Observing Notes
from the Tuckahoe Irregulars
I'm submitting the enclosed photo of the shoulder star of Hercules, with M13 visible in the lower right and Ikeya-Zhang visible in the upper right. I made this image at about 9:30 PM on 5/15/02.
This is a crop of a Fuji Provia 400F 35mm slide. I attached my Canon with a 300mm f/4 lens to the Celestron C8 and let the R.A. drive move the camera to match the sky. I did not guide this exposure; I just let the telescope track for about four minutes.
I bracketed other exposures of two and six minutes. The six-minute exposure shows sky fog barely beginning to appear, and tracking error is starting to enlarge the star images and blur the haze around the comet and the cluster. The two-minute exposure shows no detail in the cluster or comet. Four minutes seems to have been just about on the money.
I could not see anything in the camera's viewfinder when I took this. I guessed at the aim point, I guessed at the focus, I guessed at the exposure. I should have played the lottery that night ...
Steve Long
