SK Astro
Author

Stephen Kirk

Browsing
Galaxies

The Leo Triplet in a Widefield

Leo Triplet In Widefield

The Leo Triplet is a popular trio of galaxies in the constellation of Leo, popular with amateur and professional astronomers alike. They are visible in the late winter and spring in the Northern Hemisphere. Consisting of M65, M66 and NGC 3628, the galaxies are about 35 million light years away. NGC 3628 was never given the distinction of as Messier number for some reason, even though it is as bright as the other two members. The image was taken with my Samyang 135mm DLSR lens coupled with Moravian G2-8300 cooled CCD camera with Astrodon RGB filters. It consists of seventy minutes (5 minute exposures binned 1×1) in each of the red, green and blue filters to give a total integration time of three hours and thirty minutes. The triplet was about 45 degrees above the horizon when the exposures were captured. IT was then processed with Pixinsight and Photoshop. The…

More
By
Lunar

Lunar Pictures from January 2020

Mare Humorum Region

A few pictures of the moon that I took with my Meade 14 ACF SCT scope with a ASI 174MM camera in January 2020.  The pictures utilised no filters at all. Copernicus Area Apollo 11 Area Plato Region Mare Humurum Region The Meade 14″ is an astounding scope that I liked very much.  However, with a heavy heart I subsequently went on to sell this telescope since I felt that in my Bortle 5skies it doesn’t offer any significant advantage over and above the Celestron C925;  the latter scope being very much more manageable that the huge (and very heavy) 14″ Meade.   At some point in the future I may regret this decision since the scope  excelled on the few occasions I took it to truly dark skies. However, I could not let my heart rule my head and I decided to sell it.

More
By
Galaxies

M87, The Giant Elliptical Galaxy in Virgo TEC 140

M87

M87 M87 is a supergiant elliptical galaxy at the heart of the Virgo cluster of galaxies and is visible in many pictures of the famous Markarian’s Chain. It is about 65 million light years away and, after the Sun, is the brightest source of radio waves in the sky – at that vast distance! The galaxy is one of the most massive in the local universe at two hundred times the mass of our own Milky Way galaxy. M87 harbours one of the most massive Black holes in the Universe at 8 billion solar masses. The galaxy is surrounded by a swarm of globular clusters, about 12000 of them, compared to only 200 from our galaxy. The galaxy is so large that from The Earth the extended galaxy is almost the size of the full moon. Image Technical Data Imaged from by back yard in Nottingham, UK with my TEC…

More
By
Misc Uncategorized

Howie Glatter Laser Collimator

In order to get the best from your observing and imaging sessions, your reflecting telescope needs to be properly collimated. In other words, the optical axis of the telescope must be optimised to reflect the light optimally. Newtonian and Ritchey- Chretien design scopes do not deliver a crisp and sharp image unless they are properly collimated. A laser collimator is a device that can aid in getting the telescope properly collimated. I want to emphasise that I am not in any way paid in money or kind to write these words. I do this for the love of it and to help others and I have no connection whatsoever to the maker of these collimators. Sadly, Howie Glatter himself passed away in 2016. He was a very kind man and was incredibly friendly, knowledgable and approachable. There was almost nothing he didn’t know regarding the subject of collimation of telescopes! …

More
By
Galaxies

M31 – The Great Galaxy in Andromeda

M31 Andromeda Complete

Known since ancient times as a nebulous blob in the autumn and winter sky, M31 was the first galaxy to be recognised as a completely independent “island universe”, wholly separate from our own Milky Way galaxy.  This nature of M31 was only discovered in 1924.M31 is slightly larger than our own galaxy and is located about 2.2million light years away. M31 – The Great Andromeda Galaxy The abovr image is comprised of a series of 600s exposures taken during 2017 and 2018 and is approximately ten hours worth of data through Baader LRGB and Ha (7nm) filters with a Takahashi FSQ85 telescope at native focal length and with G2-8300 camera. M31 Annotated Version M31 Inverted Version

More
By
Load More