Jupiter, Venus & Moon – all at once

Conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and the Moon - February 25, 2012
Conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and the Moon - February 25, 2012

Hi!
I present to You quick, but interesting sketch. Today’s view of the three bright celestial objects.
Conjunction of Jupiter, Venus and the Moon.
Venus and Moon – close to each other.
Jupiter – bright object on the left at the top.

This sketch is based on observation with the naked eye. Made with pancil, then inverted and processed with GIMP2.
Greetings!
Aleksander Cieśla (wimmer)

Sporadic Meteor over the Castle of Forcalqueiret

Sporadic Meteor
Sporadic Meteor

January 23, 2012 at 7:37 p.m. local time, I saw this meteor fall. It seemed to fall on the castle of Forcalqueiret in Provence, already so ruined …
This meteor belongs to the sporadic family, no known shower exist at this time of the year. Slow, it has about 3 seconds to disintegrate by emitting a beautiful ocher yellow light.

My sketch was made ​​ naked eye in the cold of this early winter evening. We can see the sky from the Pleiades to the feet of Orion, passing through the Hyades in the constellation Taurus. I tried to take account of different colors like Betelgeuse and Rigel, respectively red and blue. The Great Nebula in Orion also shows a little pink shade than the surrounding stars.

I made this sketch on white paper with caracole pencils, using directly the correct reverse colour black for white, blue for the meteor, light blue for Betelgeuse and M42, and yellow for Rigel. The final work is to invert the scanned sketch.

Michel Deconinck

Web : http://astro.aquarellia.com

Comet Lovejoy

C/2011 W3 (Lovejoy)
C/2011 W3 (Lovejoy)

Hi,

My name is Peter M Moriz. I live at Moonee Beach, Australia. I’ve just started to do sketching. This is my third sketch I’ve attempted. The other 2 were of small g/c’s…..

This sketch was done at Nana Glen west of my home town to get a little darker skies to see more of the comet’s tail. It was done naked eye and it goes from horizon to crux, say around 30 to 35 degrees. I put the milky way in the top of sketch to get some idea of how big the comet has become. The Coal Sack is there as well….it was done on the 28th of December 2011 and around 3.30am and had taken me around 45 minutes to do..I hope you enjoy the sketch–Alex, a fellow sketcher here in Australia, said I should submit it.

Media: black sketch paper A4 size with white pastel and white ink pen

Thanks for the time to read and view my sketch.

Peter (Mozzie) :my nickname

Venus and Two-Day Moon

Moon-Venus Conjunction
Moon-Venus Conjunction - November 27, 2011

Moon Venus conjunction 2011-11-27 – 5 PM Local Time

Object Name (Moon, Venus)
Object Type (conjunction)
Location (Rocbaron Provence France)
Date (2011-11-27 5PM Local Time)
Media (graphite pencil and watercolour)
Material (Newton telescope 114/500 25x for the moon and naked eyes)

I climbed during half an hour with a light telescope on my back to reach the St Sauveur Mountain close to Rocbaron. This is a fantastic position. I can see the Med from the Golden Islands Porqueroles and Port-Cros to the Toulon surroundings and the sunset.

After sketching the landscape with a graphite pencil, I place the Moon and Venus. Then through my telescope I sketched the new born moon.

The home work was to colour the sketch and adds Venus and the moon reduced to the correct size on my digital watercolour.

The full adventure is described on a small youtube animation: http://youtu.be/d8kSZefO7w0

Thanks to you all

Michel Deconinck
Téléphone : 00 33 (0)4 89 36 54 03
GSM/portable : 00 33 (0)6 99 42 42 47
email : trialogmdc@yahoo.fr
Web : http://www.aquarellia.com

Mars in Leo

Mars in Leo
Mars in Leo

Hello astro-artists

I send you a Mars and Regulus conjunction sketch made this morning, November 13th 2011 at 4h50 UT.

The technique used is watercolour for the foreground and inverted graphite pencil for the sky.

To merge my sketches I use the free paint.net software.

The chimneys are typical for my Provencal region. Observation made from Rocbaron in France.

