It took me longer than planned to convert the original version of Share Astronomy to this blog-only version but the work is done and I can now focus on new blog posts.  All the blog posts from the previous version of Share Astronomy have been moved over to this version.  If you have trouble locating a particular post please take advantage of the Search box or review the Categories list in the right column.

I will continue writing about a variety of topics and I encourage you to stop by here frequently.  Please feel free to add comments.  I like your feedback!

I really believed that a web application designed to promote the sharing of astronomical ideas, projects and images couldn't fail. This seemed especially true given that membership was totally free and unlimited free disk space was being provided to imagers and project posters. Unfortunately, we never achieved the membership numbers and therefore, the advertising dollars, that were required to make this endeavor financially feasible.

This experience has been a positive one for me and it was wonderful that I had this opportunity. However, I didn't do it alone. Not by any means. There were a lot of very special people who helped me along the way and they have my everlasting gratitude. In particular, I would like thank my wife Beverly, my sister Kathleen and my mother Dori for their unwavering belief in Share Astronomy and all the incredible help and support they provided over the past two years. In addition, Tom Simstad – my one and only advertiser – put his money where is mouth is and did everything he could to make Share Astronomy a success. I would also like to sincerely thank all of the people who did interviews for Share Astronomy. Interviewees were:

• Hanny van Arkel – the discoverer of Hanny's Voorwerp.
• Fred Koch – of the Three Rivers Foundation.
• Alan Traino – chairperson of NEAF. (Note: I actually interviewed Alan twice – once for NEAF 2010 and once for NEAF 2011.)
• David Kriege – owner of Obsession Telescopes.
• Gino Bucciol – of Officina Stellare.
• Sarah Maddison – from Swinburne Astronomy Online.
• Emil Lenc, Pekka Rautajoki, Jenny Russell and Margaret Turner – students at Swinburne Astronomy Online.
• Olivier Thizy – co-owner of Shelyak Instruments.
• R. Jay GaBany – amazing "amateur" imager and Webmaster and Marketing & Communications person for the Advanced Imaging Conference.
• Juan Conejero – of Pleiades Astrophoto, S.L., the creators of PixInsight.
• Harry Page – the creator of a wonderful set of video tutorials for PixInsight.
• Tom Krajci – citizen scientist and wrench turner for the AAVSO among others.
• Jim Fox – variable star observer and the Committee Chair of the AAVSO Photoelectric Photometry (PEP) Observing Program.
• Neil Fleming – one of the best narrowband imagers in the world.
• George Normandin – an amateur astronomer who has attended NEAF at least 10 times.
• Tom Field – the developer of the RSpec program.

In addition, I visited PlaneWave Instruments and wrote an article based on interviews with several employees of PlaneWave including Rick Hedrick, President, CEO and cofounder; Joe Haberman, Vice President and co-founder; and Allan Keller the systems designer for the CDK700 Observatory Telescope System.

Finally, there is one additional group of people that I need to thank from the bottom of my heart – everyone who ever participated on Share Astronomy. I sincerely thank everyone who became a member, posted an image, created a project or submitted a comment. My wife and I were thrilled every time we would see something new on Share Astronomy!

Since it's inception in July, 2009 until today, Share Astronomy was visited 17,666 times by people from 104 countries and territories. If you were one of the visitors, I hope you enjoyed Share Astronomy and I hope you learned something new along the way. Please rest assured that we did everything we could to make Share Astronomy a success.

Share Astronomy isn't completely going away. It will migrate to a personal blog web site in the near future and I hope some of you will check it out from time-to-time. I also hope that those of you that I met personally will continue to stay in touch.

