Notices by leece (leece@aus.social)

Thank you #Monsterdon #FirstMenInTheMoon actually failed to disappoint, with all those awesome models and scenery.

This is the Eagle Nebula which I've just learned is sometimes called the Star Queen Nebula. For Messier enthusiasts it is M16. I took this at home, a few hundred frames.

Did you know that it's this nebula contains the famous Pillars of Creation which awes everyone who sees the Hubble Space Telescope images of them? They're basically under the eagle's right wingpit, but of course my telescope isn't the Hubble, I'm just grateful for what it can do for me.

Look at the Pillars of Creation folks, there's limited time - they were apparently destroyed 6000 years ago by a supernova, and in a thousand years we will no longer see them. But not so much with my telescope.

#astronomy #Astrodon #astrophotography #DrivewayAstrophotography #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #BackYardAstronomy #DwarfII

While we were all oohing and aahing over the Southern Lights on Saturday night I had my trusty Dwarfii with me. We'd been joined by a middle aged lady with a cellphone and enthusiasm but no knowledge, so between Aurora visits I cast about for an interesting galaxy to show her.

Rob suggested Centaurus A. This amazing celestial spectacle might be a spiral galaxy colliding with a larger elliptical galaxy, and there's a relativistic jet emitting from the supermassive black hole in the middle of it - heady stuff.

What is known for certain, from the party observing on Saturday night was that it looks a lot more like a hamburger than the galaxy nicknamed the Hamburger Galaxy ( NGC 3628 looks more like a hotdog to me) - specifically something from the Hungry Jack's / Burger King stable.

So I'm going to call it the Aussieburger Galaxy. It's possible that the supermassive black hole is the beetroot. We could definitely see the sesame seeds and the pickles.

This image is less than 200 frames, but with a bit of tweaking in Google photos it's acceptable viewing, and a bit of fun. I think the cloud coming in might have halted my stacking. I'd like to revisit this one again soon.

And the nice lady who'd wandered down to get a shot of the aurora with her old iphone? With the help of some advice and my monopod she caught it, and apparently is all fired up to get a Dwarfii of her own, and we have already set a stardate with her this week. Lovely!

#Astrodon #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #Astrophotography #Astronomy #Dwarfii

I am now, I find, astrophotographer enough to gripe about the clouds obscuring the supernova for the past two nights. It's broken my faithful recording of the event. And the comet too, hiding behind a band of cloud the first night's viewing. Yesterday everything was ahaze.
Tonight, hmmm could be a maybe.

#astrophotography #astronomy