7/6/2024 Rho Ophiuchi, Clouds, and a new Rig

Saturday night promised to be clear, mild, with no dew until morning. Saturday night lied. Clouds appeared after sunset, the waned, then came back later. Dew arrived around 10 PM. I did manage my best ever Rho Ophiuchi area using my new (to me) Samyang 135mm F/2 ED UMC lens with my ASI294MC Pro camera despite thin clouds traveling through each frame.

The Rho Ophiuchi cloud complex is a complex of interstellar clouds with different nebulae, particularly a dark nebula which is centered 1° south of the star ρ Ophiuchi, which it among others extends to, of the constellation Ophiuchus. Wikipedia

This video is about 2 1/2 hours condensed into 43 seconds. At the start, you can see the Big Dipper in the lower left. In the lower middle is the Little Dipper. The clouds are pretty here but annoying. 14mm f/2.8 Rokinon lens and Canon EOS T8i.

I printed this cradle to hold my Samyang lens (and camera) so that it can be attached to my equatorial mount.

6/28/2024 The Return of Galaxy 9

M51, the Whirlpool Galaxy (aka Galaxy 9), has been giving me grief this year. I’ve tried to image it a few times but something happened each time. Finally, Thursday night I was able to get a decent image. This is made from 44 two minute images with my C11 at f/6.3 with an Antlia Quadband light pollution filter and my ZWO ASI294MC Pro. I started with 51 images but seven of them had satellite trails in them.

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