Best Regards and Clear Skies,

Ken Hudson

The Jet Propulsion Laboratory is currently managing 17 active missions and 9 instruments. The basic format of the tweetup consisted of a series of presentations about current and upcoming missions as well as tours of various facilities at JPL. Specifically, our agenda included:

• Registration and hands-on demos with Bill Allen (design engineer) and Dan Goods (visual strategist). This was really fun. Each table had a spacecraft component or piece of hardware as a centerpiece and your could ask Bill or Dan questions about the item in question. Our table had a parachute support structure for the Mars Curiosity Rover.
• Introduction and Overview by Veronica McGregor (@VeronicaMcG), Stephanie Smith (@Stephist), Courtney O'Connor (@CourtOConnor) and Stephanie Schierholz (@NASA). All four of these women deserve a huge thank you for their tireless work organizing the tweetup. They made the event truly memorable and worthwhile.
• Dawn mission (@NASA_Dawn) by Marc Rayman (chief engineer). The Dawn Mission will visit two asteroids – Vesta and Ceres. In fact, it will be the first spacecraft ever to orbit two solar system bodies. Dawn will help scientists to understand more about the early solar system and how it was formed.
• Voyager mission by Suzy Dodd (project manager). As most of you probably know, both Voyager spacecraft still continue to operate 33 years after their launch. However, you may not know that the Voyager mission continues to make new discoveries. Voyager is currently studying the heliosphere and both spacecraft have enough power to last until 2020 or maybe even 2025.
• Oceans, climate and the upcoming launch of Aquarius by Josh Willis (oceanographer). Yes, you read that right, JPL does employ oceanographers and the Aquarius mission will measure sea surface salinity and provide valuable data help us study climate change.
• Tour #1 – Earth Science Center, JPL museum and 3-D pictures on Mars. This tour was very interesting. At the Earth Science Center we saw a 3-D movie about NASA's missions in orbit around the earth. The JPL museum focused on models of various spacecraft – some large models and some small models. The most impressive was a life size version of the Galileo spacecraft. Finally, we all had 3-D pictures taken on Mars. (Well, not really Mars…)
• Lunch We had the opportunity to pre-order sandwiches prior to our visit. The sandwiches were fine but I think most of us enjoyed the brownies more.
• Group photo. We actually took two group photos. The first was a traditional group photo. The second recreated an image taken by the Mars Exploration Rover Spirit. The image is called the "Everest Pan" and it is a 360 degree panorama made up of 81 separate images. You can see both group photos here (look for the photos titled "NASAJPL Tweetup — Monday, June 6").
• Juno Mission (@NASAJuno) to Jupiter by Steve Levin (project scientist). The Juno mission will launch in August 2011 and arrive at Jupiter in July 2016. Juno's scientific payload includes a number of instruments that will provide information about Jupiter itself and help us understand how solar systems form.
• GAVRT – Goldstone Apple Valley Radio Telescope also by Steve Levin. GAVRT is a partnership between NASA, JPL and The Lewis Center for Educational Research in Apple Valley California. In the 2009-2010 school year 7,089 students ran GAVRT telescopes and collected real, useful radio astronomy data. Those students were from 50 schools in 16 US states, Puerto Rico and 3 foreign countries.
• GRAIL mission by Gene Fahnestock and Amanda Briden (mission engineers). The GRAIL (Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory) mission consists of two spacecraft that are both going to the Moon. Once there, they will be used to provide a gravitational map of the Moon.
• SOFIA mission (@SOFIAtelescope) by Eric Becklin (chief science advisor). SOFIA (Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy) consists of a modified Boeing 747SP plane fitted with a 2.5 meter reflecting telescope. Essentially, it is a flying observatory. The observatory operates from 39,000 ft to 45,000 ft and was designed for a 20 year lifetime. There is an educators section on the plane and so far six teachers have flown on SOFIA.
• Near Earth Objects (@AsteroidWatch) – Don Yeomans (manager). The Near Earth Object Program monitors asteroids with the goal of identifying asteroids that may impact the Earth. At any point in time they have about 150 objects on their web page including several dozen that can't be ruled out for earth impact but at this time there are none that we know will impact our planet.
• Eyes on the Solar System (@NASA_Eyes) – Doug Ellison (visualization producer). This presentation featured two web sites: Eyes on the Earth 3D and Eyes on the Solar System. Both sites are awesome. Eyes on the Solar System is new and is still a beta release so there may be some "issues" but you should really give them both a try.
• Imagine Mars by David Delgado (project lead). This was a very interesting and inspirational presentation on an outreach project in Chicago where a group of students were tasked with imagining life on Mars and how to build a community.
• Tour #2 – Spacecraft Assembly Facility (@MarsCuriosity) / Mars In-Situ Lab / Deep Space Network Mission Control. This tour was just wonderful. Our group went to the Deep Space Network Mission Control first and really this was one of the highlights of the day for me. It was a dream-come-true to see the location – and some of the people – in charge of communicating with the various missions and instruments managed by JPL. The Mars In-Situ Lab was our second stop. It has duplicates of the Mars rovers that can be used to identify problems and test potential solutions as well as duplicate parts for the new Curiosity rover. Finally, we finished with a chance to see the Spacecraft Assembly building where Curiosity is being assembled and tested. I think that was the primary highlight for most people.

