Wednesday 6 November 2013

Unseasonal Weather

One thing you can normally rely on in November in Scotland, is that the weather will be rubbish. However, we recently have been in for a treat, four out of the last five nights have been clear. Not one to pass on such an opportunity, I have been out with my scope every clear night and thought I would share a few photos. First on the list is M57, The Ring nebula.


Located in the constellation of Lyra, the ring nebula is a planetary nebula. Such objects are formed when a shell of ionized gas is expelled into the surrounding interstellar medium by a red giant star, which was passing through the last stage in its evolution before becoming a white dwarf.

Next comes the double start Albireo, quite possibly the most beautiful double star in the night sky.




Located in Cygnus, it appears to the naked eye to be a single star of magnitude 3 but through a telescope, even low magnification views resolve it into a double star. The brighter yellow star makes a striking colour contrast with its fainter blue companion star. It's a lovely thing to look at.

Finally, the photo below shows the star Mirach, the second brightest star in the northern constellation of Andromeda. Even through a telescope it appears as just a bright star, but it holds a secret. Look closely and you will see the faint fuzzy outline of NGC404, a dwarf eliptical galaxy, known as Mirach's ghost. It's 10 million light years away but just happens to lie in the line of sight of Mirach


All of the above images were taken from my garden through an 8" reflector and all of them are single 30 second exposures with a Nikon DSLR. The recent weather may be unseasonable, but I hope it continues.

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