We will observe the Saturn, the moon and likely several other targets.
Sorry about the last minute announcement.
I'm not sure how late we will be open. The above is an estimate.
If the evenings demands and observing go well we may be out later than the title suggests.
Greg
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Sunday, June 16, 2013
Not a lot to report at HJRO lately, I did a little sidewalk astronomy last week in Riverview
Last week we had a couple members of the Faac club go out and do some work making the observatory better. They tested a new focusing mask that Tim Campbell donated to HJRO. Tim Dey and Tim Campbell were the testers.
The next evening Tim Campbell worked on the alignment of the mount. Apparently the mount wasn't pointing very well. We need to get a better alignment setup in the mount. This is a software thing, but we have been putting this off because we are going to be getting new telescope rings that hold the c14 more firmly and securely to the mount than our current setup. George Korody is donating these rings from an earlier setup he used to use as he used to own a c14. The ring setup is worth at least $1000. Plus he bought other parts and donated this to help it happen.
This last year seems to be a year of donations with many members of the club and even Leo McMaster making donations to HJRO. These items include:
A new better setup using a Macintosh mini computer. That will allow us to stream video of observing sessions to the school or other places over the Internet. Various computer hardware donated or loaned.
A camera that allows us to auto track on stars. This is necessary to allow long exposure photography of more than a minute. We can take four or five minute exposures now. At least with the testing we've done. This opens up more in the realm of long exposure astrophotography at HJRO.
The focus mask.
Telescope rings.
The telescope rings will mean we have to do an alignment to the telescope mount again. So we haven't done much in worrying about getting a killer alignment because the new rings will require another alignment.
A lot of work has been done by George Korody, Tim Dey, Tim Campbell and others at the observatory. They are just a few of the unsung heroes of the observatory.
I was able to stop by briefly and look at Saturn at HJRO, but we were out for such a short time that I couldn't make the announcement over the blog to the public because I could not guarantee the length of time the observatory will be open.
Unfortunately things are moving slow in the setup and adapting of the home for the latest health crisis at home. It's really an ongoing crisis that my family has been coping with for ten years, but things have evolved where it just requires a lot of attention at home. Part of this may be solved by streamlining our home healthcare setup, but that takes a lot of time and there is no easy way to predict when I'll be able to open ip HJRO and hang around long enough for normal visiting sessions.
Tim Campbell did announce that he would be opening up the observatory last week during one evening to the club members and I was the only member to show up.
There is supposed to be many clear sky nights next week starting on Tuesday. We may have the observatory open one or more of those nights.
Some of the members of the club that can run the observatory have been busy helping others in the club who have had health problems as well. So overall there is a lot of people who have been put on hold now that the weather is breaking. It's difficult to say if many of the core HJRO members will be available to help at HJRO with visitors.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
The next evening Tim Campbell worked on the alignment of the mount. Apparently the mount wasn't pointing very well. We need to get a better alignment setup in the mount. This is a software thing, but we have been putting this off because we are going to be getting new telescope rings that hold the c14 more firmly and securely to the mount than our current setup. George Korody is donating these rings from an earlier setup he used to use as he used to own a c14. The ring setup is worth at least $1000. Plus he bought other parts and donated this to help it happen.
This last year seems to be a year of donations with many members of the club and even Leo McMaster making donations to HJRO. These items include:
A new better setup using a Macintosh mini computer. That will allow us to stream video of observing sessions to the school or other places over the Internet. Various computer hardware donated or loaned.
A camera that allows us to auto track on stars. This is necessary to allow long exposure photography of more than a minute. We can take four or five minute exposures now. At least with the testing we've done. This opens up more in the realm of long exposure astrophotography at HJRO.
The focus mask.
Telescope rings.
The telescope rings will mean we have to do an alignment to the telescope mount again. So we haven't done much in worrying about getting a killer alignment because the new rings will require another alignment.
A lot of work has been done by George Korody, Tim Dey, Tim Campbell and others at the observatory. They are just a few of the unsung heroes of the observatory.
I was able to stop by briefly and look at Saturn at HJRO, but we were out for such a short time that I couldn't make the announcement over the blog to the public because I could not guarantee the length of time the observatory will be open.
Unfortunately things are moving slow in the setup and adapting of the home for the latest health crisis at home. It's really an ongoing crisis that my family has been coping with for ten years, but things have evolved where it just requires a lot of attention at home. Part of this may be solved by streamlining our home healthcare setup, but that takes a lot of time and there is no easy way to predict when I'll be able to open ip HJRO and hang around long enough for normal visiting sessions.
Tim Campbell did announce that he would be opening up the observatory last week during one evening to the club members and I was the only member to show up.
