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RICHARD COFER

VdB 141 Ghost Nebula

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Posts Made By: Roland Christen

April 1, 2011 03:52 PM Forum: Astro-Physics

New product announcement

Posted By Roland Christen

Folks, look for prototype new products from Astro-Physics this year at NEAF. You have heard of adaptive optics, yes? Well we have something even more exciting for you. Adaptive Underwear!

Yes, you heard right, our new line of designer adaptive underwear will keep you warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Battery operated, it comes with optional fuzzy bunny slippers and cap (complete with bunny ears) to keep you toasty during those long winter observing sessions, when you would rather be snuggled in your bed. Throw the switch to summer and it keeps you nice and cool on those hot, sticky summer nights when the mosquitos would make mincemeat out of any exposed flesh, but not to worry because this garment has you covered in all the strategic places that mosquitos normally attack. Bonus feature: turning the switch to summer automatically resets your keypad and mount servo to daylight savings, so you won't have to fiddle with these setting ever again. How about that! What will they think of next?

As you know, we astronomers are a tough crowd, we must soldier on to capture those photons that are continually raining down on us and would otherwise be going to waste (meanwhile our diet of donuts and coke are going to our waist, but that's another story indeed!).

We have an exclusive arrangement with Ralph Lauren, the famous Paris designer, along with Ru Paul, the famous New York celebrity who provided the design of the bunny slippers and bunny cap. So do not delay, this is a limited offer, good only for the first 251,928 callers who will call this special number, operators are standing by. Call now Tel 1-555-987654321. I thank you for your kind understanding if you cannot get thru, but please keep dialing.

RolandoMagnifico

May 11, 2011 11:01 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

Calamities if nature

Posted By Roland Christen

Since very few are posting here lately, I thought I would post this link:
http://www.calamitiesofnature.com/

June 1, 2011 06:05 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

Light pollution

Posted By Roland Christen

http://www.calamitiesofnature.com/archive/?c=540#idc-container

June 3, 2011 10:35 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

Supernova in M51!

Posted By Roland Christen

Ray Gralack sent these images he took just 2 days ago of a new Supernova.

In his words: "I found out a few hours ago that a supernova recently erupted in M51. As it happens I captured luminance data for M51 with my AP160 the day before the eruption and the day after (at New Mexico Skies) and have attached those images. Note that I enlarged both images by 2x to present a "closer" look. The image before the eruption is composed of 3x30mins
of luminance. The image with the supernova is only a single 30-minute image as clouds rolled in near the end of this image.
I think it messed up the guiding as the image looks slightly less sharp.

-Ray"


Rolando

June 29, 2011 09:44 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

Sharpless-SH2-112

Posted By Roland Christen

Finally a clear night last night. This obscure region is in Cygnus near Deneb.

280 minutes exposure
305 RH astrograph
STL11K camera
Baader 7nm H-a filter

Rolando

July 1, 2011 04:54 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

Sharpless - SH2-112 in color

Posted By Roland Christen

Added 40 minutes of OIII and 60 minutes of SII to the H-a image to get the color image in Hubble palette.

Rolando

August 18, 2011 07:00 PM Forum: CCD Imaging and Processing/Deep Sky

Kronberger 61

Posted By Roland Christen

This ultra-faint nebula was discovered by an amateur, Matthais Krohnberger, while poring over data in the Digitized Sky Survey. The nebula is estimated to be 25 mag/arc sec., so it is extremely faint and probably cannot be seen visually in any amateur telescope.

This image was taken here at my observatory with the 305mm F3.8 Honders astrograph, a 4 hour total exposure with 600 sec subs, Baader narrow band OIII filter. Note the open cluster NGC6791 at the bottom of the image.

Rolando

August 18, 2011 07:12 PM Forum: Astro-Physics

Krohnberger61

Posted By Roland Christen

This ultra-faint nebula was discovered by an amateur, Matthais Krohnberger, while poring over data in the Digitized Sky Survey. The nebula is estimated to be 25 mag/arc sec., so it is extremely faint and probably cannot be seen visually in any amateur telescope.

This image was taken here at my observatory with the 305mm F3.8 Honders astrograph, a 4 hour total exposure with 600 sec subs, Baader narrow band OIII filter. Note the open cluster NGC6791 at the bottom of the image.


August 23, 2011 11:40 PM Forum: Bad to the Bone Autos

Guess this one

Posted By Roland Christen

Saw this on a recent trip to Michigan, near Glen Lake. What is it?

Rolando

September 22, 2011 05:00 PM Forum: Bad to the Bone Autos

Mustango meets 3 contenders

Posted By Roland Christen

Mighty Roush Mustango met several challengers over the last 3 weeks.

1) Met up with a C6 Corvette convertible. Did a couple of side by side roll-ons and kept the Corvette about 1/2 car length behind each time. Did I have faster reflexes? Actually he was slowly moving up to almost even but lost 1/2 car length each time he shifted.

2) Another STi, same result as last time I met up with one. Quite significantly slower than the mighty Roush

3) Audi S5.... well this guy was extremely fast off launch but could not hold the lead. Impressive car nevertheless.

4) Hot wing juiced up EVO appeared last night, with 20 something driver and lead foot. Big huge wing on back, large diameter very loud muffler/tailpipe, front end hardly 1 inch off the ground, black wheels with carbon fiber brakes - the real deal I guess. Engine had that raspy growl that only a 4 cylinder can produce when it's close to blowing a head gasket.
Mustango put him in the rear view mirror twice. No contest. For shame! I bet if we were on a twisty road course he would have handed me my butt on a platter. But give me a 2012 Boss Mustango Laguna Seca, and see what happens.

Happy cruising

Rolando