Astrophotography at Bortle 5

On May 19, 2023, the closet supernova in a decade appeared in the night sky in the outer band of the Pinwheel galaxy (M101 / NGC 5457).   Located in the Constellation Ursa Major, the Pinwheel galaxy is a classical spiral galaxy that is approximately 21 million light years away.    It is estimated that it contains 1 trillion stars, measuring at a diameter of 170,000 light years across.   By comparison, the Milky Way has an estimated diameter of 100,000 to 120,000 light years. This galaxy has a high population of ionized hydrogen (H II) regions that are perfect for star formation.    It is in one of these regions that a supergiant star reached the end of its life by running out of fuel to make energy with in its core.    Stars make energy through the nuclear fusion process, converting lighter elements into heavier elements in the periodic table.    The heaviest elements that can be made in a star is nickel (eventually decaying into iron).   Once the core becomes inert with iron and nicke

  Craters and Phone Photography A few weeks ago, I did an experiment with my daughter to show her how craters are formed.   Took some flour, coca powder, and dropped a few different size objects while capturing it on the GoPro camera.  It was messy and a lot of fun. I also follow up on a previous post on how to take photos with your phone camera.   I definitely had no luck with the normal camera apps on my Google Pixel phone or iPad.   I downloaded some free software that called ProCam X Lite HD Camera Pro.   This allows you to make some adjustments to get some descent pictures of the moon at night. Great place to start your journey at taking pictures of the night sky is with the equipment everyone has:  their phone.   If your pictures don't come out - don't fret!  Try some different settings by steadying your phone, change the focus, ISO, or speed.    It takes time to get good at it.     Enjoy the process. Below is a screenshot I took setting everything up.  In summary - no fl

Many simple to complex tasks in everyday life has a set of tools or skills that we use to helps us accomplish the result we want.  For example, take the simple task of bringing food to our mouths.  Depending on the food we are eating, we can use our hands and fingers.  We can use a variety of tools that include forks, spoons, sporks, knives, chopsticks, skewers, and other items.  My toddler is always looking for the most unique (and often messy) way to place her food in her mouth.  When it comes to telescopes, there are many types of telescopes available to look at the night sky.  So what exactly is a telescope?     A telescope is "an optical instrument designed to make distant objects appear nearer, containing an arrangement of lenses, or of curved mirrors and lenses, by which rays of light are collected and focused and the resulting image magnified (Source: Oxford Languages)."   Essentially, a telescope  consists of a tube and glass (lens and/or mirrors) to make distant lig

James Webb Telescope Treasures Take a moment and gaze at the beauty of this recent picture.  It is from the James Webb Telescope.   There are over 20,000 galaxies pictured here.   This amazing snapshot from a small slice of the night sky shows the early universe with galaxies that are less than 900 million years old.   Infants in a universe that is estimated to be 13.8 billion years old.   See more of the James Webb Telescope images here How can you not gaze at the wonders of the night sky and not feel amazement at the immensity of the world we live in.   How many billions are stars are in each of those galaxies?  Like most thinks involving the universe, it is mind numbing.  WORKING ON THE LATEST VIDEOS I've got a number of YouTube video projects in the works.   Here are two recent pictures that I took as a part of those projects.   The first one is at a night, despite it looking like a day picture.   I was experimenting taking long shot photos with my Canon EOS R10 camera guided b