I have included some images from the tweetup below. I hope you enjoy them! You can click on any image to see a larger version.

The program portion of the tweetup was held in the von Karmen auditorium. This image shows a portion of the room. The spacecraft in the background in a full-size mockup of the Voyager spacecraft:

As I said above, one of the highlights of the day for me was our visit to the Deep Space Network Mission Control. This is what it looks like:

This building houses the Mars Science Laboratory In-Situ Lab:

This image shows part of the in-situ lab. The objects in the image are duplicates of various components on Curiosity:

This image shows another part of the in-situ lab with duplicate rovers:

This image shows the Spacecraft Assembly Facility for the Mars Curiosity rover. The object in the center of the picture on the blue flooring is the Curiosity rover itself. To the right of Curiosity is the actual spacecraft which will protect the rover. You can find more information on the Mars Science Laboratory here: http://mars.jpl.nasa.gov/msl/

This image shows a close up of the engineers working on Curiosity:

If you are an astronomer ("amateur" or otherwise) interested in using your skills for scientific study this conference has a lot to recommend it:

• The location is wonderful. Big Bear Lake is located in the beautiful mountains of Southern California at an altitude of about 6,750 ft (2,060m). The conference venue was the Northwoods Resort which seemed quite nice to me.
• The conference provides great opportunities to meet interesting people. The conference is small – normally about 100-150 people – and everyone is very accessible. It's easy to spend time with the speakers, vendors and other attendees. Here are a couple examples: on Tuesday morning I had breakfast with Olivier Thizy co-owner of Shelyak Instruments, his son Luc and Richard Berry co-author of "The Handbook of Astronomical Image Processing" as well as numerous other books and on Thursday I had lunch with volunteer astronomer Michael Koop and Peter Jenniskens (SETI Institute) the keynote speaker at Thursday night's dinner and the co-leader of the team that recovered meteorites from asteroid 2008 TC 3.
• The workshops and sessions were uniformly excellent. Some of the presentations were given by amateur or "volunteer" astronomers and some were given by professional astronomers. Clearly, all of the speakers had put a lot of work into their presentations and they all did a tremendous job.

Workshop attendance was separate from the main conference and cost an additional $50 per workshop. I went to both workshops. The first one was titled "Remote/Robotic Observatory Workshop" and was presented by volunteer astronomer Tom Krajci of the Astrokolkhoz Observatory and volunteer astronomer Tom Smith of the Dark Ridge Observatory. I am planning on having my own remote/robotic observatory and this workshop gave me a lot of good ideas along with real-world advice and recommendations. The second workshop was titled "Hands-On Analysis of Eclipsing Binary Light Curves" and was presented by Dirk Terrell who is an astrophysicist at the Southwest Research Institute's Department of Space Studies in Boulder, Colorado. As the title says, this was a hands-on workshop. We used software called PHOEBE which is based on the Wilson-Devinney (WD) code used by most professionals in this field. I had a great time.

