The Moon and Mercury

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Total eclipse over Pembs Land.

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Yesterday started with rain followed by rain and then guess what... yes rain! Not the best start for an eclipse event, though the weather did improve as the day went on. By early evening the Sun was shining, the clouds were making blue gaps, and the rain was having a well deserved rest! The cloud on the horizon blocked out the Moonrise, but no matter we did manage a glimpse of the event.  I was able to  capture a few photos. Had a lovely chat with a couple of fellow stargazers, which made for a great evening of astronomy talk. It was a good evening of lunar viewing, albeit in small peeps. 
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Astronomy from the 1950's, and my analogue laptop.

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Digging around in a charity shop the other day I found an interesting book titled: The Modern Children's Library of Knowledge  Book Two  The World we live in. This book was published in 1957, and towards the end of the book was a chapter about astronomy.  It contained a wealth of astronomy information and most interesting to me a large collection of 1950's era illustrations. I love these old astronomy pictures.  Why don't we have more illustrations like these in modern journals and magazines. Today's astronomy  magazines just don't interest me. Too many adverts for a start, not enough "amateur" articles, and way too "glossy". I personally like black and white illustrations, be they photos or drawings.  Saying that some of the most interesting illustrations can sometimes be in full colour: In my perfect astronomy magazine I would like nothing more than to see the typesetting done on...
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The Harp Star.

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The Harp Star -Vega I started out last night with the sole intention of imaging M13..  after a few attempts I became distracted by the beautiful brilliance of Vega. Vega resides in the constellation of Lyra the Harp, this blue-white star is sometimes called the Harp Star. In Greek mythology, Lyra the harp is said to have been played by the legendary Greek musician Orpheus.  And  whenever Orpheus started to pluck those strings, nobody it was said could resist listening. Obviously Orpheus was busy last night, for Vega the Harp Star grabbed my attention. I attempted imaging using a Nikon D50, connected via prime focus with a x2 Barlow. I tried a 20 second exposure, and was able to capture the above photo. Thank You Orpheus.
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