Exciting nebulae are starting to rise early enough that I can get some imaging done on them! M 45 (the Pleiades), M 42 (the great Orion Nebula), and Barnard 33 (the Horsehead Nebula) are becoming possible for the first time since I’ve bought my Dwarf 3 (aka Wormwood).
Date: September 14, 2025 at 07:50:11 PDT
Weather: 58°F Cloudy
Location: Eastsound, Washington, United States
Yesterday I finally accomplished a goal that I’ve been pursuing since we got Galaxy, our Embassy Dolphin SL. I set up “Police Mode” and made it configurable via the menus that you can reach via the steering wheel.
Date: September 2, 2025 at 09:13:33 MDT
Weather: 66°F Clear
Location: Louisville, Colorado, United States
Last night I gathered my third night’s worth of data for the Iris Nebula. I’ll paste in the three results-so-far: one night, two nights, three nights:
We finally got decent weather for astrophotography last night. The next two nights look good as well. I’m going to work on the Iris Nebula, C4.
I gave it pretty much the whole night, from astro dusk to astro dawn, with 45 second exposures, gain of 60. I used the astro filter, which is the first time I’ve done that for a nebula. I guess because it’s a reflection nebula, not an emission nebula, this makes more sense. Here is the initial stacking from Wormwood.
Last night was the third night (not consecutive) that I gathered light from the Pacman and Soul Nebulae.
After the previous night, I learned that I can’t see the Pacman before roughly 10:15pm (10:30 is safer). With Astronomical Dusk around 9:30, I decided to gather light from the “Caroline’s Rose” cluster from 9:30 to 10:30. I got 40 subs, 60 seconds at 60 gain, astro filter; StellarStudio “auto” and I tried Apple Photos “enhance”, as well as a bit of cropping.
We’ve had some clear skies lately, and I’ve decided to try MegaStack along with the other tools. I was planning to get M 103 while waiting for the Soul to get above the neighbors’ house, but the Pacman Nebula seems better now.
I’ve failed a few times to get the Soul Nebula from Monsters' Clubhouse, because it always seems to be behind the neighbors' house. But in Sky Safari I finally tried AR mode, and stood in the right spot, and hopefully have an idea of when I can expect the Soul to emerge.
To fill up the time before the Soul is visible, I’m going to aim at M 103 up until 12:56pm, then start the Soul at 1:06am.