I couldn't make it over to any of the "better" observing sites in Virginia last night, but the skies were great here in Rockville, so about 1130pm I rolled the 18" out onto the driveway, set it up, and got down to business.
Here's what I viewed. NGT-18 f=2230mm
M16 using the 20mm and the OIII was able to catch the eagle in the nebula fleetingly. The nebulocity was very clear.
M17 was easily visible using only the Skyglow filter, M8 was absolutely stunning even looking into the skyglow of DC.
Lesson here: OIII works best when powered by aperture. Never got much out of the OIII experience from the C8.
At Zenith
NGC 6811 (Hole in a Cluster) - Medium sized cluster with a notable lack of stars in the central region. Easy target at mag 6.8
NGC 6819 Open cluster (fox head) counted easily 25 stars in the 5x5 cluster. Viewed using 9.8mm eyepiece. Easy target. Mag 7+
NGC 6791 16x16 arc min. Looks like it contains 16 or 17 stars. Difficult to distinguish from background. 9th mag object.
NGC 6866 using 9.8mm ep. I counted around 50 stars in the 7x7 field. Pretty object.
IC4996 In the 35mm panoptic, the field containing this object is just great. IC 4996 stands out looking like a crisp little fuzzy. It looks a bit like a galaxy viewed on edge, and that's what I thought it was when I first saw it. I used the 9.8 ep to resolve it's stars. At that magnification it looked a lot less like a galaxy, and the stars were much better resolved. I included a tight finder for it. I was viewing stars in the object easily at 13th magnitude. Maybe deeper. A chart for IC 4996 is shown immediately below.
Couple things about magnitude here. Although the scope is capable of greater depth, my eyes probably are not. My site is loaded with light, and I am usually not very dark adapted. I figure I loose at least 2 magnitudes from what is possible.
NC 6888 Crescent Nebula. Using 0III saw the bright nebula. This was a real treat. The object looks a lot like a planetary. It is circular in nature like a planetary. Involves 4 relatively bright stars. This was my final object of the evening.
All in all, I was very very pleased with the catch.
Wrapped up about 2:30am