The paper presentations (ie sessions) covered a wide range of topics including: ultra-deep imaging, an alternative to the Hubble Palette which would create more realistic images, a new standardized format for reporting asteroid lightcurve data, remote/robotic telescopes, the design of a wide field Cassegrain, a new Sky Brightness Data Archive, the construction of a high resolution Littrow spectrograph for Be star analysis, visual binary star observations as a special project for a mathematics class at Estrella Mountain Community College, research options with point-and-shoot cameras, finding targets of opportunity (ie transient events), determining the proper motion and parallax of Barnard's Star using differential astrometry, using the Silicon Photomultiplier for high speed photometry, using light curves from the Kepler Mission to identify variable stars in the field surrounding EV Lyr, polarimetric observations of Epsilon Aurigae, using the methods available to Tycho in the 16th century to measure the distance to the moon and asteroids as a high school science project, flat field calibrations for the AAVSO Photometric All Sky Survey, an alternative approach for finding and applying extinction-corrected magnitude transformations, amateur exoplanet milestones, radar observations of asteroids, pro/am spectroscopy collaborations and a summary of current and planned operations for the Catalina Sky Survey. You can find and download pdf versions of the proceedings of this year's conference (and prior years) by using this link.

If you are interested in astronomical sciences and you would like the opportunity to meet a lot of interesting people and learn a lot then I would highly recommend adding this conference to your "to do" list in 2012. You won't be sorry.

What functionality is provided by RSpec?
RSpec is a program that allows a beginner or expert to capture and process spectrums of stars and planets. The program makes it easy to convert the rainbow-like smudge of a spectrum to a calibrated, annotated graph. These graphs reveal the composition and other physical properties of the star or planet you're observing. It's really quite exciting to be able to do this easily.

Your logo says "RSpec Real-time Spectroscopy". What do you mean by "real-time spectroscopy"?
Up until now, the process of processing that rainbow-smudge into a graph was something you did in several typical steps. First, you'd attach a simple grating or spectroscope to your telescope. Hoping that it was aligned, you'd take some images with your FITS camera. And then, the next morning, you'd process the images and see what kind of curves you got. That's soooo 20th century!

These days, the hardware and software can do the preliminary processing on bright objects in real-time while you're observing. Imagine being able to see the graph of the spectrum of a star as your FITS or even webcam or video camera capture it. There's no more guessing, "Am I getting a spectrum?" or "Is this over-exposed?" You can see the results in real-time. And for us impatient, 21st century attention-deficit amateurs, that's a big deal. And, the colorful spectra make a great outreach tool!

How did you get interested in spectroscopy? Do you have a science background?
Well, I had done some imaging over the years. Like many of us, visual imaging captured my attention, and offered challenges and excitement in the beginning. But after a few years, it was a matter of diminishing returns. I mean, how many times could I image M42, or some distant galaxy before it got a little too familiar? I was ready for something new!

I was looking for something new to get me excited again about the hobby. And, frankly, I wanted something that was more scientific than qualitative. I enjoy beautiful photos as much as the next guy, but I wanted something more; I wanted data!!

I was trained as an engineer; was considered a "physics jock" in college; and have always loved learning the science behind the stars! Spectroscopy is a natural fit to most amateurs because we love understanding new things about the stars.

What motivated you to write RSpec? How long has it been around?
Several years ago, I purchased an inexpensive diffraction grating that was mounted in a standard 1.25" filter cell. I went out in my backyard one night, mounted it on my C8 and made some video recordings with a cheap webcam. The next morning, when I tried to convert the images to graphs, I was unable to figure out how to do it. I say this very honestly! Here I am, a software developer for more than 15 years, and I couldn't figure out how to make the software that was available actually work! The first problem was that I had to jump through three or four programs to convert the data. No one should have to do that! Then, when I finally started processing my image, the software I was using kept crashing. It was one of those typically frustrating experiences we have all had with computers.

I figured I'd bolt together a small program for myself to do the necessary steps. When I posted it on the web to show off my work to some friends, they got all excited and urged me to take my prototype to the next step – they wanted to use it too!

How does RSpec compare to other spectroscopy programs?
Well, of course I'm a little biased, so I'm not the best person to ask! But, there are a lot of RSpec users who absolutely love the program. The only other software out there that does this kind of thing is a freeware program named VSpec, written by my good friend Valerie Desnoux. It's a great program and a lot of experts use it. But, it's tough to learn, and has been around for many years, which means that it doesn't have the benefit of being developed with the kinds of state-of-the-art software engineering tools that are available these days. And of course, it's not real-time.

