Photos from the Trip
This edition of our biannual Pinnacles adventure was unlike most other recent ones - we had sparkling clear skies all night long both Friday and Saturday, and our 10" LX200 was back in top form too. It was a great crop of students as well - they pitched in with enthusiasm and made our Saturday night group meal the all-time greatest.
Dave pronounces geological judgement on Steve's flea-market beads |
We had some serious cooking gear for this one, courtesy of Ben, and it paid off |
Dave and Phillip agree - this was the all time greatest Pinnacles group dinner! |
Ryuta (left) and Dave (background) inhale some incredible burritos |
Ashley and Patti |
Jonathan struggles vainly to get his old mount into astrophotographical shape |
14x5min stack on AE Aur nebula through the Megrez and ST2000XCM camera under perfect skies Saturday night |
Same raw image stack, but processed with more skill, and using Astronomy Tools set of actions. I've got a whole page on the creation of this image |
Galaxy NGC 6946 and Open Cluster NGC 6939 in Cepheus. 8x5min stack through the Megrez + ST2000XCM. The galaxy is magnitude 8.9 and 11' across. Post-processed in Photoshop CS2 (w/ AstronomyTools actions: 'enhance DSO and stars smaller', 'deep space noise reduction', 'local density contrast'), curves, smart sharpen. The heavy galactic dust in Cepheus reddens what would normally be blue spiral arms in this late type spiral. This is also called the "fireworks galaxy", having produced 8 supernovae in the last century, more than any other known galaxy. |
Dave explains marble roof pendants at Fremont Peak on Sunday |
