Planetary Nebula

I have always been fascinated with the night sky. My name is Dave Aucoin and as a young astronomer, just looking at the planets was fun. As the years went by and my interest grew, the planets seemed old hat. Soon as my aperature grew, so did my challenges. I went from Bright nebula, to Globular and Open clusters, to bright Planetary nebula, then to fainter objects like faint nebula and finally obscure planetary nebula. Now everybody can observe the brighter deepsky objects or DSO's, I found the brighter DSO's to be too easy, no real challenge. I then came upon faint and obscure planetary nebula in an article in 1986 issue of Deepsky magazine. Written by Jack Marling, aka Mr Lumicon, I found his article intriguing. He explained how surface brightness was proportional to an objects size in arcseconds. This got me started in the right direction.and soon, I was huinting down faint obscure PNe. But I had only a meager 6 inch SCT. I was able to upgrade to a 10" Dob, but this didnt really increase my magnitude threshold by much. Then I happened upon the purchase of a 13" Dob from Coulter.This opened new doors and better magnitude thresholds.

After a few years, lack of interest in astronomy derailed my desire to observe and sold all my equipment. A few years ago, I got back into astronomy full bore. I purchased my old Coulter from a friend, re-built the scope into something more portable and started on my quest of the faint and obscure fuzzies. Since then, I have observed about 200 obscure planetaries. I have halfway completed the Abell planetary nebula catalog. My goals now are to observe the entire SEC catalog (Strasbourg ESO Catalog) of which I have observed the aforementioned 200, and observe all of the galactic planetary nebula I can find, all with the aid of my 13" scope. I am a regular contributor to the Planetary Nebula Yahoo Group, and enjoy cooresponding with people like Steve Coe, Kent Wallace, Brian Skiff, Eric Honeycutt and Jay McNeil. All are seasoned observers.in this field.

I take this opportunity to place on the internet an observing guide and catalog of observed obscure planetary nebula and my newest obsession of finding and observing Proto-Planetaries. On the following pages, I hope you will find valuable information and hints and suggestions of finding and observing these DSO's with a medium sized telescope between the aperatures of12.5 " and 16". Surprisingly, with 13" of aperature, I have been startled by the limits I can push my scope, myself and my observing sky site. You too can obtain these results with great accuracy if you just push yourself and your equipment as far as it can go. You will be amazed, just as I have, of the remarkable amount of DSO's, in this case Planetary nebula, you can find.

A few notes to take into consideration when observing obscure planetary nebula:

• Photgraphic (p) magnitudes printed in catalogs or databases are not visual magnitudes. Film emulsion is typically red sensitive and the human eye is green or blue sensitive. You can obtain a good 1.5 to 2 magnitude gain when looking for the object in your field of view.

• Try to observe using coordinates from the SEC Catalog. In addition to its information, it also lists surface brightness which is a useful tool when observing faint and obscure PNe. Again, just because an object is faint, its smaller size may make it brighter.

• Always remember, a not finding the object at the coordinates listed is not a failed observation. If you push your scope, your observing conditions and yourself to its limits, you will not have failed. It might take another night or another scope to see the object, but it is there, waiting for you to find it.

• With new technologies, equipment and accesories, limiting magnitudes are much fainter than previously thought. As with my 13" Dob, I can see as faint as magnitude 16 on crisp clear nights. Check this page out and enter your own info and see what I mean. (You must have MS Office 97 or better to use this page)

• When you plan on a night of observing and when you go out to observe, have a positive attitude. Strive for whats on your list. It may take you a little while to bag those DSO's, but you will with determination. Even on not so good nights, practice your starhopping, it really helps out. If you have Digital Setting Circles, you need not worry about this step.