Clear skies - Sunday 5th July 2020

Hi all, 

Tonight was a night full of cloud with very few prolonged clearings. In saying that, I did manage to sketch a nice array of stars between 22:43 IST and 23:56 IST. Admittedly, I stumbled across this pretty group as I was searching for M29. What caught my attention was the arc shaped grouping of 29 Cygni, HIP 99777, which had a nice orange colour to it, HIP99769, HIP99719, TYC2683-174-1, TYC2683-3276-1, and Hip99628. 

Other details from the evening include:

Location: Dundrum - Bortle 8
Seeing: 6pk
Transparency: 5
Instrument used: f/8 150mm Newtonian Reflector
Eyepiece: 32mm Plossl (52° AFOV )
Materials used: 2B pencil.170gsm premium quality paper. The image was sketched at the eyepiece, scanned into my PC, and I used GIMP 2.1 to invert the sketch and colour  HIP 99777.

As I finished the sketch the sky cleared. For the first time this season Cassiopeia was visible from my back garden. I had a quick look at the Owl Cluster. It looked very nice indeed. What is more Jupiter, and the Moon were slowly rising in the SE. Trees obstructed my view of the Moon and Jupiter though. So I waited for almost 30 minutes for them the clear the trees, but by that time clouds blew in. It didn't matter as I was happy with the session, particularly with how the Dobsonian base moved in Azimuth - it was as smooth as butter.

As always many thanks for taking the time to read the above, and your comments and feedback are always welcomed.


Clear skies to all,

Darren.

Hi Darren.
Thank you for that marvellous sketch.
M29 is rather difficult to find.
It has been many years since I observed it.
But I can see this is a different area.
HIP 99777 has a spectral class of K5.
That's according to VisieR.
So you seeing an orange star very much makes sense. Well done!

Maybe next time you will find M29.
It has also been a long time since I observed M39 which a lot brighter and wider.
I am most pleased that Cassiopeia is now reappearing from your vantage point. As you know I too have had great success in observing NGC 457.

I am also delighted to learn that your Dobsonian is now working perfectly well in azimuth! Everyone hates having problems with any part of our observing equipment.

I have no idea as to when we will have any semblance of a clear sky anytime soon. Rain is coming after midnight. So it will probably be cloudy before then.

By the way, I went back swimming today in my local swimming pool. There were very few people in it.

Best regards from Aubrey.

Hi Aubrey, 

Very many thanks for your kind words. I was really taken in with this area of the night sky last night. I forgot just how rich it is. There were a number of doubles too, but I'm not sure of their names. 

Also, thanks for confirming the colour of HIP 99777; it was a lovely splash of colour against the white / bluish 29 Cygni.

Delighted to read you're back swimming. Not only is it a great exercise, but it also has therapeutic effect. 

Let's hope we get a few more clear nights soon. 

Kindest regards, 

Darren.