Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 17h

An hour of the open star cluster M39. It's what I was doing while waiting for the moon/Pleiades to rise. #Astronomy #Astrophotography

1 1 38

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 18h

A fool's errand right from the start: a bright moon occulting the Pleiades. Of course the moon nearly obliterates the stars in the Pleiades, so this is a composite of five different lengths of exposure, plus I had to brighten the stars. Worth it for the challenge. #Astronomy #Astrophotography

1 2 26

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 21h

This is a different comet. There are two in the northern hemisphere now. This is C/2025 A6 LEMMON, a single 60-second exposure on very low ISO so it wouldn't be too noisy. Kind of noisy anyway. #Astronomy #Astrophotography

3 46

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 1d

A couple of tries at the comet C/2025 R2 SWAN, neither of which turned out too well. Background is mucky because it's down by the horizon, and I only got the barest hint of the tail. In the longer exposure the stars look stretched because I was tracking on the comet. #Astronomy #astrophotography

3 30

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 3d

Thanks! It's because I was all set up with a 4X barlow to do planetary.

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 3d

Nice!

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 3d

Yes, that's Titan. The way you know is that star charts/apps will show you exactly where Titan is at any given time.

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 3d

It's hard living in the coastal fog zone. I have a little private observatory in the high desert inland, but at the moment I don't have a big enough scope out there for planetary. I'm glad you got a clear shot.

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 4d

In a quick 15 years I'll get another try.

1 6

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 4d

It looked like I was going to get extraordinarily lucky for the last crack at the Saturn/Titan transit, but the fog came in before the shadow of Titan was visible. But you can see Titan itself crossing in front of the planet, so it's not a total loss. #Astronomy #Astrophotography

2 3 63

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 5d

This is a binary star system in Lyra commonly called the Double Double. This is just a single snapshot of it, because I have yet to find stacking software that can handle so little detail. #Astronomy #Astrophotography

1 2 22

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 5d

This is terrific!

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 5d

It's a 3,000-frame AVI video with the best 20% stacked in Autostakkert.

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 5d

That's gorgeous. I would be over the moon (no pun intended) if I had taken that. One last shot tonight if it stays clear.

1 1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 5d

he joy of getting in a little closer.

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 6d

Another try at Jupiter. I'm hoping to get that last Saturn/Titan transit tomorrow night, so I'm practicing with the new equipment (electronic atmospheric dispersion corrector). #Astronomy #Astrophotography

3 8 130

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 7d

The good news is that it's not foggy. The bad news is that the "hole" has rotated around to a non-earth-facing position.

1 1 1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 7d

Thanks!

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 7d

You know, I did it almost entirely by trial and error. Moved the dial a bit, took a still image to see if I had made it better or worse. Otherwise, yeah. You look at the live image and you just can't really tell.

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 7d

Thank you. I haven't done much planetary because of the small(ish) scope, but I'm working on learning it.

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 8d

And also, thank you!

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 8d

It's a pretty small scope for planetary. 152mm refractor. Then I'm using a 4X barlow, the ADC, and a modded Canon DSLR, which allows me to use its built-in 5X feature to get a 1:1 pixel ratio. I might be paying for it with frame rate, but that's another headache for another day.

1 1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 8d

I don't know off the top of my head, but I'm 99% sure they are the Apennines (I'm used to having more context around the features) which should make it easy to look up.

1

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 8d

Thanks, Matt!

Catherine Ryan Hyde @catherineryanhyde.bsky.social · 8d

Possibly, if I put my H-Alpha filter back on. But first the damned fog would have to go away.

1 1 1