The Meteor Gallery Album of the Escambia Amateur Astronomers Association

VOLUME XL Numbers 11-12 November-December 2015

2015 Winner of the Warren Jarvis Astrophotography Prize

The Solar System by Rick Johnston

This composite of shots with a variety of his telescopes by EAAA member Rick Johnston includes now Pluto at top right, Ceres and Vesta in the asteroid belt gap, and Comet Holmes at bottom. It took first place in our astrophotography judging at the Pensacola Interstate Fair in October, winning Rick a $25 prize and the award named in honor of our late observing Chairman, Warren Jarvis of Milton, who did much to promote new research in photography, spectroscopy, photometry, radio astronomy, and science education for local schools.

AllyKat Francis Captures a Flare

Lots of detail in her Smartphone shot through the Coronado 60 here. Note the large prominence at left, granulation all over the disk, and large sunspot at bottom left center.

Ron Fairbanks captures an awesome prominence

Taken with his Lunt 60 on November 28, 2015, this huge combination of a prominence on lower western limb of sun and dark, detailed filaments near the limb is one the best solar shots by the EAAA lately. Note the flaring in the center of the disk as well. He used an iOptron smartphone adapter, 12mm Plossl, and his Verizon Wireless 4G LTE smartphone.

Robert Brown’s Huge Filamentary Arc of November 13, 2015

Ashton Sanderson’s Flare of October 15, 2015

Lyric Lagos Active Sun of October 29, 2015

Like the other PSC student photos, taken with smartphone, Coronado 60, 12mm Plossl, and iOptron smartphone adapted at Pensacola State College. Amazing resolution in some of their shots! While Terri was not a PSC student member, she was attending a talk I gave on the latest space discoveries, and I set up the scopes for her UWF Leisure Lecture Group’s viewing.

Terri Van Bargen’s Filmentary Arc of November 13, 2015

Tom Mallery’s “Filaprom”

Filaments appear dark on the disk, prominences bright red on limb, but they are the same type of bright clouds of 3,000K hot hydrogen, cooler than the photosphere but hotter than space.

Lunt CaK: The Sun in a Whole New Light

Do not see many purple telescopes, or a purple sun very often. But the CaK emission line at about 4,000A reveals much about the sun’s activity around sunspots and other active regions not seen in visible light or even Hydrogen alpha. The problem is that for some of us (i.e. Dr. Wooten!), this deep violet line is tantalizingly just outside our range of vision! But luckily, smart phone and digital cameras are all much more sensitive to the near UV than is our eyesight. Wayne has coupled the Lunt B 1200 CaK filter with Merry’s 70mm refractor to start his research on this aspect of solar activity. Here are his first results, comparing the visible, CAK, and Ha view of AR 2470 on December 17-18, 2015. All were taken with his Canon SX 150 and a 32mm TeleVue Plossl, at a variety of zoom and time settings to best capture the often faint detail visible on the camera’s view screen, the only way he can see CaK. Use of a dark plastic garbage bag over the observer and camera helped see the faint details better, but probably will not work for public gazes! For the visible light shot, he used the 70mm refractor above with 3” Draco Baader AstroSolar filter, and for the Ha view, his Lunt 60 Ha scope.

The Visible Sun on December 18, 2015

AR 2470 was big enough to be spotted naked eye with our AL eclipse viewers today. Note limb darkening and some granulation.

CaK Sun detail on December 17, 2015

Hydrogen Alpha Sun on December 17,2015

Both narrow emission line views reveal the twisting, turbulent magnetic fields much better than what visible light reveals. With visible light, we sample only six notes (3/4 of a single sound octave) of the cosmic symphony; how much richer the universe when we can expand these horizons.

Josh Matson’s Black Cat Aurora and other Northern Lights

While serving in Alaska, Josh took many fine auroral photos as the changing solar magnetic fields flexed the solar wind, causing it to interact with our own ionosphere in most beautiful ways. This black cat was a big hit when he shared it with us for Halloween!

Earthshine with a Galileoscope

Even the $30 Galileoscope can take good lunar photos, and with a time exposure, capture the beauty of a two day old crescent with earthshine lighting the night side here. Wayne Wooten took this shot with a 26mm Plossl and his Olympus D-595, 2” exposure on November 13, 2015.