There is supposed to be many clear sky nights next week starting on Tuesday. We may have the observatory open one or more of those nights.
Some of the members of the club that can run the observatory have been busy helping others in the club who have had health problems as well. So overall there is a lot of people who have been put on hold now that the weather is breaking. It's difficult to say if many of the core HJRO members will be available to help at HJRO with visitors.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Tuesday, June 4, 2013
A rare quick opening of the observatory, Monday afternoon for the middle school.
Because I have been tied up with family health issues, I have not been able to open up HJRO much in the past month.
There are other key keepers in the Faac club, but they have been very busy with work and other normal things in day to day life.
Yesterday I tried to open up the observatory quickly in the afternoon for the middle school students. The biggest problem however was I had a lot of morning tasks to do at home and had to run some errands as well. So I was off to a late start in the morning. I also wanted to get another Faac member to arrive so two of us could run the observatory. That took a little bit of time. I found Harold was available and willing to interrupt his shrub cutting and yard cleanup tasks. So Harold and I met and I called one of the middle school science teachers to let him know we would be open at 1pm.
Unfortunately I called him to late and he and the other teacher were about to start their last class. Harold and I ended up looking at the sun and we showed one school employee the sun as well. I texted a few members of the astronomy club as well to let them know that observatory was open, in case any could stop by. Dan Barriball a faac member stopped by briefly as well to check out the sun.
Harold and I basically talked for a couple of hours enjoying the weather.
Today is Tuesday and the sky was pretty clear out. I had to many things to do and didn't have time to contact any Faac members and try to open up the observatory again. It's difficult to plan for weather restricted viewing ahead of time and tough to get people to volunteer at the last minute.
My other viewing at HJRO was Saturn about a week ago. I stopped by late at night on the way to Meijers and looked at Saturn for about 15 minutes. A nice break, but then I had errands to run. I took a snapshot of the planet with my iPhone but didn't have time to find all the adapters and get my canon EOS to take a better photo of the planet.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
There are other key keepers in the Faac club, but they have been very busy with work and other normal things in day to day life.
Yesterday I tried to open up the observatory quickly in the afternoon for the middle school students. The biggest problem however was I had a lot of morning tasks to do at home and had to run some errands as well. So I was off to a late start in the morning. I also wanted to get another Faac member to arrive so two of us could run the observatory. That took a little bit of time. I found Harold was available and willing to interrupt his shrub cutting and yard cleanup tasks. So Harold and I met and I called one of the middle school science teachers to let him know we would be open at 1pm.
Unfortunately I called him to late and he and the other teacher were about to start their last class. Harold and I ended up looking at the sun and we showed one school employee the sun as well. I texted a few members of the astronomy club as well to let them know that observatory was open, in case any could stop by. Dan Barriball a faac member stopped by briefly as well to check out the sun.
Harold and I basically talked for a couple of hours enjoying the weather.
Today is Tuesday and the sky was pretty clear out. I had to many things to do and didn't have time to contact any Faac members and try to open up the observatory again. It's difficult to plan for weather restricted viewing ahead of time and tough to get people to volunteer at the last minute.
My other viewing at HJRO was Saturn about a week ago. I stopped by late at night on the way to Meijers and looked at Saturn for about 15 minutes. A nice break, but then I had errands to run. I took a snapshot of the planet with my iPhone but didn't have time to find all the adapters and get my canon EOS to take a better photo of the planet.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Monday, May 20, 2013
Sorry about the lack of posts about observing.
I've been very busy with two parents who are I'll for the past month. Caring for two people is can be a little stressful and keeps a person pretty busy.
Because of this much of the activity at HJRO has been by others and I have not been involved much with the astronomy club lately.
We have another person who can open up the observatory, but the current key keepers have much less time to open up the observatory due to their other commitments/jobs which keep them busy.
I was at about 90 percent of the openings of HJRO in the past couple of years. It may be a while before I can be more active with the observatory and many astronomy sessions due to the family health needs I'm dealing with.
I've quickly met a couple of other members or briefly observed at home in the past month. Haven't had much time to observe.
I hope that the session to observe the conjunction of planets in Alen park goes well around memorial day weekend, if that happens. I'm not sure I'll be able to be there as a brief visitor, much less take part in setting up many of my telescope options.
In any event the telescopes I have that would show the three planets together are small grab and go telescopes, so I might be able to show up and briefly setup and do some observing or let other Faac members use my telescopes to observe that event. We will have to see what happens.
As far as HJRO and the school system, I'm a bit disappointed that I can't offer my time to help the kids see some solar observing. My time is really limited right now and HJRO observatory is being reconfigured with more equipment. That reconfiguration could interfere with the ability to show the sky and do solar for the kids, but hopefully that will quickly happen.
