Note the Delay of one week for the meeting. It was not on the 9th.
Topic: Introduction to Astrophotography
Speaker: Blair MacDonald
When: Saturday June 16, 7pm
Location: Avonport, 475 Bluff Road
Blair spoke to Minas Astronomy Group 8 years ago, and has kindly
offered to do so again. He is an accomplished photographer of the
night sky, and has published many articles on the topic. He is a
veteran of countless hours spent in the cold and dark capturing
sparse streams of photons from distant galaxies, and more hours at a
computer screen processing the images. Blair is a very active member
of the RASC Halifax Centre, including chairing the Nova East Star
Party again this year (at Smiley’s Provincial Park, August 17 – 19).
Blair is bringing his telescope and camera equipment to demonstrate
it, and hopefully to do some astrophotography after his talk (once
the sky darkens toward 10 p.m.). Bring your camera to receive
pointers from Blair, and possibly to take some photos “piggy back”
using Blair’s telescope mount.
The weekend gathering of amateur astronomers of the Maritimes will take place this year in Smiley’s Provincial Park.
Details are available on the Nova East Website
http://halifax.rasc.ca/ne
When : 12 May 2012
Where : Avonport, 475 Bluff Road
Topic: The 2012 Transit of Venus (5 June)
Speaker: Roy Bishop
A transit of Venus has been arranged for us, only 24 days after our
meeting this Saturday. The next transit after that is scheduled for
2117 December 11. I will describe the historical significance of such
an event, why it happens so rarely, how boring a transit must be to
those who know nothing about it, how inaccessible the transit will be
to those who are not prepared to see it, and how to see it. Also, if
anyone knows how to arrange a clear sky for the day of the transit,
let me know. – Roy
Roy and Larry will give presentations.
Roy has some photos, including several from our speaker of last September, Dr. Jose Francisco Salgado who visited the South Pole a few weeks after he spoke at our meeting.
Larry will present recent new astronomy i) Testing Relativity by counting galaxies ii) Citizen Science: finding star formation regions in the Milky Way iii) Dark matter clumping in a galaxy cluster.
Spacetime coordinates:
t = 2012 April 14 19:00 AST
R = Avonport, 475 Bluff Road
CANCELLED – Saturday 11 February – due to snow storm
New Date: Saturday 18 February, 7pm
Avonport, 475 Bluff Road
( If unsure of the location, email me RLB@eastlink.ca and I will reply with detailed directions. – If the parking lot is full when you arrive, parking is also available off-pavement directly in front of 475 Bluff Road, and in the driveway next door (my home) at 465 Bluff Road.)
Castle Frederick
Speakers: Jim Bremner and Roy Bishop
Few people know where Castle Frederick is located, and fewer still know its history or how it got its curious name. The area was settled over 300 years ago by the French Acadians, and following the Seven Years War was resettled 250 years ago by Europeans and New England Planters. During the decade 1763-1773 its most famous resident, J.F.W. DesBarres carried out the greatest survey of the coasts of Nova Scotia ever done up until that time. DesBarres named his estate Castle Frederick, erected an astronomical observatory there, and during the winters prepared hydrographic charts that he eventually incorporated into the most elaborate marine atlas ever published, the “Atlantic Neptune”.
– Jim Bremner, a descendant of J.F.W. DesBarres and a lifetime resident of Castle Frederick, will describe the early history of Castle Frederick and its central location on the route from Halifax to the Annapolis Valley.
– Roy Bishop, a descendant of New England Planters, will give a sketch of DesBarres’ life, his observatory, and his monumental publication, the Atlantic Neptune.
We will meet at 7 pm in the meeting house at 475 Bluff Road in Avonport (Not at Acadia U.)
Starry Nights and Mountain Bikes? A Dark-Sky Preserve Party at Jasper National Park
by Mary Lou Whitehorne – President of the RASC
Summmary: At the invitation (and expense) of Tourism Jasper, I traveled to Jasper National Park to participate in the Park’s Dark Sky Media and VIP declaration celebration on 1 October, 2011. This 40-minute talk gives an account of the event, including aboriginal participation and sky lore, and a brief overview of the RASC’s dark-sky preserve program and its successful and growing partnership with Parks Canada. My presentation will wrap up with a quick look at Jasper National Park’s dark-sky sites, and a short detour into other interesting Park locations.
(Refreshments and conversation following)
(RASC = Royal Astronomical Society of Canada)
7 pm
Topic: “Interplanetary Missiles and Sources of Water plus Gigantic Lenses for imaging Very Distant Objects” by Larry Bogan
– Interplanetary Missile (Asteroid 2005 YU55)
– Celestial Water for Earth (Measuring water isotopes on Comet Hartley 2)
– CLASH (A program to study gravitational imaging of distant galaxies)
– Imaging a black hole (Gravitational image of a black hole disk)
New Location: Next door (east side) to Roy Bishop’s home. If you need more detailed directions:
– Wolfville and westward: From Highway 101 take exit 9 past the double bridge at the Gaspereau River. At the stop sign, turn left, and then take the next left across the 101 overpass. Go 180 degrees on the round-about and continue past the L.E. Shaw school. Immediately past the school, at the church, turn right and continue a further 2.4 km (during which you will cross a railway twice). On the left side you will encounter a wood fence backed by pine trees. The meeting location is immediately past the fence, on the left (#475).
– From Halifax, the shorter route is to take exit 8 into Hantsport, go through Hantsport on Main Street and continue straight through Hants Border and onto the Bluff Road to Avonport, turning right into the driveway immediately before the wood fence and pine trees.
OR: Take Avonport exit 9, go 90 degrees on the round-about, etc. (as above, for members coming from Wolfville).<
Saturday, September 10, 7 p.m. at Acadia University, Huggins Science Hall, Room 202
Special Speaker:
Dr. José Francisco Salgado
Title: Communicating Science through Art and Technology
José Francisco Salgado is an astronomer and visual artist at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago and Executive Director of KV 265, a non-profit organization whose mission is the communication of science through art. Formally trained in Physics (BS, Univ. of Puerto Rico) and Astronomy (PhD, Univ. of Michigan), he uses his skills in astronomy, education, and visual arts to create multimedia works that communicate science in engaging ways and provoke curiosity and a sense of wonder about the Earth and the Universe. His education and outreach efforts include an Emmy-nominated astronomy TV news segment and critically-acclaimed astronomy films (Gustav Holst’s The Planets and Astronomical Pictures at an Exhibition) created to accompany live performances of classical music works. These films were featured in the opening ceremony of the International Year of Astronomy (IYA2009) at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris and were shown around the world as part of IYA2009 festivities.. He has presented these films in more than 55 concerts, spanning 13 countries, and reaching a combined audience totaling more than 135,000. Salgado, an avid photographer, will talk about these films and how he experiments with photography and music to enhance his multimedia works. He will show excerpts of these works and explain the concept behind his new “science and symphony” film about the Moon. Dr. Salgado is in Nova Scotia for the next few days to film the tides of Fundy.
(Huggins is the second building on the right as one goes up University Avenue (opposite the gymnasium). Enter by the corner door to the right of the main entrance. Once inside, enter the stairwell on your immediate right and go up one floor. Then keep right!)