I know you were at NEAF for the first time this year. How was the response?
I was expecting to be busy at NEAF. But I wasn't expecting to be so totally swamped as we were at the booth. I had a crowd at the booth almost non-stop for the entire show. There was a lot of interest, which just proved to me what I already had thought: once amateurs know how easy and exciting spectroscopy is, they'll be flocking to it!

Do you think more amateur astronomers are becoming interested in spectroscopy? Why?
I don't have any doubt that we're in the dawn of a new age for astronomical spectroscopy. Frankly, the tools are now available. They're inexpensive and easy to use. What's missing now is that amateurs just don't know what's possible! As the amateur community learns what spectroscopy is all about, and that it's not just for professionals or high-end experts, we'll continue to see more and more "converts!"

What types of spectroscopy projects can amateurs do?
Wow.. the list of possible projects is quite long! The easiest thing is to study stars, classifying them as OBAFGKM. With a simple spectrum, that's easy… but exciting too. You can easily detect the methane gas in the atmosphere's of Uranus or Neptune. You can see the emission lines on M42. One thing that really excites me is to see the emission lines of a Wolf-Rayet star! You can actually see the exposed core of the star where the Carbon by-product of nuclear fission is glowing!

I've seen amateurs with an 8" SCT and a relatively inexpensive camera be able to detect the red-shift of quasar 3C273. No, I'm not kidding. They did this from the suburbs too! Which reminds me: I wanted to mention that compared to most astro-imaging, spectroscopy is relatively immune to light pollution. That's because we're smearing out the light and can just ignore the wavelengths where light pollution is interfering. So unlike astro-imaging, a lot of interesting spectroscopy can be done from suburban locations.

We've seen the AAVSO make some significant contributions to astronomical research. Are there similar opportunities in spectroscopy?
Yes, yes! First of all, spectroscopy dovetails well with variable star observing itself. A spectrum can easily reveal the type of nova or supernova (although SN are a bit too dim for everyday imaging by amateurs). And, there's active pro-am cooperation going on in several areas of research, including the study of Be stars. Some amateurs have been cited in publications, and attend professional conferences to make presentations.

What is the best way for an amateur astronomer to get started in spectroscopy? What skills and equipment are necessary?
It's surprisingly easy to get started in spectroscopy, Ken. All you need is a small grating for about $180 dollars. It screws right into your camera nosepiece. You can use almost any camera you've got, even an unguided DSLR! If you can point your scope at Vega and track it (even poorly like I do!), you're ready to take the first step into spectroscopy!

What is the best way to learn RSpec? Is there somewhere that newbies can ask questions?
Let's face it, most of us don't spend a lot of time reading user manuals. Who's got the time?! With that in mind, we ship RSpec with about twenty-five 3-minute videos that demonstrate real-world use of the software. These videos start at step 1 and make it really easy to get started. In fact, the videos are posted on our web site for anyone to watch.

There's a free, 30-day trial version of the software. People can always email me with questions. And we've got a very active Yahoo group. There are experts and beginners there, all enjoying spectroscopy together. It's a real community and it welcomes newcomers. After all, who amongst us doesn't like to share what we enjoy with others?

What's next for RSpec?
Hmmm… next for RSpec? I'm very lucky to have a very supportive group of users who never cease to amaze me with their good ideas for new features. There are a lot of exciting new features in the pipeline! RSpec is a young program; it's only 18 months old. But like any toddler, it's easy to love, is getting brighter every day, and has a great future ahead of it. (Just ask the proud father … oh … you just did.)

