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Hubble’s eXtreme view of the Universe

September 26, 2012

by yaska77

When it comes to looking into and imaging the past, the Hubble Space Telescope continues to produce shots of breathtaking wonder.

Called the eXtreme Deep Field, or XDF, the image below was assembled by combining 10 years of NASA Hubble Space Telescope photographs taken of a patch of sky at the center of the original Hubble Ultra Deep Field.

Astronomers have assembled a new, improved portrait of mankind’s deepest-ever view of the universe (click to enlarge) – Credit: NASA; ESA; G. Illingworth, D. Magee, and P. Oesch, University of California, Santa Cruz; R. Bouwens, Leiden University; and the HUDF09 Team

The Hubble Ultra Deep Field is an image of a small area of space in the constellation Fornax (latin for Furnace) located in the southern sky, far away from the glare of the Milky Way, and was created using Hubble Space Telescope data from 2003 and 2004.

By collecting faint light over many hours of observation (around 500 hours) it revealed thousands of galaxies, both nearby and very distant, making it the deepest image of the universe ever taken.

A finger held at arm’s length would appear to be about twice the width of the moon in this image (click to enlarge) – Credit: NASA/ESA and Z. Levay, STScI; Moon Image Credit: T. Rector/I. Dell’Antonio/NOAO/AURA/NSF

The new full-color XDF image contains about 5,500 galaxies even within its smaller field of view. The faintest galaxies are one ten-billionth the brightness of what the human eye can see.

The history of galaxies – from soon after the first galaxies were born to the great galaxies of today, like our Milky Way – is laid out in this one amazing image.

Garth Illingworth of the University of California at Santa Cruz (principal investigator of the Hubble Ultra Deep Field program) said, “The XDF is the deepest image of the sky ever obtained and reveals the faintest and most distant galaxies ever seen. XDF allows us to explore further back in time than ever before”.

It should certainly keep astronomers busy for a while, at least until the James Webb Space Telescope launches! With it’s specialised infrared instruments it is expected to find even fainter galaxies that existed when the universe was just a few hundred million years old.

You can read more details on the NASA Hubble Website here.  Galactic!

Source: NASA

Posted in Astronomy, ESA, Galaxy, Hubble, Image gallery, NASA, Space, yaska77 | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments »

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Night Motion Timelapse: Fall Collection

February 12, 2012

by yaska77

There are some things we’ll always take the time to watch, and as timelapse is a passion of ours for your enthrallment below is a recent creation from photographer Eric Hines.

We’ve featured some of Eric’s work before; his breathtaking images of the Milky Way at Devil’s Tower and a fantastic timelapse he released in September called Wild Wyoming, A Summer of Sunsets and Dark Skies.

If only we could all live under such clear skies! Go HD and fullscreen for the full effect!

Fall Timelapse Collection from Eric Hines on Vimeo.

Fall Timelapse Collection
by Eric Hines

About this video:

Shot entirely on the 5D Mark II in RAW format, with the exception of one video clip. All single exposures, no HDR.

Almost all of these shots have not been used in earlier reels, and a lot of the sequences were shot within the past month* in Indiana.

Motion control provided by the Kessler Crane KC-8 and Cineslider, using the Oracle and Smartlapse. The static sequences were shot on the Manfrotto 546B tripod with a 501HDV head.

Track is “Outpost 31″ by Simon Wilkinson available from thebluemask.com

You can find Eric on the following networks:
Google+
Facebook
Twitter
(links open in new tab)

*video posted in early November

And you can follow us on Twitter too :)

Posted in Galaxy, Night sky, Time-lapse, yaska77 | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

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My own night spent stargazing live

February 3, 2012

by yaska77

When it comes to astrophotography, occasionally I get a break and things go well. I should probably state from the offset that getting perfect scope alignment is nigh on impossible due to my house being in the way of Polaris! That doesn’t mean I haven’t got close but it does mean I still get some object drift across the field of view.

That hasn’t put me off trying though, and after watching the first episode of the recent Stargazing LIVE (on the BBC) I set up my scope and took advantage of the clear night sky. First off was a look at M42 the Orion Nebula, which I’ve imaged before but thought I’d have another look as the conditions were so good!

