Cocoon Data from Hyperstar

Last year Sal and I worked on Cocoon data from my Hyperstar rig.  I found some other subs I took and stacked them in as well, and reprocessed the old data to try and bring out more of the dust and increase contrast.  Whether it's better or not I suppose is subject to opinion.

Cocoon - Astrophotogallery.org

30x300sec, no darks
QHY-8 OSC Hyperstar III
Nexstar 8 GPS

Click a second time to maximize to full scale.

The fires at night

Just finished capturing the fire in the dark from the same vantage point I used earlier.  It's growing, fast.  Here's a few shots.  You can see an observation aircraft trailing in one of the shots.  I animated the three images - taken about a minute apart from one another.  Observe how fast the fire is moving.

Los Alamos Fire from behind my home

The Los Alamos fire is raging out of control still.  We woke up this morning to the familiar smell of smoke and a clouded sky full of smoke and ash.  On my way home I noticed something on the ridge just North of me about 15 miles out.  Seems it's not as far away as originally thought...  After a month of choking on ash and smoke from the Wallow fire in AZ, we had hoped for a break.  The fires in NM are spreading rapidly and I fear for us all this weekend when the fireworks start going off.  No appreciable precipitation since October last year.  Looks like there won't be much AP going on this New Moon cycle either, just like the last one...

In any case, for those of you who wonder what it looks like where I do my AP from, here it is, minus the smoke and clouds usually.  Completely remote and void of light.  Nothing but open country.