Bishan park sidewalk astronomy session 27/04/2012

[Davegn]

Hi,

Weather permitting,
We intend to have a bishan park sidewalk astronomy session tonight 27/04/2012 after 8pm onwards.

Venue: River Plains Bishan Park --> viewtopic.php?f=5&t=10766

All are welcomed with or without scopes!
Do bring your family and friends along.

Will be posting more updates on my twitter page, facebook and here.

[Gary]

Hi Dave and friends. I will be at Bishan Park 2 around 8 pm with my 5-inch MCT scope and binoviewer. I will be at McDonalds there doing some sidewalk first, then maybe join Dave and friends at the usual obsite across the bridge.

[jo3f]

I would like to join but i'm still stuck at office
Until what time normally u guys stargazing?

[Davegn]

I would be here till. Very late. Hmmmm. Weather is good. I would be here until the 1st bus.

[ggodetucsamoht]

how is the obs getting on there? so far so good?

[Davegn]

Yupz. We are still viewing.
Btw. We are at outside mac.

[jo3f]

Hi Dave, I think I'm not going today. Will check for the next session.

[Airconvent]

Finally met Gary and the gang when I dropped by last night. Quite a good catchment for outreach because there is a steady stream of young and curious passersby without the huge crowd that would overwhelm the queues. And it was a great night too as the outreach favourites Saturn and Mars were in full view. Wished there was a goto there with a big aperture so that we do not need to keep on adjusting for at high magnification but gary seem to enjoy it...haha.
The venue is ok except distance to car park is a little far. Thanks for the invitation!

ps and apologies to Sam Lee for missing his inaugural launch of the Observatory at Galaxy CC last night. Bishan was nearer and on my way home from work last night and I am sure this is just the first of many countless sessions Sam will organise there, so can still join in in the future.

[Gary]

Thanks to Dave and Ben for hosting this overnight event!

Glad Fizzy can make it too and bringing his ST80 to support the event. With 4 commercially mass produced non-premium scopes deployed on az mounts, the public was entertained with decent views of Moon, Mars, Saturn, Sirius, Jewel Box. When asked about the pricing of the scopes, they were pleasantly shocked they were reasonably affordable and some mentioned they would actually seriously consider getting into the hobby. A few commented they assume the rings of Saturn could only be seen in observatory class telescopes.

One group of friends enjoying the view session so much that one of them joked that they should forget their original purpose of their gathering -- a house visit to a friend staying nearby.

One gentleman liked what he saw and quickly grabbed his friend sitting in McD who was interested in astronomy and was considering getting a telescope from Toy 'R' Us. Gave them some quick tips on how to decide what get telescope to get and like everyone else, encouraged them to visit singastro for more info.

Managed to poison a few to binoviews of Moon and Saturn. Dave and Ben, since your eyes can merge the images as one without any issues, welcome to the non-expensive eyes club!

Earlier in the evening, saw a Park Officer near the bridge looking at our direction from a distance. I took the opportunity to walk up to him and explain what we were doing, started some small talk and invited him to take a look at our scopes when he is off-duty. As expected, he had no issues with our sidewalk session there.

The open area in front of McD turns out to be a good sidewalk location -- facing its main door directly but without obstructing any traffic at all. The stepped slope design is very useful too. It can be used as seats for observing, thus lessening the load further for sidewalkers without the need to carry field chairs. Az mount tripods can be retracted all the way for stability and still offer a comfortable standing position for observers. The reverse could be done to allow kids to view comfortable by shifting the setup slightly without the need to constantly adjust tripod leg height to suit different observers height.

Other plus points include close proximity to food and drinks, restrooms and the shelter roof of McD in the event of a sudden rain.

On the negative side, it is brighter than the usual ob spot, further away from car park and potential "contamination" of optics from the McD's fried oil emissions in the air. May give new meaning to oil space objective. LOL

Seeing was good, perhaps 7/10. Tried Dave's 6mm on the Mak but the 250x view was not as sharp and focused as the previous overnight session at Bishan. But the general public are not so discerning and everything look sharp to them when observing at 150x. Most of them are too shell shocked after seeing Saturn for the first time to really bother about other stuff. The craters on the Moon really put on a great show and some keep asking to push the magnification higher and higher. I suspect they are trying to find the American flag. LOL.

Also had plenty of fun showing the crowd the horoscope related constellations in the sky with a green laser pointer. Some Cancer-born people were disappointed their constellation looked kind of boring in the sky. Most amateur astronomer are not into astrology. But for educating *and* entertaining the public in sidewalk session about constellations (not astrology), it may be useful to know and show the order of the zodiac signs in the horoscope to create related astronomical awareness like the ecliptic, some constellations bearing close resemblance to the animal it symbolises (e.g scorpius) and the difference in size of the zodiacal signs in the sky.

An interesting activity to engage the public is to make them realise the difference between seeing and observing. For example, after showing Jewel Box to them, most of them just notice it as a bunch of stars in a "A" shape formation after a few seconds of seeing and assume that is all to it. I would then ask them to see if they notice the different coloured stars in the cluster. They do and spend more seconds looking at it and now they are truly observing.

After midnight, fizzy and I had fun showing Dave and Ben how to find interesting objects in saggi, scorpius and the summer triangle in their own telescope - M5, M6, M22, NGC6231, Albeiro, Double Double, M8. Comparing the star cluster views in the refractors and my Mak, again there is no doubt there is this extra pin-point contrasty edge of the refractors over the Mak. The difference is very small but nonetheless observable. Perhaps the numerous nights spent under clear skies in Johor comparing my C8 with the 5" refractor makes it even more obvious to my eyes now. Especially the night in Johor just 48 hours before this sidewalk session.

We tried to find faint fuzzies (in sg sky context) like M4, M22, Ring Nebula. I was quite impress they can still be seen in Dave's 4" Omni XLT at 41x with a 24mm EP even though some of them are very faint, mainly due to the haze and light pollution in the sky. For example, ring nebula can still be faintly seen even though the 2 bright stars sandwiching it is barely visible in the sky with naked eyes. As it was way past midnight after a tiring sidewalk session and being new to observing faint DSOs, Dave and Ben most probably had a tough time observing them through the scope by then.

We were too busy with crowd most of time and did not bother to take much photos or group shot.

@Airconvent: The stars and planets aligned and finally managed to meet you! Thanks for dropping by and sharing your knowledge with the participants of the session.

I agree with you it is nice to have a steady stream of observers and not overwhelming large queues and crowd. More time to take short breaks and interact with fellow astronomers or just enjoy the park view. But once in a while, it is also nice to see such big queues which is a reminder to us that given a chance, most people are indeed curious about the cosmos and thus willing to queue and take a peek. And not that the majority of the public is totally disinterested in astronomy at all. And it creates good photo/video taking opportunities as a bonus. These photos and videos may be important in our fight for creating more awareness of light pollution and the preservation of our night skies in the future.

Do consider joining us again with your GOTO scope so the public have a chance to learn about the technological advances in amateur astronomy. I suspect I may eventually get tired of explaining why objects are "moving" through my scopes. Haha.

@JP and Sam: Sorry couldn't make it for the Galaxy CC ob session. Waited for more than a year, what is one more week? You guys are doing a fantastic job. The people staying in the north are so fortunate!