Now that summer is winding down in the northern hemisphere, we are approaching the
time when the constellation Hercules is getting lower in the western sky after
evening twilight. Soon it will be too low for ideal evening observation until next
year. Of the three brightest planetaries in Hercules, the one that wins out is NGC
6210. This little bluish planetary nebula is easily located south of the keystone
and glows at magnitude 8.8. The nebula appears slightly elongated in the east-west
direction and sports a 12.5 magnitude central star. The diameter appears to be
about 13” of arc and with a narrow band filter just a bit larger. This planetary
is estimated to be about 6500 light years away.
Sketching:
Date and Time: 9-12-2007, 2:10-2:40 UT
Scope: 10” f/5.7 Dobsonian. 21mm and 12mm eyepieces 70x and 121x
8”x12” white sketching paper, B, 2B graphite pencils, scanned and inverted, star
magnitude adjustments using Paint
Averted vision was a very useful aid in this sketch.
Seeing: Pickering 8/10
Transparency: above average 4/5
Nelm: 4.9
Frank McCabe
5 thoughts on “Brightest Planetary in the Strongman”
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Beautiful sketch of NGC 6210, Frank! 🙂
Eric,
Thank you. I’m happy you like it. Planetaries do show through light polluted skies pretty well.
Frank
Frank,
Great sketch of this distant planetary! It’s like a sapphire in a field of diamonds. Well done! 8)
Jason
Jason,
Thank you. Clear skies to you.
Frank
Frank,
Not only is this a nice drawing, but it also inspired me to try and fond this previously unknown (to me) Planetary. No luck so far, but I now have your drawing as a guide to finding it.
Nice job Frank!
~Wade