the real credit for technical expertise in planetary photography goes to those who design the cameras and imaging tracking and sharpening software. Patience and attention to detail are the recipe. And--quality of seeing can be almost everything. I moved from the Austin area to west Texas for 5 years to find that I simply could not get stable air for imaging from my driveway. This can be due to conditions over a very large area, or just a bad location in the local topography.


Planetary imaging is a snap compared to deep sky, long focus imaging of galaxies and nebulae. Such as those breathtaking views seen in Sky and Telescope etc. The latter is much more complex and incredibly expensive. The price of a new BMW or Accura would not be an exaggeration for serious deep sky work. Way out of my league.

 

[exo_doc]

I have been an avid amateur astronomer since my first telescope I got for Christmas back in 1978. I own several now, my favorite being my Meade LX200 10" when I feel like setting it up, thing weighs a ton. I have a couple of decent refractors, but my goto for starry nights are my old Celestron Skymaster binoculars. I have an off axis tripod for it and get really good views through it.
As far as seeing things I can't explain, I have seen a very, very slow moving satellite a couple of years ago that may have been a passing asteroid, but I never found out. I've seen blinking lights that appear to stay put in the sky while the earth rotates, ...on three separate occasions I've seen satellites move from east to west which doesn't sound unusual except no one launches satellites like that for numerous reasons including it would use 3 times the fuel to get into orbit. About 15 years ago I saw a light spot on the dark part of the moon that was in earthshine, I watched that until the moon set. I've never seen it since.
But no "flying saucers" or anything I could definitively say was non-human made. BUT, I keep looking.

 

[mike]

I had the usual small ones as a kid, but the neighbour up the road built this massive thing.
Sent away to england for the lenses and mirrors and built it himself

Saw the rings of saturn and moons of jupiter through it.

We have an observatory very nearby

wsaag - Linden Observatory

 

[stonehart]

I had the usual small ones as a kid, but the neighbour up the road built this massive thing.
Sent away to england for the lenses and mirrors and built it himself

Saw the rings of saturn and moons of jupiter through it.

We have an observatory very nearby

wsaag - Linden Observatory

Now that is impressive!

I had a small Newtonian a number of years ago but sold it when we moved into town. Simply do not have the time to drive far enough out of town to clear the light pollution.
What I use these days is a set of Binoculars attached to a tripod just for casual observation (used it just recently for the lunar eclipse), setup works ok but damn I miss having a good scope.

 

[boomerang]

The key to having fun observing in the field is a really dark sky location. But those are sadly getting rare.

 

[ALPHA ROMEO UNIFORM]

One time saw large disc shape on the moon and reported to locals they reply in five mins with cannot see it.

 

[technomage]

The key to having fun observing in the field is a really dark sky location. But those are sadly getting rare.

Luckily, I have a pretty dark location so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to order a 12" telescope yesterday.