Speaking of the moon, did anyone catch this past weekend's "Supermoon"?

It was clear here, and the full moon look nice and bright and big closer to the horizon, but nothing hugely out of the ordinary. Still, a full moon is always beautiful (except in that it limits stargazing ).

I often mistake the Burger King sign for the moon when riding in the car

Got quite a chuckle out of this, Bella! I can see how that would be the case.

Sadly, we did not see the eclipse. Our western view is quite full of trees, and although there is a convenient schoolyard that offers a wider vista in that direction, it still wasn't enough, as the sun was so low by then. At any rate, I did not get our solar glasses/eclipse glasses in time, but have them now: 10 pairs. All ready for Venus' transit on Tuesday early evening.

starkat, were you able to view the eclipse, being in a prime area?

stargazer, how awesome you had a great view of the eclipse! That representative photo is spectacular.

Mother-Music, too, wow, what a shot! Beautiful! *goosebumps*

*has August 2017 marked down in bold for an awesome solar eclipse*

This test is recommended: make a dark pencil dot 2 mm in diameter on white paper, then step back 7 m (23 feet). If you can see the dot, you should be able to see Venus in your viewer.

Cool, thanks for the info. I just did this now, and could see the 2 mm dot quite well. Tuesday better be clear.

NASA has a thorough and interesting article on the transit.

I rather expect to be checking the weather Monday evening and Tuesday morning, ready to drive if I must (within reason!).

Haha, likewise! *looks up our forecast* Hmm, a mixture of sun and cloud.

For the first time, a transit of Venus will be observed from space

Now, that is cool!

Hi Boy Scout, welcome to this thread! It's great to see your passion for all things astronomy. 'Tis interesting to read of your Merit Badge requirements. That's great! You must have learned 'a ton' whilst fulfilling those.

As for ISS passes, the Chinese space station, TIANGONG 1, and Iridium flares are all gradually coming into view from my location again, although many times are still in the very wee hours of the morning. Still, from heavens-above, I see some brighter views in the more reasonable hours.

Saturday evening, I enjoyed a backyard fire with Ryadian's family. After dark, I anticipated viewing a Tiangong pass with her father and younger brother. I was somewhat surprised when her father spotted a satellite to the right direction (southwest) but too high in the sky! We watched it move into the south, high above the big bright moon, when I spotted the actual Tiangong passing just a degree or two above Saturn (currently due south). So we saw 2 satellites at once - rather unusual for the city. We later identified the other object as a spent fuel tank from an old Russian rocket.

It was cloudy here for this morning's eclipse.

The forecast is still uncertain for tomorrow's transit - 'pop-up' showers may come in the heat of the afternoon (the transit begins just after 5 pm here). I'm keeping the fingers crossed.

All this excitement about the Venus Transit! I join whole-heartedly. Thanking God that it is summer and I scheduled all my students on Wednesdays--normally I would be working at 5 in the afternoon.

My youngest daughter and I will walk to our favorite viewing area and see what can be seen. Our weather is iffy as well, so here's hoping it will become and remain clear long enough for us to see.

Meanwhile...my Orion catalog came in last night and I spent a lovely half hour before going to sleep gazing at the sales. This brought up a question that frequently causes me much pain and suffering and confusion. On another astronomy forum of which I am a member, I have watched others ask similar questions, only to receive the vaguest of answers. Perhaps their questions are too vague, I don't know. But to spare myself the embarrassment of receiving unhelpful replies from condescending experts, I want to avoid asking this question in that other forum.

What lenses to get?

I have an f/5 reflector which came with two Kellner lenses; a 25mm and a 10mm. I probably would simply be happy with these if it weren't for that Orion catalog that comes in every couple weeks (it seems) with beautiful photos and descriptions of the amazing sights one can enjoy if one purchases any number of the lenses pictured.

