Pembrokeshire Astronomer

Seeing: Antoniadi III Last night was cold and windy, and the fast moving clouds were also playing havoc with my Jupiter observations. Tal1 did a good job of dampening down the vibrations of the gusting wind - even at X169 the image was pretty well vibration free. I decided to make a brief sketch and then get back to the warm fire as quickly as possible to draw up my results. Here is the finished sketch in pencil.

Just before supper last night, I had a quick look through the telescope. Jupiter was shining brightly over in the East, so I trained the scope onto the King of the planets. With the 15mm Kellner and X3 Barlow I was able to up the magnification to X169. Considering the pretty poor seeing I was surprised to see any detail on the gas giant. Whilst observing I thought I saw the great red spot. It was only just visible through my 110mm reflector.

This year I'm hoping to sketch a lot more of the  Messier objects  list - using the Tal1.  To get me started, I've reworked a couple of my sketches from last years collection. Also I've added a photo of the Pleiades that I took; I think back in November.   I'll have to dig through my CD's to find the actual date. I've had Tal1 for nearly two years, and in that time I've not as yet attacked the Messier list with any real conviction. Over the years I've seen many of the Messier objects through various telescopes, but it will be interesting to see what the mighty Russian reflector is capable of. With Tal1 as company it will be nice to revisit some of my Messier favourites. I'm expecting mostly to make sketches of my Messier-Tal1 findings, but sometimes it will be easier just to train our Nikon D50+ 300mm lens onto my intended target. The picture below of M45 was taken with our 70-300mm telephoto lens. I wonder if

I do a have a red safelight in the observatory, but I find no reason to hook it up and use it... The reason being...... I enjoy candlelight..... The soft subdued glow of the naked flame imparts a feeling of warmth that no red safety light is able to do. Also when my hands feel a bit cold, I move them for a while closer to the flame. Now if I could also run my RA drive on mechanicals, be it a wind up clock, or maybe a falling weight, then that would be my perfect astronomy set up.