Little Dipper
- Click here for a larger version
- Get a large (or small) quality poster of this image with asterism lines and star names
- Get a large (or small) quality poster of the "naked" version
I started this project in January, from the Pinar de Araceil in Spain, during two incredibly freezing nights, imaging only between 4:30 and 6am. After that, I captured more data very slowly, as I only wanted to capture data when the bowl of the constellation was high in the sky, and that could only be at the time all you want to do is pack and go home.
Finally, during several nights in April I was able to finish all frames that included the actual asterism, and in 4 more nights in May (all at the DARC Observatory), I completed the areas above and below it, to become the 20 frames (4x5) mosaic that you can now see.
The image at first doesn't seem to impact very much. It is after all mainly dominated by stars and some faint galactic cirrus in the background. Still, I had this project in mind for many months, as I really wanted to see this "small" constellation at a better resolution and depth than what I had been able to see before, and I was just patiently waiting for the right time to capture it.
Down here you can see the image with asterism and star names:
Comments
You are great and your images too. More constellations Rogelio?.
Pd:There are an artefact over Polaris!
But what is that near Polaris -- a meteor? a circumpolar satellite? Your explanation?
I appreciate you freezing for our benefit, but why didn't you choose different times in other months when the asterism would be just as high?
Fernando, what artifact are you referring to?
Kevin, it could be a meteor, or maybe just an old Iridium satellite. I don't really know. Why not wait? Well, sometimes you just want to capture something because you want to see it :-) As you can see, I didn't really rush it, I simply started very early. Keep in mind those nights that I'd get some data for this image, I would spend most of the night capturing data for other images, so it's not like I'd go to a dark site and wait until 2-4am to start imaging, but when the time came, sure, I wanted to continue adding data for this project :-)
Greg
ciao
Ric