Deep Sky Imaging Session - October 13-14, 2012

Despite a lot of Astro Gremlins (Snapped Power Steering Belt, Resoldering of Battery terminal of polar scope, etc) that haunt my imaging session trip to Caliraya, Laguna last October 13, 2012 with some members of the Astronomical League of the Philippines (ALP). I initially plan to do some deep sky object imaging with the ATIK 16HR CCD setup with my TV-101 refractor on GP-DX mount but the soil on the site keeps sinking bit by bit so I had a hard time getting decent images with the setup so I used my alternate imaging gear with the Canon EOS 500D DSLR with Canon EF100-400mm f.4.5-5.6 IS L lens on Kenko Sky Memo-R tracker instead which gives me a better imaging session that evening. The sky was almost 80% clear but very heavy dewing with an average temperature of around 21 deg C with 93% humidity so I have to use the dew heater at Max whole session. I was able to do some imaging on M45 Pleiades star cluster, M42 Great Orion Nebula, Comet 168/P Hegenrother. I ended the imaging session with the capture of the waning thin crescent Moon as well as earthshine to cap the successful imaging session. All of us were happy on the outcome of the weather that evening and we look forward to doing another imaging session this weekend and I hope to be able to finally get good results on my CCD imaging :)