I've tried to narrow it down, but not understanding that much about focal length and magnification blahblah, I was hoping to get someone who truly understands that stuff to help me narrow down the choices to what will really be helpful for my set-up.

Would a Barlow lens be the best first purchase to enhance what I've got? Or would something else do better? I wear glasses, so the more eye-relief the better.

I like looking for/at nebulas. I have pointed my scope at the North American nebula numerous times. I have never seen anything like what I am told I should see--I think I sort of saw an area that was darker than the surrounding area last time I looked. Would a specific lens or filter or combination make a difference?

Can anyone offer some specific suggestions? Or am I still being too mentally dense or general in my question.

mm

Thanks, Jo!!

I've really been enjoying the pictures of the eclipse lately. (That one is so lovely, Mother-Music!!)

After seeing much about Venus' transit across the sun, I am greatly anticipating the opportunity to see it. The Planetarium is having a feature and I'm hoping we can see it through a telescope tomorrow. *squees*

stargazer, what an interesting viewing time you had on Saturday night with the satellites amidst the natural orbs, wow! Unexpected night-sky surprises are such treats.

Yay, Mother-Music! Enjoy the viewing tonight.
I don't know much about lenses, so can't help you there, unfortunately.

Bella, how exciting you might be able to have the privilege of seeing the transit through a telescope. This is when we wish we had purchased a solar filter for ours years ago. Before the solar eclipse in 2017 (August, I believe), we are determined to acquire one, pricey though they are.

As for tonight, the weather forecast is iffy for southern Ontario. It's brilliantly clear and cloudless now (at 7:41 EDT), but some spotty clouds could be moving in, with even showers later. Time will tell. We have a spot at a local schoolyard we head to that gives a better view towards the west. Armed with our 'transit glasses', we'll head over that-a-way to enjoy this momentous event, beginning just after 6 EDT here.

I'm eager to hear your stories tomorrow, as we each watch from our respective corners of the world. Just think, though, the next transit, in 2117, we can all see together from a totally different Location.

P.S. Spaceweather has a wonderful photo from Australia of the 2004 transit (a video from the NASA site).

P.P.S. I found a branch of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada that is about a half hour from us going around the western end of Lake Ontario, and they are holding a gathering at a school in Stoney Creek this evening with telescopes available for the transit. We just may head down there (after rush hour ) to join in.

Only 5.5 hours until the transit begins, more or less. Best of luck to all of us!

Bella and jo, your opportunities to view it with others sound like fun! (I can think of a number of special astronomical occasions, like the total solar eclipse of February 1979, which were made all the more memorable because we observed them with other interested people). Similarly, there are a number of open houses here in the Twin Cities; I'm planning to attend one with Ryadian's father and possibly some of his kids in a nearby suburb:

Eisenhower Observatory Transit of Venus Viewing Party

Watch for sunspots near Venus; they won't seem nearly as dark as usual when compared to the blackness of the passing planet.

Just started watching the transit. Have my old hunting sights, and sticking them through a cardboard so I have a shadow around the image. Looking nice so far.

Well, alrighty, then. I was there for the Venus Transit. I have no way of documenting it, though, because I was unable to get any pictures.

It was a fun evening! My youngest daughter and I began our short walk to our viewing area around 4:45 pm. It was a hot one yesterday afternoon, I can tell you! As we arrived near our usual place, we came to some shade, and decided that setting up our chairs there instead of in the full sun would be a better choice, so we plopped down our camping chairs and prepared to wait a few minutes until ingress.

And waited. And waited. And waited.

The problem was two-fold: a) all the pictures led me to believe that Venus would begin her transit from the bottom left. So that's the part of the sun I was looking at. b) I was using two welding glasses of #10 darkness stacked on top of one another. This was so dark that it failed to reveal Venus' sneak attack from the top right to my eyes. I tried one glass, but the sun was so bright through it that I almost couldn't look at it and was afraid to try.

