Comet Imaging Session - October 31, 2025

The sky this late afternoon is partly cloudy and once again shows some cloud openings in the sky thus encouraging me to drive to Manila Bay near Diokno Bridge where I last image Comet C/2025 A6 Lemmon last October 24.At around 6:00pm, I was able to polar align as well as see the comet in the field already but it was still too bright for me to get a decent shot till around 6:15pm but clouds suddenly pops out once again to obscure the comet and thus I play cat and mouse with the clouds till around 6:25pm where I was imaging the comet through passing clouds. But I was able to get a decent cloudless frame of the comet and it shows a very bright nucleus as well as a long tail. Estimated magnitude of the comet is more or less magnitude 4. Afterwards, I slew to another bright comet, Comet C/2025 R2 Swan which is very high in the sky but unfortunately, lots of passing clouds interfere with my imaging routine and I was able to get a few frames with less clouds only. I also notice the comet brightness dimming a lot compare to last week but nevertheless the comet is still bright enough at Magnitude 7-8 to be able to capture in the city. I use my trusty Dwarf 3 Smart Scope at Astro Mode with Astro Filter at EQ Mode to capture the 2 comets with total exposure of 5 minutes for each comet.

Comet Imaging Session - October 24, 2025

The sky just before sunset is cloudy but I can see some blue sky in between so I forced myself to go out to Manila Bay area near SM Mall of Asia vicinity to setup my Dwarf 3 Smart Scope to try to image C/2025 A6 Lemmon which is very bright at around estimate Mag 3.6 but the challenge ge is that it is very low in the NW horizon where lots of thick clouds are hovering that afternoon. Despite the situation , I still persevere and play the waiting game till I got a chance to image the comet at only 4 degrees above the horizon! This really helps me distress myself today as I was very sad today because my Facebook Account got hacked this morning and I wasted the whole day trying to recover my account as the damn hacker is soliciting money from my FB friends and also doing phishing activities and I know a few of my FB friends got duped by this hacker and I really feel bad about it as I was locked out of my account thus wasn't able to warned all of them. Sorry... So this comet recovery really helped me lessen the stress and frustration that I'm having the whole day... I hope to be able to get another chance to image it tomorrow with a better and clearer view of this comet...

Comet Imaging Session - October 23, 2025

I tried to image Comet C/2025 A6 Lemmon this early evening but unfortunately, I got clouded out in the western horizon so better luck next time for me. So I get back to C/2025 R2 Swan after the sky open up a little for me to capture it once again with my Dwarf 3. I just did a quick and dirty phone processing only for this 5mins total exposure of the comet. I will process again this comet on my computer if I got some free time this week.

Comet Imaging Session - October 22, 2025

Comet Imaging Session - October 22, 2025 After a hard rain. Downpour late in the afternoon, the sky cleared up for me to image Comet C/2025 R2 Swan again using my trusty Dwarf 3 Smart Scope at Astro Mode on EQ Mode with total exposure of 5 minutes (30 sec x 10) at Gain 60 before I go to our basketball practice. Comet is also getting higher as the days pass by and today it is already in the constellation of Aquila. #astroridervlog #comet #comet2025r2swan #dwarf3

Comet Imaging Session - October 17, 2025

The sky this evening is partly cloudy but there are some small cloud openings in the western sky so I quickly ran home to setup my Dwarf 3 Smart Scope to try to image Comet C/2025 R2 Swan in Serpens. I capture the comet with a total exposure of 5 minutes to lessen the comet from getting trails before I got clouded out totally :( Hopefully I can have another chance to image the comet with clear sky and longer integration time to enhance the faint tail. I didn't setup my Borg 76ED Refractor as the sky specially in the North is super cloudy!

Solar Imaging Session - October 16, 2025

The sky this afternoon is super cloudy and I was only able to get a shot of AR4250/4248 Region in white light wavelength before I got clouded out.

Comet Imaging Session - October 14, 2025

I saw some clearing in the western sky after sunset and this itched me to do an impossible imaging attempt on the C/2025 R2 Swan. With almost whole sky with patchy clouds, I forgot using my main imaging rig and just use my trusty Dwarf 3 Smart Scope to locate and image the comet. I was able to put the comet into the field with a modest 15sec exposure as longer exposure washed out the field. After around 4 mins total exposure , I can see the green comet near the star Sabik in Ophiuchius to confirm it in the lower right area of the field of view through passing clouds and haze but since it was off center, I had to re-enter the comet but got clouded out totally instead :( Nevertheless,I'm still glad to be able to see it today. Will attempt again if sky permits in the days to come with better exposure.

Solar Imaging Session - October 12, 2025

The sky this afternoon is partly cloudy and seeing condition is fair. The huge NE Hedgerow Prominence is still visible but has slightly deteriorate a bit compared to yesterday view but nevertheless still spectacular! AR4248 Region continues to grow as well as AR4246 Region. There is a new AR4252 Region emerging from the SE limb and may become a prominent sunspot in the days to come after it totally emerges out of the limb. I was able to image both WL and Ha closeups as well as full disk solar in whitelight. I had a close call with hard rain after I started to packup! Whew!

Solar Imaging Session - October 11, 2025

The sky is partly cloudy this afternoon and seeing condition is fair. It's been almost 5 months now since I did any solar imaging due to bad weather and busy work schedule. So I use this opportunity to image the the full disk Sun using Dwarf 3 Smart Scope. I was also able to image a huge NE Looped Prominence and AR4248 Region under cloudy condition before I got totally clouded out in the end. Initially, I got clouded out after I setup and waited for almost an hour and decided to packup. After I almost completely packed up, there was a small window of open sky with some haze for me to quickly setup once again to image the Sun. Oh well.... Better have some images than nothing at all! :) LOL

Lunar Imaging Session - October 7, 2025

The sky this evening is cloudy but lots of cloud opening so I use my Dwarf 3 Smart Scope to image the Full Moon at Astro Mode Stack of 20 images of 1/2000sec exposure and Gain 0 at AZ Mode.

Lunar Imaging Session- October 5, 2025

The sky tonight is partly cloudy but I can see the Waxing Gibbous Moon rising from the eastern horizon so I tested Samsung S25 Ultra 100x digital zoom to see how it looks like. Not bad is what I can say but of course can't compete in sharpness against afocal or prime shots taken with mirrorless camera or astro camera but I think it is good enough for layman's point of view.

Total Lunar Eclipse Imaging Session - September 7-8, 2025

The sky in the evening was very cloudy and the Full Moon is playing hide and seek with us the whole evening till early morning time of next day! There is a total lunar eclipse that is visible in the evening near midnight. I was joined by my son KC as well as his friend Cha who is interested in learning astronomy as well as astrophotography. I setup my Borg 76ED Refractor with Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera mounted on ZWO AM5 mount. KC set up his Canon EOS 500D DSLR on Canon EFS55-250mm zoom lens as well as Dwarf 3 smart scopes so that we can also image using them. The eclipsed Moon continues to play hide and seek with us the whole session and luckily, despite the clouds covering the Moon most of time, we were able to still locate the Moon and image the eclipse through thin and thick clouds. As totality approached at around 1:30am, we were able to see the faint Moon that almost makes it invisible and hard to view through our naked eyes and we rely on our more sensitive imaging equipment to monitor and capture it. We continue to document the event till past 3am when the Moon is completely covered by thick clouds as well as some light drizzle that signal us to end the session.

Lunar Imaging Session - September 6, 2025

The sky this evening is cloudy but I was able to get some thin clouds and clearing for me to take a snap shot of the Waning Gibbous Moon using my Dwarf 3 Smart Scope at Astro Mode at AZ mode. Stacked of 20 images at 1/1000sec exposure at Gain 0. This is a test shot for tomorrow night's total lunar eclipse which will start September 7 around 11:28pm as the Moon enters penumbra phase and partial eclipse (umbra) will start past midnight toward September 8 at 12:27am and gradually enters totality at around 1:31pm. Maximum Totality occurs at 2:12am and ends at 2:53am. After that, Moon will start to exit umbra at around 3:57am and exits also penumbra at 4:55am signaling the end of the eclipse in its entirely.

Lunar Imaging Session - August 8, 2025

The sky this evening is partly cloudy and seeing condition is fair. I use this opportunity to image the Waxing Gibbous Moon (99.33% almost Full Moon) using my trusty Dwarf 3 Smart Scope at Astro Mode and AZ Mode with 1/1600sec exposure at Gain 0.

Solar Imaging Session - May 28, 2025

The sky this afternoon is hazy and seeing condition is fair. There are 2 moderate sized sunspots in AR4100 and AR4099 Regions that are worth observing as they have nice umbral and penumbral structures both in white light and Ha wavelength.