The Crescent Moon by Bethany Lee

Taken with her Smartphone on October 16th at our last Pavilion Gaze of the

year, it uses the Eon 72 and iOptron 12mm Plossl Smartphone adapter. The moon was about three days past new moon for this fine image.

Five Day Old Crescent Moon by Erica George

Now more of the mare flows at top right are in view, as well as the ancient

heavily cratered highlands in lower center and bottom. Smartphone photo with Eon 72.

Terminator of the Six Day Moon by Ed Magowan

Clavius by Rachel Oliver

Located at bottom left, Clavius is over 200 miles wide, the largest “crater”

on our side of the moon. Eon 72 and Smartphone.

Copernicus and Sinus Iridium by Derek Riddle

Derek’s first astrophoto through his new 8” scope is surely a winner. At bottom left are the rays from Copernicus, and above it to left center is the

arc of Sinus iridium, the “Bay of Rainbows” after the arc shape this partially drowned impact scar now exhibits.

Sunrise over Copernicus by Rachel Oliver

Certainly one of the most dramatic sights in the solar system.

Smartphone Graphic of the Moon Lady by Paul Childers

Who do you see in the moon? Wayne Wooten likes to imagine Kate Winslett

with a Gibson Girl hairdo from the famed pose in the movie Titanic, wearing the “Star of the Ocean” as the crater Tycho at lower right. Paul Childers

used his Smartphone phone and stylus to bring her to life. Isn’t technology great! Looks like she is about to kiss Copernicus (ghost of Leonardo de

Caprio?)….

The Daytime Moon by Briana McDavid

Taken before sunset on October 21, 2015using a Polaroid filter to enhance

contrast, this Smartphone shot with an Eon 72 shows the Lady quite well.

How we do it….

Here Wayne Wooten works with Michael Garner while his brother Shaun

takes a picture of the Eon 72 focused on the moon with the iOptron Smartphone adapter and 12mm Plossl; this is the best $46 any amateur can

spend, if they want the scope to be a hit at public gazes. It is amazing how well the newest smartphones can capture lunar and solar detail, in many

cases better than $500 Digital SLR cameras. Some of the newest ones also have exposure controls that promise good results with the planets next

Spring when Jupiter, Mars, and Saturn will all be out in the evening skies at our gazes!

And here is Michael’s shot.

Waxing Gibbous Moon by Jerome Klingaman

The contrast afforded by Jerome’s big refractor is obvious! Size matters!

Rebecca Elliff gets lucky!

As the Wednesday night class dismissed about 7:30 PM on November 18th,

we drove over to the Airport Approach strip on Langley Avenue to witness

the waning gibbous moon rising right on cue. Several students captured the moon coming up over the horizon, but no one else got a 373 taking off!

Only local Lunar Eclipse shot

We had dozens of folks come out to the planetarium for the lunar eclipse on the evening of September 27, 2015, but overcast skies limited Dewey Barker

and I to just passing out star charts. But Rick Johnston patiently waited for a quick break in the clouds at 8:53 PM to capture the moon about 2/3 the

way into our umbra. Note how much larger the arc of our Earth’s umbral shadow is than our satellite. It was Aristotle who used this phenomena to

show that the Earth must be a sphere in space (the shadow is always the same circle, for every eclipse), and about 4X larger than our moon; all this

about 300 BC, long before Copernicus, Columbus, or Magellan.

Don Ruth battles haze to capture the eclipse

Out of town in the Midwest, Don Ruth had better luck, but still some haze to work through. Here is his shot of the moon about half way in our shadow,

around 8:30 PM.

Moon and Planets in the Dawn by Bert Black

On October 8th, the waning crescent moon is just above Venus in the dawn sky, with fainter Jupiter to the lower left.

The Next Morning

Early riser Bert Black captures the Moon below Venus, but above Jupiter on October 9th in the dawn sky. The Moon moves about 12 degrees east daily.

And now, on October 10th.

Now the slender crescent features earthshine, and lies below Jupiter.