After checking every 5 minutes until 5:47 pm, we gathered up our stuff and started home. It was hot, and we weren't seeing anything. The sun was still quite high in the sky, so I would be able to check every so often to see if anything could be discerned.

On the way home, I conceived of a plan. It could be dangerous, but I would be very careful.

Once we arrived at home, I pulled out my binoculars and removed the lens protectors from only one side--this is because the welding glasses were not wide enough to cover both lenses, and I wanted no accidents. I walked outside and, covering the open lens with the stacked glasses, pointed the binoculars at the sun and had a look.

There it was! I found that little black dot diagonally opposite to where I had been looking! It was perfectly harmless to look this way, and I shared the image with my daughter, father, and nephew.

By this time it was well after 6 pm. The last person took a look through the binoculars just as great raindrops began to fall. I thought it wouldn't last long and I would be able to get another glimpse later, but although the rain itself lasted only about 15 minutes, the clouds did move in, and we were unable to see the sun again that evening.

We contented ourselves with watching the Nasa EDGE live coverage until 10 pm, then went to bed.

Looking forward to hearing everyone else's reports!

During the day it occurred to me that starting an astronomy club in my area might be something to look into. I'll be researching that and seeing what needs to be done and if there is any interest at all. The nearest club is 1.5 hours away in the middle of the big city of Austin, TX--literally, in the middle of downtown. It's scary for this country girl to go driving around in there, so I don't try to go to the meetings anymore, though I have been to one star party at their dark-sky site, which is only 45 minutes from here. I didn't have to nice of an experience: no one would talk to me, and I ended up helping some other newbies to see a few things before clouds and lightning put an end to the evening. So I'm not highly motivated to get involved with that club.

I would appreciate input from any one concerning the question I asked above about lenses.

Bon ciel a tous.

mm

I was able to get a few pictures of the transit with my cell phone camera, but I cannot find a way of transferring the image.
My wife, and I were able to watch off, and on for about two hours before clouds started to move in. It was truly strange how sharp the clouds looked on the cardboard as they moved over the sun.

It's fun reading everyone's accounts of their transit experience.

Our weather was forecast to be warmer than average (around 84F/29C) with fair-weather cumulus clouds and "pop-up" showers possible by the time of first contact (5:08 pm here). I drove the 20 or so miles to the Eisenhower Observatory site I referred to earlier, and arrived about 20 minutes before first contact to find several dozen people and a half-dozen telescopes already in action.

The clouds were quite obliging; only once did one cross the sun and it appeared as a wispy contrast to the dark circle of Venus. Most of the clouds were gone by 6pm - which is when crowds really picked up as people stopped by on the way home from work.

A local TV station broadcast several weather segments live from our site; that was fun to watch.

I tended to hang around a large Dobsonian scope stopped down to about 3 inches; its owner had attached a digital camera to the eyepiece tube, allowing several people to view at once - very convenient. We were lucky to see both first contact (when Venus first touched the sun) and second contact some 18 minutes later, when the planet was entirely on the sun.

They were selling special solar glasses, but I used the hand-held solar viewer I described earlier. I was really surprised at how easy Venus was to see (once it was fully on the sun), since I'd tried that 2mm dot test with less than stellar ( ) results.

Ryadian's father arrived from work and joined the fun. By around 6:30 the lines were quite long and we decided to go to his house, so we could show his family the sight. Their neighborhood has lots of trees, and by now the sun was getting low enough that we had to walk down the street to get a good view. All of Ryadian's family enjoyed the view through the viewer. A few neighbors also stopped by to take a look.

Several people commented on how seeing that little black dot - 8000 miles across yet millions of miles away - against the blistering disk of the sun offered a little perspective of the size of the solar system and of our place in it.

So it was the best of both worlds, so to speak - sharing the experience through multiple telescopes with lots of other interested people, and then sharing it with just a few close friends with just a solar filter for equipment.

