Partial Lunar Eclipse 2026-08-28 — All Ten Phases
Combined images from 2 VP-2 scopes at the Buffalo Ridge Observatory.
Individual images (10)
Solar Partial Eclipse
Looks like the moon, but it is the sun. Taken from Denver, CO
Veil Nebula Complex: Mosaic from multiple telescopes. Summer 2026
A star 20 times more massive than the Sun exploded between 10,000 and 20,000 years ago. The remnants have since expanded to cover an area of the sky roughly 3 degrees in diameter (about 6 times the diameter, and 36 times the area, of the full Moon). Images from the Buffalo Ridge Observatory; approximately 50 hours of observation.
Pinwheel Galaxy
The Pinwheel Galaxy, M101, is a large galaxy, with a diameter of 252,000 light-years. By comparison, the Milky Way has a diameter of 87,400 light-years. It has around a trillion stars. It has a disk mass on the order of 100 billion solar masses, along with a small central bulge of about 3 billion solar masses.
Eastern Veil
A second image of the Veil Nebula Complex, taken primarily at the Buffalo Ridge Observatory.
The Bat Nebula, part of the Veil Nebula Complex. Summer, 2026
The Bat Nebula is a faint section of the Cygnus Loop supernova remnant in the constellation Cygnus, around 2400 light-years from Earth. Its thin, filamentary structure marks the expanding shock front from a massive star that exploded thousands of years ago. Captured with a dual-band filter over several nights.
Eastern Veil
Duplicate - mark for deletion
Moon
Taken with a Vespera scope.
Moon 2
Taken with a Panasonic Lumix camera at the Buffalo Ridge Observatory.
Moon 3
Taken at the Buffalo Ridge Observatory with a Panasonic Lumix.
Lagoon Nebula
it is one of only two star-forming nebulae faintly visible to the naked eye from mid-northern latitudes. Located approximately 4,000–6,000 light-years from Earth, the nebula spans 110 by 50 light-years.
Rosette A
Taken with my original Vespera 1 scope, which has been retired. It is about 5,000 light-years from Earth and measures roughly 130 light years in diameter. The radiation from the young stars excites the atoms in the nebula, causing them to emit radiation themselves producing the emission nebula we see. The mass of the nebula is estimated to be around 10,000 solar masses.
M3
Messier 3 (M3; also NGC 5272) is a globular cluster located 33.9 thousand light years from Earth in the northern constellation of Canes Venatici. It is one of the largest and brightest globular clusters discovered with around 500,000 stars. Clusters such as this can be described as a collection of stellar odds and ends, pulled together by gravitational forces.
Great Orion Nebula
The brightest Nebula from Earth, designated M42. This is visible with the naked eye, although its structure can only be discerned with binoculars or a telescope. This image is from about 20 hours of observations, primarily at the Buffalo Ridge Observatory, and additional data acquired in Denver.
Horsehead Nebula
The Horsehead nebula is a favorite - a dark nebula formed by non-reflective material that blocks the light from the nebula, creating a shape similar to a horse head. It is located about 1,375 light-years from Earth in the constellation of Orion.
Elephant Trunk Nebula
The Elephant Trunk Nebula is a concentration of interstellar gas and dust within the much larger ionized gas region IC 1396 located in the constellation Cepheus about 2,400 light years away from Earth. This image was acquired from my first scope, since retired, and was processed before the development of my APAS software.
California Nebula
An "artistic" rendition of this image was acquired from my first scope, since retired, and was processed before the development of my APAS software. The shape resembles that of the state of California. It is almost 2.5° long on the sky and, because of its very low surface brightness, it is extremely difficult to observe visually. It can be observed with a Hα filter (isolates the Hα line at 656 nm) or Hβ filter (isolates the Hβ line at 486 nm) in a rich-field telescope under dark skies. It lies at a distance of about 1,000 light years from Earth.
Rosette Nebula
An earlier image of the Rosette Nebula, acquired from my first scope and processed before the development of my APAS software.
Helix Nebula (Eye of God)
The Helix is a planetary nebula, a type of emission nebula consisting of an expanding, glowing shell of ionized gas ejected from red giant stars late in their lives. acquired from my first scope and processed before the development of my APAS software.
Rosette Nebula 2
Another Rosette rendition, acquired from my first scope and processed before the development of my APAS software.
Thor's Helmet
The nebula is approximately 3,670 parsecs (11.96 thousand light years) away and 30 light-years in size. The central star is the Wolf-Rayet star WR7, an extremely hot star thought to be in a brief pre-supernova stage of evolution. It is largely interstellar material swept up by winds from the central star, although some material does appear to be enriched with the products of fusion.
Eagle Nebula
One of my very first images is pretty basic. The Eagle Nebula contains the Pillars of Creation, although that can't be seen in this image.