Telescope Reviews: Jul08 CN Imaging/Sketching Contest Poll!

We are very pleased and proud to present the July 2008 Sketching Semi-Finalists in the Imaging/Sketching Contest.

Jeff Young:

This is M3 as viewed at the very end of April through an APM/Mattias Wirth 16" f/10 Mak-Cass and 26mm Nagler T5 on an AP1200GTO mount. Seeing was quite good; transparency so-so. Sketch was done in HB and 6H pencil on A5 white cartridge paper, scanned into Photoshop and inverted.

cildarith:

Object Name: IC 1318(c) (West Extension)
Object Type: Emission Nebula
Constellation: Cygnus
Right Ascension (2000.0): 20h 17.1m
Declination (2000.0): +40° 50'

Date/Time: 27 July 2008 • 05:45 to 07:00 UT
Location: Oakzanita Springs, San Diego Co., California, USA
Telescope: Parks Astrolight EQ6 • 6" f/6 Newtonian Reflector
Eyepiece/Magnification: Parks 20mm Gold Series Plössl • 45x • 70' FoV
Filters: Lumicon OIII
Conditions: Clear, Calm, 64°F
Seeing: Pickering 6-7
Transparency: NELM 6.4; TLM 14.2

This cascade of stars shrouded in smoky wisps of nebulosity caught my attention as I made the star hop from Gamma Cygni to IC 1318(b). The cascade ends at the sparse open cluster Collinder 419, whose brightest star is a close pair known as Struve 2666 (6.0, 8.2; 2.6"; 245°). Just northeast of this cluster the narrow stream of nebulosity blossoms into a hazy morass of delicate nebulosity – this is IC 1318(c). Fifth magnitude HD 193092 blazes with a reddish-orange light to the south.

Sketch Info: Nebulosity sketched with graphite applied with artist chamois and blending stump on 24# paper in 7½" circle. Stars with pencil and ink, cleaned up digitally (and colorized) in Microsoft Picture It!

frank5817:

Lunar Crater Eddington

137 kilometer, walled-plain crater remnant Eddington was well positioned and illuminated in the morning sunlight for drawing on this night.

For this sketch I used: black Strathmore 400 Artagain paper, white and black Conte’
pastel pencils and a blending stump. After scanning, Brightness was slightly decreased (-3) and contrast increased (+3) using Microsoft Office Picture Manager.

Telescope: 10 inch f/ 5.7 Dobsonian and 9 mm eyepiece 161x
Date: 6-17-2008, 2:55-3:50 UT
Temperature: 19° C (67° F)
Clear, transparent, calm
Seeing: Antoniadi III
Colongitude 72.7 °
Lunation 13.4 days
Illumination 98 %

markseibold:

Moon, 2 days past full July 20th 2008 Midnight ~ 2 AM, observed through Nexstar 5i with 32mm Plossl and 12mm Plossl for close-up inset image in detail.

*Sky clear, calm; seeing estimated as 9/10.
*Temperature 63 deg F dropping to 58 with dew point rising fast.

Observed through a Nexstar 5i at low and medium magnification, my original intention was to render this sketch as the whole moon.

Materials used:

Canson Mi Tientes medium tooth Blue Indigo paper of 20” X 24”.

Old antique pastel chalk sticks in square sticks and round include Sargeant, Grumbacher, Eagle Prismapastel, and various carbon greys as Swan Stbilo CarbOthello brand; I have purchased a few new ones as small square sticks. These are NuPastel. I have never used a blending stick. Only cotton swabs, Q-Tips and occasionally my bare fingers although I abstain from that as I know that it destroys the paper surface. I have never used a fixative on any of my works so they are vulnerable to smearing, thus kept stored until determination of whot to do with them in many requested prints now. Occasionally but not too often I accidentally smear some chalk in the void blank areas. I will lightly clean off or erase those areas with a dampened cotton swab before photographing the work with a 5.1 megapixel Sony Cybershot under north daylight or photoflash at night. If exposure is insufficient, I will drop brightness in Photoshop by a fer points and raise the contrast an equal amount. Color balancing is done with the camera settings per the ambient light- True north UV daylight or photoflash.

This was the first time I also used new chalk pencils by Faber Castell in snow white and a Swan Stabilo in cream white.

Much of the color on the whole moon was left as unblended with the exception of some small portions as you can see. That image is to be somewhat impressionistic yet I have rendered the actual craters and maria as accurate in position and placement as I could in under 2 hours (25 ~ 30 minutes of that time was spent on the close-up inset detail which actually became the final work for this forum.) Finally my left hand was omitted from the lower potion of the work with Photoshop erasure so as to not clutter the subject matter, hence the vignetting in the lower edges of the blank blue indigo paper.

darkstar528:

July 27th held some fascinating features...Equipment used is standard for me, PST, Barlow 2x and VIXEN zoom...On this particular day the limb was very active!

I use white 20# paper, black pens and photoshop to blow up and invert the features...

Please note that voting will conclude on August 8th at Midnight EST.

Many thanks to all who took part in the contest!

*

Which Sketch goes to the Finals?
Users may choose only one (22 total votes)

Jeff Young:

4 18%

cildarith:

5 22%

frank5817:

3 13%

markseibold:

8 36%

darkstar528:

2 09%

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Weston CSC: