Winter Solstice Total Lunar Eclipse Movie

Well I finally put together some of my images from the eclipse to make this movie. The next Total Lunar Eclipse visible from my area will be December 10 2011. I can't help but wonder what I'll be doing or where I'll be when it occurs. Things change, doors close, new ones open. I think a lot of the time we stare too long at the closed doors we don't notice the new one being open for us, do we go in look around and then back out or do we go for it, only God knows.

I took the image below December 31, the last Moon Rise of 2010. Watching an orange Crescent Moon Rise is always so surreal for me, add to it -26c and 5:30am and you get the feeling like you're the only one around probably watching the show. In the distant a couple miles there is a highway that runs in front of it, watching the tiny headlights of the cars travel in front of it, makes it even more odd, surely they see what I see, why don't they stop and take it in, well I guess they have somewhere to be. I think there is a lot of stuff going on that we don't notice, it's cool sometimes to take the time to stop what you're doing, as in my case sleeping in my cozy bed, leave it's comfort and experience something even more juicy, taking that step of faith that there is something out there worth the effort with awesome results. One last thing, got a mention as one of the top 50 blogs about space travel, which is cool...all the best in 2011.



Lunapic Photo Editing

Winter Solstice Total Lunar Eclipse

Well, didn't get to see the Geminids due to clouds, or the Moon Pleiades conjunction, again due to clouds and snow, but 3rd times the charm, got to see and image a very rare Winter Solstice Total Eclipse of the Moon, WOO HOO! Hasn't been one for over 300 years and the next won't happen till 2094.



Touch and go up to the event whether or not I was going to see it at all, was a light cloud cover throughout but my good ole faithful Moon burnt through to put on quite the show, I hope and actually know some of you got to see it, Astro-Nuts was with and he got some great pics, JJ got some great images as well as Genie, as of this writing Genie and Astro-Nuts have only posted to FB, anyone else get pics just send me some and I will post here.

Went pretty smooth cept for the fact I almost killed myself, as I was carrying my 90 pound scope across my slippy deck to mount it on the tripod I slipped and would have gone down if not for the fact there was a bbq behind me which kept me up, man that so would have sucked. All good in the end and got the shots, 240 of them, I hope to stitch them together soon into a movie, which I will post. Last but not least, wishing you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Space Goings On for December

Finally, after almost 3 years we will be treated to a Total Lunar Eclipse starting at 1:32 am EST. December 21. I took the above image during the last Total Lunar Eclipse, February 20, 2008. If you live in North America and miss this one you'll be waiting awhile for the next...April 2014. If you look real close, preferably with binocs just before and right after totality you'll see a beautiful turquoise color, like the above image.

During a Lunar Eclipse, the Earth comes between the Sun and the Moon, you see the reddish brown on the Moon as the result of the Sunlight going through the Earth's stratosphere which absorbs the blues and allows the reds through to the Moon's surface, much like our lower atmosphere does during Sunrises/sets. Just before and after totality some of the Sunlight reaches into the Ozone layer which absorbs the reds and allows the blues through to the Lunar surface, just an fyi. Later that day, we have the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year, now the good thing about that is after it occurs the days will be getting longer, sweet.


December 13th look to the East for the Geminids Meteor Shower, they have actually started right now but will peak in numbers around 2 am, EST. December 14. If not for my Fisheye lens I would not have been so lucky to capture the low Geminid back in 2008. I was actually out to capture an Ursid Meteor in the Big Dipper near the end of December when by a total fluke caught the latecomer Geminid. Cool thing about low meteors is the dust in the lower atmosphere tends to make them more colorful, like the green above.


On December 18th the Moon and Pleiades will be getting together. If you can score a pair of binocs do so. They are a perfect celestial couple and look awesome through them and since the Moon will be near full it will kind of wash out the Pleiades, the binocs will help make them more visible. I will give reminders here as well and weather permitting take and post the images here.

