Juno16 wrote: ↑Sun Jul 24, 2022 12:07 am
Frankskywatcher wrote: ↑Sat Jul 23, 2022 7:46 pm
Juno16 wrote: ↑Sat Jul 23, 2022 7:00 pm
@Frankskywatcher
Thanks Frank!
Cool video!
I know that you are enjoying this hobby. I enjoy it very much too. My only regret is that I wish I had started before my 60’s!
Tell me about it my friend !
I’m 66 retired, I worked at an Ivy League University for 32 years .
I used to take my kids to open telescope nights at the University, I was always interested but living in light polluted skies.
When I moved to where I now live with no lights at night and dark skies I decided to buy a telescope BUT this Forum has put me light years ahead of where I would have been and I have been gifted things that helped me tremendously !
Hey Frank,
I will be 67 next month and I retired from Dupont QC lab. Quite a bit different from your work career, but it got the job done. I retired at 63 and wish that I had retired earlier. Retirement is a hard thing to do!
I started observing in 2016 when I saw a colleague at work looking at his phone
app of the skies (Sky Guide). He showed me what what up there and I started to log satellite and space junk observations. Sky Guide is a really cool
app and I still use it. I had a blast doing that usually after dusk and before dawn.
Then I bought a
goto celestron 5" newt and I saw so many amazing things. I logged 93
Messier's from
Bortle 7 skies with that scope and it was awesome. I would get up two hours before I had to leave for work to observe. It made for a nice day.
I saved about 2k$ of vacation money that I cashed in when I retired to start
AP. I really wanted to see a better view of these amazing sights in the skies from my light polluted backyard.
I could see a smudge in the eyepiece visually, or spend an evening or two imaging the same object and see spectacular details. I was hooked!
Unfortunately, my skies are quite hit and miss. I haven't had good skies since May 28, but this is kind of unusual. I hope to get back out soon and capture some cool targets.
Take care sir!
Juno 16 thank you so much for responding to my post and my apologies for such a late reply somehow I missed your post.
I have always been interested in astronomy but had other hobbies as well ,amateur radio and the Scottish highland bagpipe and playing in a pipe and drum band.
The university that I worked at every Tuesday had open night at the observatory that was only two blocks from my house,I used to take my kids there.
Now that I’m retired and live out in the countryside here in South Carolina it didn’t take me long to get the urge to buy a telescope looking up at night.
I have Class4
Bortle skies and no street lights on my two Lane Highway out in the countryside.
I know one thing I would certainly not be enjoying this hobby as much if it was not for this Forum, between the guidance, friendliness, helpfulness and generosity of the members in this group.
As far as Astro photography I’m still having fun doing it old-school just looking at stuff, last night was Saturn the moon and Jupiter .
I hate to agree with you but I have to so because so many times I’ll see a smudge in the sky and no matter how much magnification I put on it ,it’s still a smudge, sometimes it’s an immense star cluster but other times I have a feeling it’s something that I just can’t see with my class 4 skies.