#LCFCatalogue #Astrodon #DwarfLabs #GlobularStarCluster #OpenStarCluster
#SmartTelescope #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #Dwarf3 #Astrophotography

Getting all ready for #ScienceWeek

https://photos.app.goo.gl/jwEb8dbjZk2A6AzJ9 here's an album of the last ClusterFudge I did, the video about it is here https://aus.social/@leece/114744657142743643

Several new objects were added to the LCF Catalogue that night. I am particularly fond of LCF 100-O and might give it a bit more attention, possibly even tonight.

That's one of the beauties of ClusterFudging - you can find interesting stuff and go back to have a more detailed look later.

Up to 107 LCF Objects now! Here's a link to the current state of play with the LCF Catalogue as it stands.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1FYHvsqL3F5S-Bq3_LftPYy0YVJUZJuwW/view?usp=drivesdk

Some of them haven't really been post processed, some have in a fairly cursory fashion, but with ClusterFudging we all know it's the quantity, not the quality when you're showing off a big ClusterFudge.

Last night's effort, with some #Snapseed and Google photos editing with advice from @rdm for OCl 999.0 with Prawn Nebula.

#SmartTelescope #Astrodon #Astronomy #Astrophotography #DwarfIII #Dwarf3 #DwarfLab #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #DrivewayAstrophotography

So last night was pretty successful and I am still really amazed the #dwarfiii did not just stop when it had the focus issue fixed, it just calibrated and went straight to the second target. Here are the rushes. It's a pretty big ClusterFudge all up.

Some of these are already #LCFCatalogue objects, some are new, so they'll be added to the list presently.

#Astrodon #SmartTelescope #Dwarf3 #Astrophotography #BackyardAstronomy #DrivewayAstrophotography #StellarClusterFudge #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy

Still processing the images from last night but a successful schedule of mostly clusters. Less dew too which made me more comfortable leaving the telescope out all night!
This one caught my eye so processed it first. C106 (47 Tucanae) 16,700 light years away.
20 minutes of stacked 15s photos.
Looking forward to seeing the results of other Perth people with the new moon and cloudless skies
@rdm
@leece

#astrophotography #perth #southernhemisphereastronomy

On our way after some technical issues

#LeecesClusterFudge #astrodon #astronomy #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #AstroPhotograhy #BackYardAstronomy #LCFCatalogue

@buddhawilliams well, I've had an exciting time with my clusterfudge. Firstly my final one just kept closing when I went to check on it, so, unlike the Titanic, was unsynchable.

So I quickly entered up another, well as quick as I could, on another tablet in case my first one wasn't stable because of the Beta Dwarf App. Phew, got that done.

Then my DwarfIII tried and tried to calibrate, but it looked like something was wrong with the focus, so @rdm found the option to reset the 0 point for the second target to my immense surprise. I had no idea it was THAT resilient!

Hope yours is going well too!

My Dwarf 2 has settled on the VDB 102 reflection nebula for much of the night and the Great Winter Solstice-ish ClusterFudge is underway!

#astrodon #LeecesClusterFudge #astronomy #SmartTelescope #DwarfII #DwarfIII #dwarflab #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #DrivewayAstrophotography #Astrophotography #LCFCatalogue #BackYardAstronomy

Huge kudos and thank you to @rdm who showed extreme grace under pressure in helping me get this video out before tomorrow!

We did well getting this together in just a few hours so be kind!

#Astrodon #Astronomy #LeecesClusterFudge #SmartTelescope #GlobularStarCluster #OpenStarCluster #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #LCFCatalogue

https://youtu.be/RoWVYCLXsX4?si=oDJyIpbFAr_Nlp5Z

This refers back to my original talk about Clusterfudging -https://aus.social/@leece/114664990023826144

Hello everybody and I hope you’ve been getting some clear skies for your telescoping if you’re into it. If you’re not into it, that’s cool, this may not be of interest to you.

It’s clagged over for me, but before it did, I was very busy with the sky indeed. Let me take you on a journey - the journey of the Leece’s ClusterFudge.

