Observing Log for Mike Durkin


10/31/2026-11/1/26 about 9:00PM-1:30AM
Locust Valley, NY
Transparency: 7/10, Seeing ??/5
Temperature: 40-55 degrees
Equipment: Seestar S50

I recently applied the firmware update on the Seestar that added photometry.
I first was going to try to take photometry measures of AB And, but after I started to take measurements I realized I miscalculated the time to start, so I had to give up on that.
After that I tried to measure QX And, which had better timing, although the change in total magnitude is projected to be just about 0.3.
Around midnight or so however, the sky seemed to be a bit more hazy with thin clouds.
I also noticed that the field of view was drifting in the Seestar. I don't know if the less than perfect tracking is normal or was there something I did wrong. I would also say the the crude light curve that I saw in the Seestar iPhone app did not look as nice as I was hoping. I think it fluctuated about 0.1-0.2 magnitudes netween data points.


10/25/2026 about 7:30PM-9:30PM
Locust Valley, NY
Transparency: 9/10, Seeing 3/5
Temperature: 50-60 degrees
Equipment: Hutech modified Canon T3i

DSLR photometry of P Cyg, CH Cyg, and AG Peg.
CH Cyg looked pretty red in the display screen, so I think there is a good chance I'll have to reject it. It has been a long time since I took a measurement of AG Peg, so I'm not sure how well that will go either.


10/3-4/2026 about 8:30PM-3:00AM
Locust Valley, NY
Transparency: 9/10, Seeing 3/5
Temperature: 50-65 degrees
Equipment: Hutech modified Canon T3i and Seestar S50

DSLR photometry of P Cyg and CH Cyg. One problem though is that for CH Cyg, the focal length ring must have slipped a little, just enough for the brightest chech star to saturate some pixels.
Then I used the Seestar S50 to image the galaxy M74 for 122 minutes.

M74
10/3-4/2026 about 8:30PM-3:00AM
Long Island, NY
Transparency: 9/10, Seeing 3/5
Temperature: 50-65 degrees
Equipment: Seestar S50
Exposure: 732 x 10s (122 minutes)
Processed with Siril




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