Venus catches Jupiter on October 26th

Andy Walker rose early to catch on the closest planetary groupings in years!

On December 7th, the Moon eats Venus!

New member Orlando DeJesus got up early to catch the moon approaching Venus in the dawn sky on December 7, 2015.

Malone Calvert shows the waning crescent moon closing in at 9 AM.

And by noon….

From Niceville, Dave Halupowski shows the crescent moon and Venus have

similar phases. The moon’s revolution around Earth carries it about a half

degree (its own diameter, the basis of the hour?) eastward every hour, so about an hour later….

Bye, bye, Venus

Ed Magowan shows how much brighter Venus is than the moon. Venus reappears about an hour later, with the moon much lower and fainter.

Ed Magowan captures Mercury in Daylight as well!

With new GPS driven computer assisted scopes, finding planets in broad

daylight is no longer such a challenge, and in the future, may make for much better use of the day sky than just solar observing.

Malone Calvert captures a Taurid Meteor

This minor shower way actually better than the more famous Leonids this year. The Leonid Meteor Storm should cycle back around about 2033,

something to look forward to! The Pleaides is at right center, and

Aldeberan’s orange light at the top of the “V” of stars in the Hyades in upper center. Orion’s belt is at top left.

Bruce Mullis Captures a Geminid Meteor

On December 14th, the Geminids were definitely the best shower of 2015.

Malone Calvert also got a nice fireball; we had a fine gaze with the PSC folks

at Portofino beach that evening.

Malone Calvert Catches Comet Catalina in the Dawn on December 5th

Note its motion among the stars by December 8th.

Malone Calvert goes down under!

Alpha and Beta Centauri are just to the left of the tree limb at left, and below them are the four stars of Crux, the Southern Cross. Taken by

Malone Calvert at Ayers Rock during his family’s September trip to Australia. Note that taking the long axis of Crus to the left takes you to the south

celestial pole, in the branches of the tree at lower left. No bright star like Polaris lies anywhere near the SCP, alas.

M-42, the Orion Nebula

Chris and Gina Gomez used the new PIXINSIGHT program to bring out fine detail and enhance contrast in this stellar nursery. I rate it second only to

Saturn as the showpiece of the sky. They used their Orion 8” newtonian

astrograph to make this exquisite image!

The Pac Man Nebula, NGC 291

Again the fine imaging skills of Team Gomez on display!

The Rosette Nebula

Here a very young cluster is being born in the center of the star forming

molecular cloud, and the radiation pressure pushes the star stuff outward in dark threads of planet stuff. Again, the magic of Team Gomez!

Star Formation in Elephant’s Trunk

From the darkness shall come a great light…certainly true here, where the darker and denser the nebula, the more star stuff there is to make bigger

and brighter stars. Triumph for Team Gomez…

M-67, an ancient open cluster in Cancer

Now Chris and Gina image the many red and yellow giants of this cluster,

perhaps at 4.5 billion years old the origin cluster for our own solar system.

Star Death in 1054 AD

M-1, the Crab Nebula, is the remains of a huge Type II supernova seen from Earth in 1054 AD. At its brightest, the exploding star was seen in broad

daylight for almost a month! Today the remnant expands at over 2,000 km/sec, around the pulsar spinning about 30 times a second. Team Gomez

imaged the brightest stellar corpse in the sky, the first entry of Charles

Messier in his list of objects for comet hunters to avoid. It is visible with big binocs near the south horn of Taurus.

And beyond the Milky Way

Malone Calvert captures the only object beyond our own Milky Way easily

visible to the naked eye from Pensacola. Malone Calvert imaged the Magellanic Clouds while in Australia, but they did not show up when I tried

to post them here to our Gallery.

M-33 in Triangulum, three ways

By remote scope, Bill Martinec captures the only other spiral in our Local Group. Note the many H-II regions in the spiral arms, indicating even more

star formation than in our own Galaxy.

The Triangulum Galaxy by Jerome Klingaman

Taken with his impressive 5” astrographic refractor, shown below.

And last, this version with PIXINSIGHT by Chris and Gina.

Merry Christmas, and Happy New Year! Keep looking up!