Month: September 2012

Two Days in the Life of Our Sun

H-Alpha Sun
H-Alpha Sun

Object Name : Sun
Object Type : H alpha observation
Location : Montreal, Canada
Date : September 2 and 3
Media : Acrylic on black paper
Scope: Lunt LS60THa/B600|CPT on motorized EQ3 mount.

Our star put up a great show during 2 days. I was able to observe the «good hair day» of the sun for a total of nearly 5 hours. Many proeminences, which remained relatively stable throughout 48 hours, could be seen. The observation of September 2nd was interesting. I started the observation around 13:00 EDT keeping the magnification low (25-50X) to sketch the whole disk and the distribution of the proeminences. I kept an eye on AR 1560, which was facing earth. Around 14:00 EDT this region began to light up. Two bright flares (showed at the upper center lane of the first disk) were clearly visible and increased in brightness for the next 30 minutes. Then they faded away and by 15:00 EDT the phenomenon ended. I was glad to be able to capture this activity on my sketch.

The sketches were done on black Pastel Paper with HB pencil to record details of the proeminences. The disk was traced with a compass. Acrylic paint (red and yellow) was then used to reproduce the color seen in H alpha. The paint was layered with large and small brushes directly on the lines of the HB pencil. The two separate sketches were photographed and then assembled with Photoshop CS3. No color or contrast adjustment were done except for the background.

Jean Barbeau

M81 – A Photographic Sketching Lesson

Messier 81 - Practice Sketch
Messier 81 - Practice Sketch

Object Name: M81
Object Type: Spiral galaxy located 12 million light years away in the constellation Ursa Major
Location: Home, based on a photograph of the galaxy
Date: September 4, 2012
Media: Graphite pencil on white paper

This is my first submission; I took my first astronomical sketching lesson one week earlier so I’m a beginner, but have a strong interest in keep developing the necessary skills. I’m also about to undertake my first introductory astronomy course this week.

Greetings from Costa Rica.

Mauricio Gamboa

Editor’s Note:
As a rule, the Astronomy Sketch of the Day focuses on sketches that are based on live observing sessions. However, from time to time, we do take the opportunity to feature sketches, paintings, illustrations and mixed media that are created under other circumstances.

Weird family of Reichenbach

Reichenbach Craters
Reichenbach Craters

Weird family of Reichenbach.
I mean the craters Reichenbach 😉
Strange, intricate, rugged. They have a sharp hills beautiful shining at this stage of illumination.. And deep gorges.
At high magnification, we find there a long slit running on the slope of Reichenbach C.

SCT 5″. Magnification about 277x. White pastels. Shadows darkened with the soft pencil.
Aleksander Cieśla (Wimmer)
www.astro-art.com.pl

Mooncrater Moretus

Craters Moretus, Short and Cysatus
Craters Moretus, Short and Cysatus

Hello,

this evening I drawed the crater Moretus and two of his neighbours: Short and Cysatus.
Moretus has a flat floor filled with lava and an imposante central mountain of 2700 m. In my eye fell immediately his stage crater wall.

Difficult course, was the perspective. Due to the southerly location of Moretus it was a real challenge.

I hope, that you like my sketch.

Greetings and clear sky

Uwe

Just After Sunset

Just After Sunset - 12 Sketches
Just After Sunset - 12 Sketches

When we sketch the sun, we sketch sunspots or H-alpha. But the most beautiful thing to sketch is a sunrise or sunset. During my 2 weeks holiday in France I observed every day the sky just after sunset. I missed only one day due to rain.

The sky and the trees were sketched with a set of 12 soft pastels. The farm was sketched with pastel pencils. The original drawings are all A4-format. I waited the sun to set behind the trees and started sketching as fast as I could. After 30 minutes I stopped because the sky changes very fast.

I had great difficulty in sketching the trees. The dark green pastel was to light, the black and brown to dark… The second week the result is much better than the first week.

Clear skies
Jef De Wit

Location: Ronnet, France (46°12’ N 2°42’ E)
Date and time: 4-16 august 2012 around 19.00 UT
Equipment: naked eye
Medium: soft pastel and pastel pencils on art paper (A4)

Carbon Star RX Cygni

RX Cygni
RX Cygni

Hi!
I decided to submit a sketch of an extraordinary object: RX Cygni. It’s one of these very red shining carbon stars; nice to observe and unlike other deep-sky-aims, because you easily see colors, even in small telescopes. I suppose the most famous carbon star is R Leporis, which can be found in winter – much more intense than RX Cygni!
Information can be seen in the picture.
Greets – Anne