A New Song

So, this is what I've been doing for the last 5 months. I mentioned in my last post that I was working with some talented musicians, well we have a name for our group now and our first recorded song. The name of the song , "Restless Dreams", the name of the group, "Soul Reviver".

But to me it's really not about the music as much as it is about the friendships that have developed in the group, Dennis Perry on Bass, Dale Kostyk on Drums and did the mixdown on the song, and our fearless leader, singer, songwriter Guitarist Ed Saraka, the man who got it all started last July. I've known Ed for some 25 years and when he gave me the call to join the project I thought Ed's involved, gonna be good. The call came at a point in my life when I was wondering what to do next, my life hadn't turned out quite the way I planned, maybe joining a rock and roll group will make it all better, hey God does work in mysterious ways.

Restless Dreams was written at a turning point in my life, you know when you come to a point in your life when you realize you've made mistakes and look within yourself and find there is nothing you can do, or anyone else for that matter, so you make a choice, look to a higher power, ie God and realize crap I should have done this a long time ago, God forgives you, you forgive yourself (the hardest part) and move on, the end. But not really the end, always doubts, we are after all only human, that's why it's nice to have God 24/7 to pull us back into line again when we doubt about our self worth, our purpose.

As far as Blackholes and astrostuff look for more posts, if only as Anna suggested the odd image or so.

Where to Find Astronomy Videos And Photo Galleries Online

I have another great guest post from education writer Karen Schweitzer. Karen is the About.com Guide to Business School. She also writes about pharmacy technician certification for PharmacyTechnicianCertification.com.



Browsing astronomy video and photo galleries is a great way to learn more about space and get a look at things you might otherwise never see. The following ten sites host thousands of videos and images for your viewing pleasure.



Space.com Video Collection - Space.com has assembled hundreds of astronomy videos from around the web and put them in one easy-to-access collection. More than 500 videos can be view directly in Space.com's video player.



ScienceDaily Video Collection - ScienceDaily, a site that reports on the latest science news, hosts a large selection of astronomy videos. Videos include clips of the moon, planets, asteroids, meteors, stars, black holes, space exploration, and much more.



Sixty Symbols Video Collection - Created by the University of Nottingham, Sixty Symbols provides an interesting library of videos about the symbols of physics and astronomy. The site also links to their Flickr photo collection.





Discovery.com Video Collection - Discovery.com has an excellent collection of videos for space and science enthusiasts. The videos feature the top 10 greatest discoveries in astronomy.


National Geographic Video Collection - National Geographic offers dozens of high-quality space videos in their online science video collection. Videos cover everything from the latest news in space and shuttle missions to forces of nature.


NASA Image Gallery - NASA offers a wide range of videos and images on their site. Photos include images from the Kennedy Space Center, NASA aircraft, aeronautics facilities, and research centers. Visitors can browse collections or search for images using NASA's image exchange engine.


Hubble Gallery - The Hubble Site offers a huge selection of images captured by the Hubble Space Telescope. Site visitors can browse individual images, search albums, or tour entire image galleries.




Astronomy Magazine's Online Reader Gallery - Astronomy Magazine posts a wide range of images snapped by astrophotographers from around the world. Registered members can leave comments on the images or submit their own photo. Image categories include the sun and moon, comets, star clusters, galaxies, and nebulae.

NOAO Image Gallery - This site features pictures taken with the facilities of the National Optical Astronomy Observatory (NOAO). The gallery includes images of the sun, moon, stars, solar system, nebulae, galaxies, telescopes, and more.


APOD Archives - Created by Robert Nemiroff and Jerry Bonnell, Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) features the largest collection of annotated astronomy images on the web. Archives include images that have been posted daily from 1995 to present day.


Thanks a lot Karen, I little update about me, I have been very fortunate to hook up with some talented musicians and am getting back to creating music with the main goal of putting a CD of originals together within the year, lot easier to write stuff when you understand more about who you are, very exciting times, and I Thank God for this.

I will be getting back into posting more regularly in the future, thanks for all your kind comments and emails, you have all been just super.