You can find information about RSpec at http://www.rspec-astro.com/

• Herschel digs the dust on galaxies
• Tuning Into ExoPlanet Radio
• Hot jupiter shocks astronomers
• Variable stars under the gaze of STEREO
• Astronomers find 'smoking gun' of compact galaxy formation
• Interacting Sunspots Spawn Gigantic Solar Flare
• School students help astronomers study mysterious X-ray source
• X-ray outburst observed by school children
• Black plants 'could grow' on exoplanets with two suns
• Large galaxies stopped growing 7 billion years ago
• Could Low-Cost Space Missions Keep Astronomy Aiming High
• Pluto has carbon monoxide in its atmosphere
• Was the Merry Monarch's birth heralded by a supernova?
• Hottest Known Planet May Use Shock Wave to Save Atmosphere
• LOFAR-UK at the UK National Astronomy Meeting

• Alan Traino is an amazing guy. In case you haven't heard his name before, Alan is the Chairperson of NEAF. Every year he outdoes himself and this year was no exception. NEAF 2011 had about 140 vendors, probably around 15 speakers and almost 6,000 attendees. NEAF is the largest astronomy expo in the world. Organizing an event of this size can't be easy but Alan makes it look easy. We all owe a big thanks to Alan for a job exceptionally well done.
• The diversity of exhibitors and the wide range of products at NEAF 2011 was amazing. We were able to see:
  
  • A wide range of telescopes including Big Dobs (40"), little Dobs (6"), refractors, newtonians, mak-cassegrains, mak-newts, mass-produced telescopes, wooden hand-crafted telescopes, Ritchey-Chrétiens, Corrected Dall-Kirkhams, solar and Riccardi_Honders.
  • German Equatorial Mounts and Alt/Az mounts from a wide variety of vendors. Just to put it in perspective, we saw an beautifully engineerd Alt/Az mount designed to support 18 pounds and another massive Alt/Az mount capable of supporting a 24" Corrected Dall-Kirkham telescope that weighs 240 pounds.
  • CCD cameras and DSLR cameras.
  • Eyepieces.
  • Scientific instruments ranging from simple and relatively inexpensive diffraction gratings to high resolution spectrographs, low resolution spectrographs and Echelle spectrographs.
  • Dome observatories and clamshell observatories.
  • Meteorites.
  • A wide variety of software designed to: control telescopes, plan observing runs, create sky charts and provide real-time spectroscopy.
  • Laser collimators.
  • Every conceivable astronomy accessory.
  • Magazine and book vendors.
  • A vendor who specializes in vinyl banners, table throws, scope wraps, and very large prints all with astronomical themes.
  • A vendor selling land for an astronomy enclave in New Mexico.
  • And a whole lot more.
• Once again NEAF did a good job of providing activities and exhibits for children of various ages. My favorite was the "Talons! Birds of Prey Experience™". Of course, this exhibit wasn't just for children – adults loved it, too.
• I have spoken to several vendors about NEAF 2011 and all of them were very excited about this year's show. They all indicated that business was very good.
• NEAF 2011 was, once again, a great place to meet some of the "big names" in the amateur astronomy world. Where else could you meet Al Nagler of TeleVue, Vic Maris of Stellarvue, Olivier Thizy from Shelyak Instruments, Steve and Tom Bisque of Software Bisque, David Ho of Hotech, Gino Bucciol from Officina Stellare, Rick Hedrick of PlaneWave and more all in a single day? What great opportunity.

If you haven't been to NEAF before, you really should submit a vacation request tomorrow and start saving your money. You should also plan on attending both days. Why two days? Because it will take you two days to see and do everything. As Alan pointed out to me before the conference, if a person spent 5 minutes at each exhibit it would take her/him more than 11.5 hours just to see all the exhibits. That 11.5 hours wouldn't leave any time to attend workshops, presentations, or the solar star party. In my opinion, one day is better than nothing but two days would be best.

That's it for our NEAF coverage this year. See you at NEAF 2012!

While the Solar Star Party was in full swing outside, the exhibit hall was filled with activity inside. As I mentioned in yesterday's blog posts there are a lot of different types of vendors at NEAF. The following image is good example. This is an 11.5 foot ExploraDome II with an optional bay extension.

The Meteorite Men were extremely popular at NEAF 2010 and just as popular at NEAF 2011. Here's the 109 pound pallasite meteorite which was found by the Meteorite Men at the "secret alpha site".