People who are familiar with my astronomy writings may remember that once I had a telescope of the smart persuasion I found I liked hunting Nebulae.

I thought they were beautiful and cool and interesting, and really gave one the impression of 3 dimensionality in the night sky, that space was indeed filled with vast depths.

Clusters, I said, especially Globular Clusters were not very interesting. They all look the same, I said, and they’re not really going to be on my dance card.

So I set my Dwarf II and Dwarf III for long periods to capture all sorts of nebulae and was happy over the course of a year and a half, during which time we volunteered at the Perth Astrofest and showed thousands of people how cool smart telescopes were, and I won an astrophotography prize.

We got Covid 19 and got great comfort from being able to put our telescopes out by barely leaving our recovery room, and watching the images build. I found by accident while chasing nebulae that some open clusters were quite interesting and beautiful, although nebulae were still where it was at for me.

We visited the Gravity Discovery Centre for one of their Astronomy Nights, and listened to the Chief Astronomer talk about globular clusters, and how some people thought that they all looked the same.

Yep that’s me I thought, but I listened and his enthusiasm touched me. Hmm, yes okay I thought, maybe I’ll take a look. Great tour, by the way, recommended.

So I had a look, and something started ticking away in my mind thoughtfully. These clusters sure are bright I thought. I bet they don’t need much time. Maybe if I lined up a lot of Globular Clusters next to each other, I could see the differences and develop an appreciation of them.

It might be fun to see just how many clusters I can take in a period of darkness. I’ll have to fudge together a schedule. And thus the inception of the LCF Catalogue- the Leece’s ClusterFudge Catalogue.

I started testing as to what the shortest period my telescopes could be set for during a scheduled shoot.

#Astrodon #Astronomy #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #Astrophotography #DwarfLab #Dwarf2 #Dwarf3 #LCFCatalogue

We have been blessed/cursed by a very dry Djeran / Autumn period. Cursed because no rain after a long, hot Bunuru( Second Summer) and blessed because the nights are cold, and very clear.

This and @rdm having to be on Munich time for a few days prompted some enthusiastic astrophotography sessions ahead of the news that the clouds were finally coming to us with some rain.

We figured that we'd do a lot of astrophotography, and then write it up and share photos during the rainy cloudy bits to keep us going.

So here we are - this is my first post about it, and it's about the last day of the clear sky.

We have here NGC 4945 or Caldwell 83 - also known as the Tweezers Galaxy (I personally think it looks more like an orange peeler).

I was leafing through Astronomy Australia 2025 and found it as a target for May. I hadn't come across this galaxy before, and was thrilled to find a galaxy that's a big enough apparent size to suit my #dwarf3

These are great books and the last of this great almanac that they'll publish, after 30 years - so get yours today - https://quasarastronomy.com.au/product/astronomy-2025/ even though it's a yearbook it's still going to be useful down the track. If you're in Australia or close enough. #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy folks. I grabbed some of their back catalogue - incredibly cheap and plenty of interesting stuff in there, if only historically. 🙂

So, anyway, back to the galaxy - I plonked the #SmartTelescope on the roof later in the evening so it's only a few hours exposure. Gain was 80, exposure was 60. Got a few hundred frames in two sessions as I belatedly realised that I should get the telescope to shut down before the closest Sun made itself apparent.

So then, in the morning @rdm ran me through the Mega Stack and Stellar Studio provided through Infinity Lab within the telescope, which was super easy, and then I did some cropping in Snapseed.

And this is the result, I hope you enjoy!

#Astrodon #Astronomy #BackyardAstrophotography #DrivewayAstrophotography #Galaxy

So on the Anzac Day weekend I finally was able to take a print of my award winning photograph taken at Orchard Glory Farm Resort to present to the proprietor David, as a thank you for keeping the skies dark.

Thank you to @rdm for taking the photos for the presentation and once again to the #Astrofest for the photography competition and of course, #AustralasianDarkSkyAlliance for sponsoring the prize.

#Astrodon #astrophotography #SouthernHemisphereAstronomy #astronomy