Saturday I posted some pictures of the lunar eclipse and a blog posting about how the pictures were taken over at my personal blog site http://blog.chinookcity.com.
If you are interested in seeing the pictures head over there and check it out. Links to both my Flickr and Picasa sites are in the post.
Just a reminder that the Calgary Centre of RASC is holding a public star night tomorrow, March 24th at the west end of Fish Creek Park. The event starts at 7:00 PM and runs till 10:00, and goes clear or cloudy. Several members will have telescopes set up to see our special guest, the planet Saturn, (Weather permitting) and there will be games for kids, informative booths and presentations. For more information and maps to the location please visit the RASC Calgary website at
http://calgary.rasc.ca
You can also read more about the event in my earlier post about it, just click on the Astronomy category.
Stephen
On Saturday March 24th the Calgary Centre of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada is holding their annual Spring Star Night at Fish Creek Park in SW Calgary. This event is free and open to all. Members of Calgary Centre will be on hand with Telescopes pointed at all types of Celestial Wonders, including Saturn (in a prime position for observing now).
The event runs from 7 PM to 10 PM whether the sky is clear or cloudy. Inside the Shannon Terrace Environmental Learning Centre, there will be games, astronomy and “Rings in the Park” displays. RASC members will be on hand to answer any questions you may have.
To get there from the end of Anderson road SW (west end) turn south on to 37th Street SW. Turn east off 37th st SW onto 130 Ave SW, turn right on Woodpath RD SW into Fish Creek Park. Follow the road down the valley to the Shannon Terrace Environmental Learning Centre.
I hope that we will see some of you there and we may be there with a couple of our own scopes displaying objects!
Stephen
There will be a site to behold Wednesday Nov 8th! Mercury will pass in it’s orbit across the face of the sun. Starting at 12:12PM and continuing till 5:10 PM, you will be able to see this tiny planet pass directly in front of our neighboring star! Never look at the sun directly either with your eyes or with a telescope or binoculars without having appropriate solar filters installed!
If the weather is clear, I will have a couple of scopes set up and try to photograph the event. I am planning on mounting my SW 80 ED and my Coronado PST and try to get pictures! If I am successful links will be posted, so watch this site!
S
I have just posted three shots I took of the moon. All three were taken Sept 8th between 12 and 1:30 AM through my Celestron C6SGT and with my Canon Digital Rebel XT. I am pretty proud of these as this was the first time I used the Rebel XT on that scope. Two are taken just directly through the scope, (the top half and the bottom half images) and the other was taken using an Antares 6.3 Focal Reducer (Full moon shot). Have a look. They can be seen in my gallery at the following location.
Well I’m hooked…. I figured I needed another hobby other than always working on PCs and now I have it! I have jumped fully into astronomy..
I have always thought that I wanted a telescope (especially when celestial events were occuring ie lunar eclipses) and had actually taken a small stab at looking for one in a department stores the previous christmas.
Then in June of 2005 a co worker mentioned that a local surplus store had a number of Celestron 80GTL scopes on for an incredible price… I looked around the net, saw that it was an OK scope and went out and purchased one.
Things were great we used it the first night and the kids saw the rings of Saturn and the moon looked really cool. The more I used it the more I looked up on it. Then I saw that I could merge the scope to a computer and have my laptop control it. I found a local telescope retailer and started talking to him and bought my first book on astronomy (Nightwatch by Terence Dickson). I started into reading and going over what the author said about scopes and started getting aperture fever!
I soon went out and purchased a pair of Celestron 15X70 Skymaster Binoculars to scan the skies with as well.
About a month later I purchased a Skywatcher 200mm reflector scope on a Skywatcher HEq-5 mount. What a joy this scope was to use…
Well that didn’t last long, and because I also wanted to take those stunning astrophotos we see in Magazine’s and on the Nasa sites I started looking at a 127MM Mak Cas scope as a quick grab and go scope. Well the day came to pick up the Mak Cas and instead I walked out with a Skywatcher 80MM ED Refractor.
This scope is a beauty, wide field of view, good optics and portable to boot. (I also got an Alt Az mount to leave in my car).
Well it is now January of 2006 and I still have the same driving intensity (if not more) than I started with… One day I might get out and use everything!
I have learned that this one hobby were I can easily spend more than I did on my PC hobby and not be able to write off any of it!!!
I soon hope to have some early photos that I have taken (of the moon, some clusters and auroras) posted. I am still waiting for a few components to arrive (new ccd camera, filters and focuser), and then I will start getting right into this!
Keep your eyes here for more information.