August 2024

Welcome to Hank’s August 2024 Astrophotography Blog! The cloudy nights and smoke have continued to plague us for much of the month, but with a forecast for the BHAS-Custer State Park Star Party coming up on August 30th, it looks like our spell of bad skies may be lifting! We will be traveling so I’m getting my blog out just a few days early this month. Here’s what’s been going on in August…

Supermoon Blue Moon—This month saw the Moon reach its closest approach to Earth while it was a Full Moon (called a Supermoon), making it as big and bright as it gets for us. There are two types of Blue Moons. The first type refers to the third full moon in a season that has four full moons. The other type is the second full moon that occurs within one month. August only had one full moon, so it’s not that type. The other thing about blue moons is that they aren’t blue. Go figure. This image was taken with my SeeStar telescope.

Also, this month the Moon, Mars and Jupiter were in the same neighborhood early on the morning of the 28th. I got up about 3:00 am and took a photo of the three in the East. In fact, Neptune, Uranus and Saturn were also in the sky, that morning, but I didn’t want to drive out to a spot where I could photograph them all. In a crowded star field it’s hard to know exactly what is a planet and what is a star, so I use an iPhone app (in this case SkySafari Pro) to pinpoint what’s-what in the sky. The image to the right is a screen shot of my phone showing that same area at about the time the photo was taken. Handy! If you look closely, you can also see that the Pleiades (the Seven Sisters) is also in the photo. This image was taken with my cell phone camera.

A few nights before I took the Moon-Mars-Jupiter photo, I was up about 3:00 am to catch Mars and Jupiter as they passed by each other. I’m not sure why, but I just love viewing these astronomical events. Mars and Jupiter were only close to us on Earth because of the way they lined up, but it’s just cool to be out under the stars and see it for myself. Also here are photos that show a closeup of Mars and Jupiter and four of Jupiter’s moons that were visible that night too.

I’m just lovin’ my new SeeStar telescope. It’s easy to carry around and we will be taking it on a trip to California next month, something that I’d never attempt with my Celestron. It fits in a box that’s 12”x12”x6” and I can run it from either my iPhone or iPad. Very cool. Here are some photos I took at a star party this month, that I was able to show to those who were in attendance. Then the next day I processed the .fits images that SeeStar saves during the capture, to compare the quality.

Here are a couple of other SeeStar images I processed later.

And finally, a photo I was waiting to take! It has been literally months since I’ve had great skies to photograph, but on the 27th the clouds parted, and I was able to get out for a couple of hours. So, here’s the (drum roll) West Veil Nebula!

Until next time, clear skies! -Hank