December 2002 photos

The evening of December 3rd was bone chillingly cold but it was the first cloudless new moon here in New Hampshire since September.  I wanted to shoot M33 but neighborhood christmas lights were just too much (I couldn't even find it in the eyepiece!).  So I waited until the sky glow diminished and turned my attention to mighty orion rising in the east... All photographs taken on Kodak LE400.  These are the first photos I've taken from my driveway using the ST-4 and the LE400, so I was curious if the longer exposures would be dark enough, they seem to have come out pretty good.

My first Orion nebula shot for this Winter!  This is a digital stack of 4 seperate images, their exposure times were 30, 20, 15 and 10 minutes.  These photos were taken with the F/7 refractor.

This is a closeup of M42 taken at the same time as the one on the left.  The photos were taken through the F/10 SCT and their exposure times are the same.  Still slightly out of focus, but getting closer.

After taking several shots of the orion nebula, I turned my attention to the flame and the horsehead.  Finding this object in the eyepiece is near impossible without special filtration, so I just aimed at alnitak (the brightest star) and started photographing.  This is a digital stack of three exposures measuring 30, 15 and 5 minutes.

One of these days I'll get a good photograph of the Rosette nebula!  This is two seperate exposures, 30 and 15 minutes stacked with picture window.  The rosette crossed the zenith during this exposure and the refractor 'flopped' a bit causing some trailing.

This was my first attempt at photographing M1, the crab nebula.  There appears to be some trailing and a bit out of focus, so once again, the f/10 12" SCT comes close, but no cigar.  This is two seperate exposures, 45 and 90 minutes, an in focus photo would show much grander detail in the filaments within this nebula.

This M1 shot was actually taken a couple of nights later than the one on the left.  Once again, slightly out of focus but no trailing.  This is a 45 minute exposure with the new crescent moon setting in the west.