M42 the Orion Nebula with faint M43 Nebula top left (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

For the first time I caught some of the faint nebula M43 to the top left of the image, and you can also see the stars that make up the Trapezium cluster in the centre of M42. Of all the things I’ve seen since I got my telescope, the Orion Nebula will always remain a favourite. Beautiful!

I next looked towards M1, the Crab Nebula, which I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to see through the light polluted skies over where I live. To my surprise the stacked images clearly define the shape of the nebula.

M1 the Crab Nebula is a supernova remnant in the constellation Taurus (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

Because I know now that I can find M1 and image it I’m hoping to try again soon using a 2x magnifying barlow lens, to see if any more details can be caught!

Passing back through Orion I aimed now towards the Rosette Nebula. I was sure it would appear too large in my camera’s field of view, but as star cluster NGC 2244 is at the centre I was hopeful I’d be able to get some details.

NGC 2244 is an open cluster of stars in the heart of the Rosette Nebula (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

The stars of the open cluster shine brightly, surrounded by the gas and dust that make up the Rosette Nebula. You can even make out some of the darker lanes to the top right of the cluster.

By now it was into morning, and the prospect of getting up for work in a few hours was pushed from my mind. I was having too much fun and was sure I was getting some good results. So I decided to stay out in the cold a while longer and push my luck. I’d imaged the Andromeda Galaxy in October last year, but could I get two galaxies in the same image?

Two for the price of one! Galaxies M96 (left) and M95 (right) in the same shot (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

Despite being small in the image, you can clearly make out the spiral shapes of both galaxies, M96 and M95, located in the constellation Leo. M96 is the closer of the two at 31 million light-years away, with M95 being 38 million light-years away.

The cold was setting in now and dew was beginning to build up, but I thought I’d try one more target and see what happened.  It was already 3 hours past when I should have gone to bed, what difference would another half hour make?!

Messier 37 is the richest open cluster in the constellation Auriga (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

The M37 open cluster is roughly 300 million years old and contains over 500 stars (many of insufficient magnitude to be seen in this image). The camera finished clicking away as the battery warning light started flashing, and I could see dew building up on the scope’s mirror so I finally called it a night. I’d taken over 10 gigabytes worth of images and now had the stacking to look forward to.

So I finally got them all finished and they’re now here for your perusal :)   Was it worth the 3 hours sleep I got and the tough day at work that followed? Most definitely!

To not only see these sights with my own eyes, but to capture them in pictures too has more than justified the cost of the scope and camera as far as i’m concerned, and there can only be more to come!

Thank you to Stargazing LIVE for inspiring the nation (and me to stay up way too late!), we hope we can help keep the interest going!

Equipment used:
Unmodified Canon EOS 550D (with T-Ring)
Sky-Watcher Explorer 200P EQ5 PRO SynScan 200mm Newtonian Reflector Telescope
Intervalometer
DeepSkyStacker Software

Posted in Astronomy, Blog gallery, Galaxy, Nebula, Night sky, Stars, yaska77 | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

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Sky-Watching Images of the Year 2011

December 31, 2011

by yaska77

You might not have noticed but we love posting astro related imagery here at Sky-Watching. With that in mind we decided to put together our favourite images from throughout the year, as voted for by us :)

Sky-Watching Image of the Year 2011

50 stacked images helped the dust lane details stand out in my image of Andromeda (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

At the risk of sounding like blowing our own trumpet, chosen independently as their favourite blog image from 2011 by both tte-77 and mattelk (with no coercion from me whatsoever!) this was one of the first ever stacked images I captured and processed.

Galaxies are fascinating for their variety and magnitude, so to photograph one so clearly using our own equipment through our own light polluted skies helped my M31 Andromeda image stand out.

Creating images like this was one of the main reasons I bought a telescope and camera in the first place, so astrophotography can be very rewarding when your efforts pay off.

The original post (also featuring the Orion Nebula and The Pleiades) can be viewed here.

Sky-Watching Best Planetary Image 2011

The rings of Saturn shine brightly as the planet eclipses the Sun (click to enlarge) - Credit: Cassini Imaging Team, SSI, JPL, ESA, NASA

As soon as mattelk first posted this image of Saturn from the Cassini spacecraft we knew it would be a contender for the best planetary image of the year.