Soooo...who's up for the next one? It's only 105 years, 6 months away. Sound like a long time? Well, as Commander Riker quipped in Star Trek Generations, "Speak for yourself, sir. I plan to live forever."

Boy, this thread has been kind of quiet for a couple of weeks.

We've had lots of clouds and a little rain. I also took a trip to Kentucky (where, apparently, there is no night sky at all, haha).

Before I left on the trip, however, I had caught another stargazing bug: sketching. It seemed like a great idea, because it would give me something more to do at the eyepiece than just go "oh, cool!", and drive to the next amazing sight.

In my research on how this special type of sketching is done, I came across the following article: http://www.iceinspace.com.au/63-614-0-0-1-0.html. This technique made a lot of sense to me, since it seemed somewhat counterintuitive to try to draw a reverse image; i.e., black on white, when what I was seeing was white on black.

However, I was unable to quickly procure the supplies for the Mellish technique, so for the first time out I settled for charcoal pencils on white cardstock.

blech.

During the Kentucky trip, I was able to find a Michael's craft store and purchase the supplies necessary. Last night I got myself outside with the scope and put some sketches on paper. I couldn't find a sketchbook with black paper, so I just purchased some black cardstock from the scrapbooking section of the craft store, figuring I could store the sketches in protective sleeves in a notebook.

Here are the results of my endeavors. Each sketch took quite some time...30-40 minutes by my guestimate.

This is my very first attempt but one: I sketched this one twice, since I made mistakes on the first one and haven't figured out how to erase white from black yet:

On the preview, it looks as if the images got cut off on the right hand side just a little. FYI.

Instead of a "white charcoal" pencil, I bought a good quality white colored pencil. After trying it out, I think I might like to try the "white charcoal" pencil to see if it's a little easier to use and more accurate as far as size/luminosity, and shape, too.

One of my daughters has trouble "seeing" constellations. She just can't seem to make her brain "see" the asterisms. But after seeing my sketch of the Coathanger, it was more obvious to her, and she asked me if I would try to sketch some constellations. I think I might try that, because I still haven't learned them all and think it would be fun to try.

mm

Has everyone heard about the Mars-One mission yet?

http://www.space.com/16300-mars-one-rea ... olony.html

What do you think? Good idea? Bad? Crazy? Feasible? I like the prospect of there someday being a human colony on Mars, but I don't really like the whole... reality TV show thing. It's so commercial and Hollywood, and they're acting like that's a good thing. Moving into space is a great step in human achievement. Not a media spectacle. I would hope that such a project would have more of a focus on scientific advancement, not TV ratings.

Here's the project's main site: http://mars-one.com/en/

~Riella

Nice sketches, Mother-Music! I think in this age of computer-aided CCD exposures and spectacular Hubble images, the time-honored practice of sketching is overlooked. But I think it really helps us see what we're looking at. (Now if I'd only practice what I preach )

Ithilwen, thanks for sharing this news. I'm not sure what I think about this approach...yet encouraging the private sector to explore space is good, I think. I imagine the science will follow. (I'm a bit skeptical that sponsorships of a Big Brother-type reality show would be enough to finance a Mars colony, but who knows?)

I wanted to share this music video recently posted on Astronomy Picture of the Day. It shows the transit of Venus in time-lapse as seen from the Solar Dynamics Observatory. It's shown in several different wavelengths, and often Venus can be seen against the corona, before it crosses the solar disk.

Does anyone know of any good Astronomy and (especially) Cosmology websites that are from a Christian perspective? I love Cosmology, but whenever I go to websites concerning it, everything is about "How the Universe Doesn't Need God to Be Created!' and studies based on the assumption that there have been millions of years. And I'm never sure what parts of the information to trust and what parts I shouldn't...

~Riella

Anyone been seeing the red sunsets where they are? I was heading home the other evening, and we saw what had to be the best, brightest-red sun in years.
I know there are wildfires out west which explains it with ash in the atmosphere, and all. But it still looks amazing.