#Backyard Astronomy

[pixelatedcosmosastro]

The Bubble Nebula (NGC7635) with the Scorpion Cluster (M52)

[discrepancybot]

The 2024 Perseid meteor shower. (August 11th to 12th)

The Perseids are supposed to peak on the night of Sunday/Monday this year. So if sky conditions are good and there isn't much outdoor lighting around you, relax for a few hours outside and watch the meteors.

No binoculars or telescope necessary! This is a naked eye event – though you don't have to get naked for it.

The Perseids are the best predictable meteor shower you can see in the Northern Hemisphere.

These links provide additional info.

[infinities-and-binaries]

It was Aurora Borealis all over Friday night, thanks to the severe geomagnetic storms caused by the sun's really active phase (solar maximum). Here are some of my shots from our backyard. First time to see the aurora this further down south.

Notes:

Aurora Borealis, May 10-11, 2024

Devon, UK

Nikon D5600

Tokina 11-16mm

I used incandescent white balance to kick out the ugly glow from light pollution and also to prioritize the cooler colours.

A bit of a timelapse below:

[the0phrastus]

Well, that worked pretty well for an 88% waxing moon with the ZWO ASI071MC color camera. The near-full moon and Jupiter at opposition were just far enough away to make this set up work--plus a lot of 5-minute exposures. That band of red at the top left is the tail end of the ridge of hydrogen that runs behind the Horsehead Nebula (B33). Imaging notes: 63 x 300-second subs, no filters with the ZWO ASI071 color camera cooled to 0C, William Optics RedCat 15 Apo refractor, Sky-Watcher EQ6-R Pro mount. The Orion Nebula (M42), Running Man Nebula (Sh2-279), De Mairan's Nebula (NGC 1982,M43), and surrounding nebulosity.

More of my astro stuff here: https://SaltwaterWitch.com

[princess-fancy-pants]

Not as clear but still so pretty!!!

[meteorologistaustenlonek]

"...a fleeting but potentially stark celestial display that scientists are calling "a once-in-a-lifetime event."

""It's a once-in-a-lifetime event that will create a lot of new astronomers out there, giving young people a cosmic event they can observe for themselves, ask their own questions, and collect their own data," said Rebekah Hounsell, an assistant research scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center who specializes in nova events, in a statement. "It'll fuel the next generation of scientists.""

[dragons-in-spaceee]

Best aurora display I’ve ever seen! And it wasn’t even in a dark sky place! Very cool colours 10/10 experience :)

From 27th Feb 2023.

[actiaslunaris]

October 5, 2023, 7:23 am.

[seanewilliams]

Cell phone snap through the telescope of Jupiter and five of her moons this morning.

This doesn’t come close to doing it justice. You can see lines on her when looking through with your eye.

[john-keels-sinister-goatee]

Tonight's cool astronomy thing: Jupiter, Aldebaran, and Mars making a neat little triangle, with the Moon and the Pleiades nearby. Supposedly Uranus was there too, but I still haven't been able to pick it out even with binoculars. But the Pleiades are so pretty and so are the Galilean moons.

[pixelatedcosmosastro]

The Omega Nebula (M17) in Sagittarius - July 2024

Photo by Turricula 556x10" exposure (93 min) Stacked and stretched in Siril Color balancing, noise reduction in Photoshop

[the-maddest-robot]

Photo of Pickering's triangle (also known as Fleming's triangle) and NGC 6979 / NGC 6974 (the more diffused clouds at the top center/left). This is the third part of the Cygnus loop / veil nebula, this part of the supernova remnant is fainter than the previous two parts of the loop I photographed. This explains in part why it was only discovered by in 1904 by Williamina Fleming (whereas the two writer part were discovered in 1784 by William Herschel). Williamina Fleming was a pioneer in stellar classification, she worked with other women at the Harvard college observatory. Their work in star classification resulted in the Henry Draper Catalogue, an extensive (225 300 stars in the first edition) classification of stars with their position and their spectra. Williamina is also credited with the discovery of 59 nebula (including the famous hors head nebula) more than 300 variable stars as well as (with Henry Norris Russell and Edward Charles Pickering) the discovery of white dwarfs (the remnants of dead sun-like stars).

[the0phrastus]

I spent most of the night capturing OIII (Oxygen 3) and SII (Sulfur 2) data in the IC1396 region in Cepheus, enough to combine with last week's Ha (Hydrogen-alpha) data to create a SHO color image, mapping sulfur to red, hydrogen to green, and oxygen to blue in RGB. I've balanced the RGB intensity, but left green for Ha a bit higher. Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe—by a very wide margin, and without balancing the Ha, OIII, SII channel values, most nebulae would be overwhelmingly green. That said, I do like to keep more hydrogen green in my images, making them a bit truer to the emission values of most deep sky objects.

[princess-fancy-pants]

Another picture of the last full moon 🌝 🌕 ❤️

[meteorologistaustenlonek]

@wdefnews12 @ChattanoogaZoo #AsianLanternFestival @EPB_Chattanooga webcam showing #FullMoon #SuperMoon #BeaverMoon rising over the eastern horizon Friday evening in #ChattanoogaTN. https://www.wdef.com/weather-cam-network/