Taken by Cassini as it drifted in the shadow of the planet Saturn (looking towards the eclipsed sun) the night side of the planet is illuminated by sunlight reflected from its own ring system, and the rings themselves are lit by sunlight scattering off of the particles in the ring system.

The small white dot just top left of the main ring system is us, planet Earth!

Jaw-dropping.

Sky-Watching Historic Images of 2011

We followed the last months of NASA’s space shuttle program incredibly closely, so as 2011 saw the end of the iconic spacecraft (with all 3 remaining orbiters retired to museums) it’s only right that we picked a couple of historic shuttle photos for images of particular historic interest.

Docked together 220 miles above the Earth, the penultimate shuttle flight STS-134 Endeavour and the ISS as photographed by ESA Astronaut Paolo Nespoli (Click to enlarge) - Credit: NASA

The image captured above by Paolo Nespoli from a Soyuz capsule returning to Earth were historic, as the first ever images taken from space of a shuttle docked to the ISS. Nothing like waiting for the penultimate mission!

NASA officials said this spacecraft “family portrait” served as a reminder of the contributions the shuttle program made to the construction of the International Space Station.  The 100 billion dollar station began assembly in 1998 with the Russian module Zarya, and then a certain orbiter called Endeavour (STS-88) took the first US built section (the Unity Module) into orbit the same year.

The NASA gallery page features several more photographs, take a look here.

Launching into history, the iconic shuttle Atlantis spears skyward beginning the last ever shuttle mission (click to enlarge) - Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

NASA’s space shuttle Atlantis (STS-135) blasted into orbit on 8th July 2011 on the 135th and final space shuttle mission, launching from Kennedy Space Center (on a 13 day mission delivering supplies to the ISS) with thousands of spectators lining the roads and beaches nearby.

With the shuttle flying no more, we’re eagerly awaiting NASA’s next innovation in launch systems.

It’s been a good year for great images, and we’re now eagerly waiting to see what 2012 will bring.

Different images evoke different responses in different people, but we managed to agree what images should feature, even if I abstained from voting for one of them (for obvious reasons of favouritism) ;)

And on that note all of us at Sky-Watching wish all our visitors, subscribers and Twitter followers a very Happy New Year, may 2012 be great for all of you.

So let’s finish 2011 with a smile, this little image posted through Twitter made me laugh, and from comments made it caused a few chuckles in others too!

Just for Fun

NASA claim plans to send humans back to the Moon haven't been hit by budget cuts... (click to enlarge) - Credit: Sky-Watching/A.Welbourn

Just kidding :)

Happy New Year!

Posted in Galaxy, Image gallery, ISS, NASA, yaska77 | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a Comment »

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Astronomy Advent Calendar – 24th December

December 24, 2011

by yaska77

Well here we are! Our final astronomy advent calendar image for 2011 is here, and we’re just one sleep away from Santa’s visit…

It seemed appropriate therefore that the Christmas Eve image be one with a certain magical, mystical quality, and few come more striking than this!

Day 24

Astronomy Advent Calendar 24th December - Close Encounters of the Milky Way Kind (click to enlarge, opens flickr image) - Image Copyright: Eric Hines Photography

Scan your channel guide over the holiday season and it’s likely that somewhere, on some channel, they’ll be showing Close Encounters of the Third Kind by Steven Spielberg.

The familiar outline of Devil’s Tower in Wyoming appeared many times throughout the film, in shaving foam, mashed potato and even a huge scale model built by Roy Neary (Richard Dreyfuss) in his lounge!

Captured in the summer by amateur photographer Eric Hines of Valparaiso, Indiana, his image is truly out of this world! I almost wish there was an alien ship streaking across the sky!

You can view more of Eric’s photos or follow him on Twitter here:
Eric Hines Photography on Flicker
Follow: @EricHinesPhotos on Twitter

View yesterday’s image

All of us at Sky-Watching wish our visitors and kind commenters throughout 2011 a very Happy Christmas and a great New Year. Thank you for sharing our interest and enthusiasm and keeping this blog far busier than we could have believed!

Posted in Astronomy, Galaxy, Stars, yaska77 | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

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