The PlaneWave booth is always a popular destination at any astronomy show. Why? Well, probably because they have some beautiful large telescopes. This is a 24" CDK (Corrected Dall-Kirkham).

Lance Frederick, owner of Monstar Prints, has a unique business. He provides vinyl banners, table throws, scope wraps, shack wraps and MonSTAR prints for the individual astronomers, clubs and other organizations. You can see some of his MonSTAR prints in the image below:

Exploradome wasn't the only observatory vendor at NEAF. Here's a clamshell observatory from Astro Haven:

Another popular telescope vendor at any show is Officina Stellare. The scope in the picture below is a Riccardi-Honders RH-200.

That's it for today's pictures. However, that's not it for the NEAF 2011 blog posts. When I get back home and have some time I'm planning on writing a summary of my trip to NEAF. Please keep you eyes open for that blog post in a few days. Clear Skies!

The image below shows a Planewave 24" CDK mounted on an Astro-Physics 3600 GTO GEM also known as "El Capitan" at the Astro-Physics booth.

Also at the Astro-Physics booth was a 130 Starfire EDF Gran Turismo telescope on a Mach 1 GTO mount. I'm on the waiting list for one of these telescopes. I think I only have 6 or 7 years left to wait!

As I mentioned in my first blog post from NEAF 2011, NEAF isn't just about telescopes and cameras. Here's a wonderful display of MoonLite focusers. This was only 1 display of 3 at the MoonLite booth.

Here's another new product at this year's NEAF – the new SBig ST-i planetary camera and guider.

At the beginning of this blog post, I showed you a picture of a Celestron 14" EdgeHD telescope but I certainly don't want to leave out Meade. Here's a beautiful Meade 20" Max-ACF SCT.

Shown below is the new Software Bisque Paramount MX mount with an Officina Stellare Pro RC 250 telescope.

Tomorrow we will be back at NEAF 2011 and we will post more pictures. See you then!

In case you're wondering what this year's show looks like, here's a quick view of part of the exhibit hall:

Our first booth stop this year was the Teeter's Telescope booth. This is a 20" f/3.5 scope complete with ServoCat.

Teeter's Telescopes doesn't just make large telescopes. Here's an 8" scope. The rocker box is made from tiger maple and amazingly the wood is all from one tree.

Here are a couple great refractors from Takahashi. The foreground scope is a TOA-130 mounted on an EM-200. The background scope is an FRC-300 mounted on an NJP mount.

Speaking of Takahashi, the new Advanced Temma Hand Controller has been generating a huge amount of interest. Pictured below is Bruce Prager of AstroSolutions, LLC, the designer/developer of the hand controller, with his new "baby". By the way, they are hoping to start shipping in July.

Here is a close-up view of the hand controller itself:

Everyone reading this post is probably familiar with the telescopes from big name vendors like Celestron and Meade but how often do get to see hand-crafted wooden telescopes like this one? This is a 16" scope from Normand Fullum. This scope is made primarily from Zebra wood and Yellow Birch. There's also a bit of jatoba wood, as well.

Normand Fullum makes telescopes in many sizes. Here's a closeup of the wood detail on a 6" scope. Amazingly beautiful, isn't it?

Before I came to NEAF this year, one of the things I was looking forward to seeing the most were the Intes Micro telescopes sold by Astronomics. Guess what? I got to see a whole table full of them:

So far, I haven't seen a lot of new products at NEAF 2011. However, QSI has not let me down. First, they have introduced a new line of cameras – the 600 series with all new electronics and better cooling. Second, they have a new 8 position filter wheel which is shown below (the filter wheel itself is shown on the right with the cover on the left.)

At NEAF, it's not all about telescopes, eyepieces and cameras. There's also software. Here's a picture of Tom Field at the RSpec booth giving a talk about RSpec's capabilities.

Speaking of Spectroscopy here's a picture of Olivier Thizy of Shelyak Instruments. Shelyak markets a whole line of spectrographs. The spectrograph in Olvier's hands is the new Lisa.

Well, that's it for now. I need to go back to the exhibit hall and take more pictures. I'll post them as soon as I can!