Category Archives: Deep Sky

Stars, Galaxies and Nebulae

HT Cassiopeia – Light Curve (Part 2)

Posted on November 16, 2010 by rbuchwald

The 600 images collected during the observing session were analyzed photometrically using the capabilities of the MAXIM DL5 software. There are numerous reference/comparison stars available for the analysis as shown on an AAVSO finder chart obtained at http://www.aavso.org/vsp/chart under the … Continue reading →

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HT Cassiopeia – an Amazing Binary Star System (Part 1)

Posted on November 7, 2010 by rbuchwald

On November 2nd, a new AAVSO Special Notice (#221) arrived in my email inbox. HT Cas is a dwarf nova star in the constellation of Cassiopeia (the one that looks like a “W” and is currently well placed in our … Continue reading →

Posted in Deep Sky, Imaging, Stars | 1 Comment

Observations of an Exoplanet!

Posted on January 16, 2010 by rbuchwald

Last Wednesday night we lucked out with clear sky conditions and relatively good seeing to observe something amazing: the transit of an exoplanet! HD80606b is a planet that is four times larger than Jupiter, orbiting one star of a binary … Continue reading →

Posted in General, Imaging, Stars | 4 Comments

An Unusual Variable Star in Auriga

Posted on November 27, 2009 by rbuchwald

Auriga is the “Charioteer” in the sky, and is quite prominent in the sky now. Its brightest star is Capella. A fairly bright star (3rd magnitude) not far away from Capella called epsilon Aurigae is undergoing one of its unusual … Continue reading →

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Another Nova in Scutum

Posted on November 11, 2009 by rbuchwald

Another nova was tentitively discovered by H. Nishimura in Japan and I went to the observatory Tues night to see if I could confirm it. Yup – its there! I took an AAVSO finder chart wit me, but it was … Continue reading →

Posted in Imaging, Sky Events, Stars | 4 Comments

Adventures in Guiding. . .

Posted on November 9, 2009 by twalkowski

I spent some time last Saturday evening taking images of some galaxies.  I wanted to get a good wide field image of M33 in Triangulum which was nearly overhead.  M33 (along with the Andromeda Galaxy) is part of our local … Continue reading →

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Nova in Sagittarius

Posted on October 28, 2009 by rbuchwald

Image of the nova – a star that was not visible there before. A little while back, I subscribed to the special notice bulletins from the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO). I thought that it might be interesting to … Continue reading →

Posted in Deep Sky, Imaging, Sky Events, Software, Stars | 2 Comments

Long Time Exposures for Deep Space

Posted on September 21, 2009 by rbuchwald

The CCD cameras at the observatory are very light sensitive but have a smaller number of “megapixels” as compared to the digital camera that you may be using at home. The CCD chip in many digital cameras today might also … Continue reading →

Posted in Cameras, Deep Sky, Equipment, Imaging | Comments Off