Astronomy in Kitchener-Waterloo

A new super nova has been spotted and we are going out Saturday night to observe it. Go out and take a look. https://astronomy.com//observe-theres-a-new-nova-visible-i

Trevor Chandler has been awarded the Astroimaging Widefield Certificate for the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada. Congratulations Trevor! Follow this link to a sample of his work. https://rascastroimaging.zenfolio.com/p173694269

Astrophotography can feel hard. I can help you reveal the beauty of the cosmos with equipment and software support, as well as image processing in PixInisight. ...Private message me for details. Ask my students what it is like to work with me. Clear skies, Ron

Astrophotography Contest this Friday, March 12, 7:30 PM. Join us for our annual contest where we vote on the best of our members astro images. Come and see how good they are. You are invited to a Zoom meeting. Register in advance for this meeting: https://us02web.zoom.us//tZIlceusqT0qGtS998dXTk_SOuxYnTeRD... After registering, you will receive a confirmation email about joining the meeting. We will also have Astro News, What's Up and an update on the Moon.

Last night I took some test shots under a full moon and thin haze. My sky was about a Bortle 8 or worse. My last test was on NGC 2174/2175, so I imaged it for a... couple hours using two scopes: Sky-Watcher Esprit 150 with monochrome QHY16200A and Optolong Ha filter, and Takahashi FSQ-106 with one-shot colour QHY367C Pro and Optolong UV/IR filter. Full res version available at https://astrodoc.ca//upl/2021/02/Monkey-head-Full-Moon.jpg I'll shoot this again in a darker sky, but this shows good results are possible even under less-than-ideal conditions. Clear skies, Ron Brecher

Went out observing at Otterbein tonight. Clear and cold. Sirius and M42 were good until the Moon came up and ruined everything.

Remember this. A real meeting with real people. Well we are still not doing them. Our February 12th meeting will be held online at 7:30. There is a rumour that astronomy will be talked about. So come online and meet people who really know the night sky.

From Marie Newnham. NGC5907 in Draco. Imaged from the Canary Islands. The blue background my be due to moonlight.

This image shows the Pacman Nebula in the Hubble Palette (left) and natural colour (right). Click the pic for high res versions, object information, and details on equipment, acquisition, and processing. Clear skies, Ron

From George Pucula. The second is the Orion Nebula (5-10 second exposures, about 8 minutes, untracked). All with the Canon RP and iOptron Skyguider.

From George Pucula. So excited I was able to try out some new astronomy gear a couple of weeks ago when we had rare night of clear skies! This was first light for my new Williams Optics Z61 scope. One picture is the Pleiades star cluster (30second exposures, about 1 hour, tracked).

From December 16 to 25, Jupiter and Saturn will be separated by less than the width of the Moon. On December 21 the planets will look like a double planet separated by only a fifth the Moon's diameter. For most telescopes they will be seen in the same field of view. On clear evenings we will have a telescope or two on top of the hill at McClennan Park in Kitchener. Everyone is invited to come and take a look. Notices will be posted here. Stay tuned.

Two minutes later, the ISS zips past Mars. 300mm, 15 seconds Untracked.

From Marie Newnham. This one is for you Trevor, M46 and associated planetary, from Chile 2.

Speaker: Randy Attwood, Past Executive Director, RASC Topic: Apollo 13 The Flight That Failed Fifty years ago, NASA launched its third mission to land two peo...ple on the Moon. On the third day of the flight, a serious problem forced the cancellation of the plans for the lunar landing and started a race to get the astronauts home alive. In this talk, Randy will detail all the things that had to go right to save the Apollo 13 crew. Interested in joining us? Send us a message for the Zoom Meeting ID and full invitation. Clear skies!

From Kitchener; Seven astronauts on the ISS join Jupiter, Saturn and the over exposed Moon. November 20.

Webinar Nov 23 @ 8:30 pm EST. RASC History Committee: The Research Legacy of Lowell Observatory. Presented by Klaus Brasch. For further details and to register for this Zoom event, click link below. https://us02web.zoom.us//register/WN_JDpkGpLVRCGizUp3AzVVDw

A quick shot of the Moon, Jupiter and Saturn conjunction tonight from Kitchener.

From K-W and surrounding area watch the Space Station join the conjunction of the Moon, Jupiter and Saturn on the evening November 19 at about 7:04 pm local time. You will need a good SW horizon.

The final session of our PixInsight Virtual Workshop Dialing Down the Noise is Saturday, Nov 14 at 10am EST. Join us! Details and registration at https://www....mastersofpixinsight.com/november-10-workshop Clear skies, Ron Brecher

Alen Koebel. Here's another one from Monday night at Tilker's. This time I actually did a stack but with minimal subsequent processing, just a contrast stretch and increased colour saturation. Full processing will need flat fielding and a colour-preserving stretch plus noise reduction, etc. As you can see, I had to use a shoehorn to fit M31 into the frame while not losing M101 in the process. It would have fit comfortably into a full 35mm frame but my camera is APS-C. I initially tried to do a four-panel mosaic but that proved a little bit too ambitious and I reverted to this all-in-one framing.

Our 'Dialing Down the Noise' PixInsight Virtual Workshop is being held TODAY at 7pm GMT and 7pm EST. We're giving away some great door prizes including a QHYCCD... QHY5III485C high-sensitivity planetary camera. All the details and registration at: https://www.mastersofpixinsight.com/november-10-workshop