Clear sky to you all

Michel Deconinck

Jupiter and the Moon in Conjunction with the big Tower

Conjunction of Moon and Jupiter
Conjunction of Moon and Jupiter

Object Type: Conjunction
Location: Montreal, Canada
Date: October 13th 2011
Media: Pastel
On October the 13th while returning home after a lecture given by the astrophysicist J.P. Luminet, I saw this beautiful conjunction between our moon, Jupiter and the Dome of the Tower of the University of Montreal where I work. Our moon looked as if it rested on a small cloud. I sat on a nearby bench and took my time to sketched the view in my notebook. I copied the sketched at home on black paper, adding colors with pastel.

Jean Barbeau,
microbiologiste
Faculté de médecine dentaire
Université de Montréal
C.P. 6128, succursale Centre-ville
Montréal, Qué
H1T 1K3

Moon visits the Scorpion

Moon and Scorpius
Moon and Scorpius

On holiday in France I witnessed a beautiful conjunction between the Moon and the constellation Scorpius. Sketching the background with a pastel pencil was the most difficult task to do. I think I will use a chalk pastel next time for a smoother result. There is also still some work on the stars (I almost never draw naked eye stars). On the other hand the glow around the Moon looks very nice. Hope you like my holiday souvenir.

Clear skies
Jef De Wit

Object Name: Moon and constellation Scorpius
Object Type: moon and asterism
Location: Louroux-Bourbonnais, France (46°33’ N 2°51’ E)
Date and time: 7 August 2011 around 20.15 UT
Equipment: naked eye
Medium: color pastel pencils on black paper, Antares and Moon were redraw digital, process with Paint

Stellar Explosion in The Whirlpool

Object : Supernova SN2011dh in Spiral Galaxy M51
Date : June 08, 2011
Time : 12:30-02:00 LST/ 07:30-09:00 UT
Location : Aguila, Arizona USA
Gear : Binoculars 25 x 100 and CPC1100 XLT with 25mm Plossl
Detector : Visual Sketch
Magnitude : 8.5 for M51 and 14.9 for SN2011dh(webtreatz.com)
Weather : Clear sky, no winds, low 70’s and quiet as a mouse!
Comments :
It’s interesting to ponder in awe, how a star that has turned into a supernova some 30 million light years distant is just NOW reaching our immediate universe, our light buckets our dilated pupils! This recently discovered supernova cataloged SN2011dh and found on May 31, 2011, might not last long. It’s believed to be diminishing in magnitude with a possible viewing window of some weeks or perhaps a couple of months. If you would like to get a glimpse of it, my suggestion is- don’t wait any longer!
With mounted binoculars it is quite easy to pick up M51 as it appears elongated and fuzzy. Some fidgetting of the eyeball around the circumference of the oculars and it’s companion NGC5195 emerges just as well. Both gravitationally interacting galaxies seem like puffs of smoke with their nucleus showing a hint of brightness.There are no noticeable spiral arms, no connecting bridge or other discernable features- not even the main attraction SN2011dh.
All this will change when I prepare the 11 inch SCT and aim it at the said subject with a 25mm Plossl. Yes, I had tried a 10mm and a 32mm but the 25mm gave me the best results. Peering down the eyepiece, Hazy blotches but distinct spiral structures are emanating from the soft glowing core of M51. Of the two major spiraling limbs, the one stretching all the way to NGC5195 or the one with the southeast orientation, will be the one sporting the newly discovered supernova. Four tiny specks of starlight ranging in magnitude from 13 -15 located on the southwest side of the Whirlpool and lined-up from East to West are clearly visible when using the cone receptors within the corners of your eyeballs. Averted vision here my friends, or you will miss the whole point. No pun intended! From recent photo submissions to various popular social websites, I made a mental note to see the whereabouts or location of SN2011dh. It’ll be nested on the spiral arm which embraces NGC5195 or the one facing the southeast coordinates.Much better seeing than explaining but after plotting their correct places among the broken segments of spiral arcs- one of the specks surely did fell where the photos had indicated it should be! I concluded my quest and my sketching for the night was done. Enjoy!

Dark and clear skies to all,

Juanchin 😀

The Moon at Work

Object Name: Moon
Object Type: moon
Location: São Bernardo do Campo, SP – Brazil
Date: 2011, april 17th
Media: crayons on white paper

Past friday I was leaving work, in a huge petrochemical industry located in Santo André, when I noticed a shy Moon beside the flare. I kept observing it a couple of minutes, and today, two days after, I decided to sketch it. This is a sample from what I’ve seen that afternoon, about 5h20min. pm local time. (GMT – 3h). Clear skies to everybody!

Best regards,
Rodrigo.