Author: richardhandy

Craters Posidonius at Sunrise

Craters Posidonius at Sunrise

A rare clear evening this spring got me to the eyepiece of my scope to view and sketch the moon. The Apollo 11 landing site was just receiving first light as was crater Posidonius some distance to the south. I have sketched Posidonius at sunset but never at sunrise and this was my opportunity.

The narrow sharp edge wall of 95 km. diameter Posidonius was reflecting much light at the time of this observation. The floor fractures were not well illuminated at the time of this viewing but the central crater A (11 km.) was prominent. Posidonius is an Upper Imbrian period crater that formed by impact at the time lava flooding was occurring in Mare Serenitatis.

Other craters visible at the time of this sketch include from south to north Chacornac (51 km.), on the north rim of Posidonius you see partly illuminated Posidonius B (14 km.), then J (22km.), M (10 km.), Daniell (26km.), and P (15 km.) out beyond the terminator shadow.

Sketching Information

Posidonius crater on ebony black Canson paper using white and black Conte’ pastel pencils
Sketch Date: May 8, 2011, using a 10 inch f/5.7 Dobsonian telescope riding on an equatorial platform with a 6mm eyepiece for 241x at 01:15-02:30 UT
Seeing: Antoniadi III
Weather clear, breezy, 55 degrees F (12 degrees C)
Lunation 4.8 days
Moon 21.5% illuminated
Colongitude 331.6°
Rükl Atlas Pl 14

Frank McCabe

The Active Sun

– Object Name: Sun
– Object Type: Star
– Location: Lith, the Netherlands
– Date: 5-5-2011
– Media: white pastel, black paper, PhotoShop CS5
– Telescope: Coronado P.S.T.

Today was a nice clear day in Holland. The sun was shining bright, so i aimed my brand new solar telescope (Coronado P.S.T.) at it to see some Solar Flares. There where many flares visible, and also some sunspots and other details on the surface.
This is my first solar sketch in H-Alpha. The original sketch is black & white, and i changed that colour in PhotoShop.

Clear Skies!

Rutger Teule
www.rutgerteule.com

The Misplaced Core

Object name: NGC 4013 (galaxy in UMa)
Location: Nádasdladány, Hungary
Date: May 2, 2011
Media: B pencil on white paper, then inverted on computer
SQM reading: 21.23m/arcsec^2, 5°C
Weather: we had rains all day yesterday, so the air has a very high humidity now

I was very surprised when I noticed that this galaxy has its core out
of its geometrical center. I was wondering if this is the result of a
single, well grown spiral arm, but later studies revealed the answer
for this phenomenon: the misplaced core is actually not at all related
to this tiny edge-on galaxy but it’s only a foreground star in our own
Milky Way. This little gem is located in a very sparse stellar
environment which makes it a difficult target.

Ferenc

Our Star Revealed

2011 05 05, 1230 UT – 1515 UT
Solar h-alpha, NOAAs 11203, 11204, 11205, 11207 and prominences

PCW Memorial Observatory, Zanesville, Ohio USA – Erika Rix, www.pcwobservatory.com
Temp: 22.5°C, Humidity 38%
Seeing: Wilson 4, Transparency: 3/6

DS 60mm Maxscope, LXD75, 21-7mm Zhumell, ETX70 AT w/tilt plate and white light glass filter.

H-alpha sketch created scopeside with black Strathmore Artagain paper, white Conte’ crayon and pencil, Derwent charcoal pencil, black oil pencil. White light sketch created on photocopy paper with 0.5mm mechanical pencil and #2 pencil.

The Sun was a little too low in the observatory for me to stay inside at the beginning of the session, so I pulled all my gear onto the grass. It was probably the best move anyway, since it warmed up quite a bit during the session.

I started off with the Maxscope for an overall view. The prominence at the western limb caught my eye initially, but it was the prominence on the eastern limb that really put on a show. It was nearly three times taller than the other and had the faintest wisps of filament reaching out connecting the brightest three areas of that prominence section.

The h-alpha full disk was filled with filaments and plage within the band of active regions. I’ve flipped the views of both the white light and h-alpha full disk sketches to match the standard view (at least a little more so as I didn’t rotate it completely) for comparisons with SOHO views. In white light, there were three distinct areas of faculae, one each on the western and eastern limbs and one around AR 11207. I couldn’t detect 1205 in white light and although the Sun had rotated slightly, I’m fairly sure 1207 is indeed that designation in my sketch and not 1205. Prenumbrae were noted around the preceding spots in 1204 and around the entirety of 1203.

Connecting the Two Galaxies

Object Name (M51)
Object Type (Galaxy)
Naxxar, Malta
April 2nd, 2011 @ 22:38UT
Graphite pencil, charcoal, blenders, white paper, scanned and inverted using GIMP)

M51 under averted vision.
200mm SCT, f/10, 25mm, eyepiece, 81x, binoviewer, light pollution filter.

On April 2nd, 2011 I spent an hour observing this magnificent Messier object. I have produced the sketch using graphite pencils and blenders on white paper, scanned and inverted the digital image using GIMP. It is based on the intensity sketch shown below drawn at the eyepiece under averted vision.

I wanted to portray the ‘ghostly’ appearence of the two galaxies to mimic the actual eyepiece view. Most of the observing time was spent detecting under averted vision the very faint streak that connects the two galaxies as well as the spiral arms.