HJRO will be getting a new telescope ring setup, which will allow the telescope to be mounted to the telescope mount with a much better and rigid setup. The rings are being donated by George Korody, who is one of the main faac members responsible for the setting up and rebirth of the hjr observatory at Lincoln Park.
In any event I may write more, but find it really difficult to announce and plan any observing events. I'm literally working or up about 18 hours per day with maybe four or five hours sleep at night lately. Needless to say this affects and wears me out as well and makes any spare time in the day a candidate for a cat nap rather than a time to plan to observe. And since demands are random and unplanned, it's almost impossible to block off any time and commit to observe or have the observatory open.
Right now the moon is out and I may head out and do a quick observe of it from my yard before heading to bed or perhaps helping others here get to bed.
There are far more important things happening right now than astronomy for me so I'm just going to have to sit on the sidelines forma while.
Greg
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Because of this much of the activity at HJRO has been by others and I have not been involved much with the astronomy club lately.
We have another person who can open up the observatory, but the current key keepers have much less time to open up the observatory due to their other commitments/jobs which keep them busy.
I was at about 90 percent of the openings of HJRO in the past couple of years. It may be a while before I can be more active with the observatory and many astronomy sessions due to the family health needs I'm dealing with.
I've quickly met a couple of other members or briefly observed at home in the past month. Haven't had much time to observe.
I hope that the session to observe the conjunction of planets in Alen park goes well around memorial day weekend, if that happens. I'm not sure I'll be able to be there as a brief visitor, much less take part in setting up many of my telescope options.
In any event the telescopes I have that would show the three planets together are small grab and go telescopes, so I might be able to show up and briefly setup and do some observing or let other Faac members use my telescopes to observe that event. We will have to see what happens.
As far as HJRO and the school system, I'm a bit disappointed that I can't offer my time to help the kids see some solar observing. My time is really limited right now and HJRO observatory is being reconfigured with more equipment. That reconfiguration could interfere with the ability to show the sky and do solar for the kids, but hopefully that will quickly happen.
HJRO will be getting a new telescope ring setup, which will allow the telescope to be mounted to the telescope mount with a much better and rigid setup. The rings are being donated by George Korody, who is one of the main faac members responsible for the setting up and rebirth of the hjr observatory at Lincoln Park.
In any event I may write more, but find it really difficult to announce and plan any observing events. I'm literally working or up about 18 hours per day with maybe four or five hours sleep at night lately. Needless to say this affects and wears me out as well and makes any spare time in the day a candidate for a cat nap rather than a time to plan to observe. And since demands are random and unplanned, it's almost impossible to block off any time and commit to observe or have the observatory open.
Right now the moon is out and I may head out and do a quick observe of it from my yard before heading to bed or perhaps helping others here get to bed.
There are far more important things happening right now than astronomy for me so I'm just going to have to sit on the sidelines forma while.
Greg
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Monday, May 13, 2013
I went out to HJRO late tonight to take a quick look at Saturn and took a movie of it and processed it, at about 2AM
I've been very busy at home lately and unable to plan and set aside a long block of time for visitors. I watched the Red Wings today for a couple of periods. Also decided to make a quick late night trip to the observatory and try to get a better photo of Saturn. Saturn looked really sharp but not as good as it did the other night. There was actually quite a bit of moderately average seeing conditions. Not horrible, but not good. This movie taken can be processed to not show the seeing issues. This gives a pretty good representation of what I could see in the eyepiece. But my view was less powerful and the Cassini division was pretty dark and didn't stand out with a kind of shadow effect that we see here. I could see some gradient banding detail visually, but my contrast wasn't as good as we see here in the processed image. Also I could see the ring and some color differences in different parts of the ring for a while. This using a 15mm eyepiece on the C14 in it's native 3911mm configuration. I sent out a message to a few FAAC members who might be up and wondering if anything was happening.
Image of Saturn: Photo was created using Registax 6 from a 1000 frame movie. Best 100 frames selected.
I probably over processed this a bit with a little bit to much wavelet settings. I used Linked wavelets on the first four out of six layers. Turning off the last layer in Registax 6. Saturn did look wonderful. This movie was taken at 3911mm with the T1i and 5x digital zoom using BACKYARD EOS. The shot was taken at 1600 iso, I don't have the exposure setting handy, but I can look it up if someone is interested.
Wednesday, May 1, 2013
I took a photo of some nice sunspots but blogpress on the iPad is acting up
There are some nice sunspots on the sun.
I'll edit this and post the quick photo I took later on the computer.
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I'll edit this and post the quick photo I took later on the computer.
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Some Faac astronomers will be at HJRO at 8pm or so tonight
The plan is to open up around 8pm.
Will post more later.
Greg
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Will post more later.
Greg
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
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