Tag: star-gazing

First time astrophotography on La Palma with my own equipment – failed

/ Carsten / 1 Comment
Astrophotography on La Palma

Astrophotography on La Palma

Weather forecast - Clear sky on La Palma.

Wellā€¦ I like the moonā€¦ butā€¦ YEAH! He is gone! Time for astrophotography on La Palma šŸ™‚ For this purpose I rent a VW Caddy here on La Palma. The plan: Put all the equipment and my girlfriend into the Caddy and drive up to Mirador del Jable – a quite popular place for watching the stars. One last look at the weather forecast from aemetā€¦ Looks quite promising! Even though it is almost impossible to predict the weather on La Palma. Furthermore, hdmeteo can be helpful to get an idea of the current weather conditions on the island. And last but not least the NOT webcam can give another impression. The decision has been made – tonight will be astro-night!

Continue reading →

The Great Orion Nebula from La Palma

/ Carsten / Leave a comment
The Great Orion Nebula (M42) - 2017/02/02

Recently I took this image of the Great Orion Nebula from La Palma / Spain. Actually it was just a test of my equipment. I did not align the mount and hence the guiding was miserable. I only took some frames with the IR filter with different exposure times. Still, in the end the result was much better than I expected. I love the La Palma sky! šŸ™‚ The image is also available in full resolution here.

Date2017/02/02
LocationLa Palma / Spain
ObjectThe Great Orion Nebula
CameraAtik383L+
Guidingyes, QHY5-II Mono via OAG
Telescope8" GSO Newtonian
Barlow lensnone
MountEQ6Syntrek
Cooling0Ā°C
Luminance4x 5s, 7x 15s, 9x 75s, 7x 150s, 5x 300s, 2x 600s, all bin: 1x1
Red-
Green-
Blue-
Dark-
Flat10x
Total exposure~1h15m

Clear skies!

Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 13:20 pm

Looking at the Sunflower Galaxy ~8.7 billion Round-the-World trips away

/ Carsten / Leave a comment

36 million light years away – or 8.700.000.000 trips around the world! That’s the approximate distance to the Sunflower Galaxy which also has the boring acronym M63.

Tonight I decided to point my 8″ Newton telescope to this object to have a closer look. Even if I only had 2 hours of time I am still satisfied with the result. Personally, I think a sunflower looks a little different – anyway I like the shape and the structure of this object. M63 is located in constellation Canes Venatici and is not “so far” away from M51. Its apparent magnitude is about 9.3mag. Besides, I already targeted M63 a few years ago, but this new result I think is much better.

Date2016/05/02
LocationBƶblingen / Germany
ObjectSunflower Galaxy (M63)
CameraAtik383L+
Guidingyes, QHY5-II Mono via OAG
Telescope8" GSO Newtonian
Barlow lensnone
MountEQ6Syntrek
Cooling-15Ā°C
Luminance4x, 600s, bin: 1x1
Red4x, 150s, bin: 2x2
Green4x, 150s, bin: 2x2
Blue4x, 150s, bin: 2x2
Dark2x
Flat10x
Total exposure~1h10min.
m63_final_cut_border

Clear skies!

Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 14:09 pm

The ParaTi magazine on La Palma published a lost-infinity.com article

/ Carsten / Leave a comment
Orion Nebula (M43) - 2014/02/07

Recently I had the chance to contribute an article about astronomy to the La Palma Para TI magazine. In this article I write about my impressions and emotions when I was visiting Roque de Los Muchachos at night. “El Roque” is the highest point on La Plama (2426m).Up there the Roque de Los Muchachos Osbervatory is situated. The title picture of the article is the Great Orion nebula (M42) which is one of my favorite pictures. I imaged it back in February 2014. If you are on La Palma, I recommend you to visit “El Roque” in a clear and moonless night (see also my previous article) – you will be surprised šŸ™‚

Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 19:11 pm

Astrocups – The perfect Christmas present for Astro-Fans!

/ Carsten / 1 Comment
astro_cups_border

Merry Christmas to everyone! Well, if you are still looking for an astronomy related Christmas present you areĀ probably a little late this year šŸ˜€ But maybe you just found something for next year… Using some of my best images I composed some fancy “astrocups”. Next time you prepare for your star-gazing event you should have one of these with you! To produce the cups I used the service of https://www.luebeckgeschenke.de/ (more exactly here). The images are designed for the “standard cup (white)” and the “black cup” with a dimension of 1496 Ɨ 630 pixels, 200×200 ppi. Here are the three best ones so far:

cup3_2

1. The “Black Hole Cup”

This cup symbolizes a black hole just like the center of M51 – the Whirlpool Galaxy which is printed on the cup. This image is the outcome of a long night in May 2015. Personally I think this cup is best suited for black coffeeā€¦

Download

2. The “Good night Cup”

TheĀ “Good night cup” has images of Jupiter, Saturn, our moon and the sun. TheĀ photo of the sun has been taken during the partial solarĀ eclipse in March 2015. The moon is a small version of the moon mosaic recorded in July 2015.

Download
cup1_2
cup2_1

3. The “Star-gazer Cup”

Finally, the Star-gazer cup reminds me on the time I spent on La Palma. The cup is white since the sky is already dark enough thereā€¦

Download

Clear skies!

Last updated: June 16, 2022 at 21:24 pm