I have eclipse good news and bad news from our site at Columbia, MO.  The bad news is it was cloudy Monday morning during the initial partial eclipse portion.  The good news is it cleared up for the afternoon eclipse portion. 
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The total eclipse was definitely visible, though we still had some light clouds.  Even so, I was amazed when I took off my solar glasses during the total eclipse portion and looked up.  I didn't really know what I expected I could see, but it was better than anything I imagined! The Sun appeared as a dark disk, and I could clearly see the corona extending out from its surface - much further out that I thought it would be.  And it was easily visible to the naked eye! 
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I used my Remote Video Astronomy setup with the laptop inside our camper connected to the DS2.3+ on my PST outside. This allowed the laptop to stay cool (and humans too) while capturing images of the eclipse.

Because of the morning clouds, we couldn't see very well visually through the solar glasses prior to totality, but could at least see the telescope camera image of the progression of the eclipse on the outside display. 
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It cleared up nicely in the afternoon allowing me to capture some good partial eclipse images. We used the solar glasses outside for direct viewing of the Sun during the partial eclipse time.  I would periodically go inside and capture a short exposure showing the Sun’s surface and a longer exposure showing prominences extending from the surface.  These details were also clearly visible on the outside monitor. Below are a couple composite images where I combined a long and short exposure to see both the Sun’s surface and prominences in one image.  
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You can see the rotation of the camera image over time due to my use of an Alt-Az mount.
Here are a series of image captures (no post processing) showing the progression of the partial eclipse after totality (when we had clear skies).
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I recorded a time lapse video during totality using my best guess pre-set exposure. It turned out it was fine for seeing prominences near the surface just after totality, but the exposure setting was not enough to capture corona effects during totality … and I was busy looking up directly with my eyes during totality rather than adjusting the camera settings.  Looking directly at the Sun and seeing the corona around it was very captivating! ​

Here is a link to my time lapse recording that does give a feel of the total eclipse event. It also conveys the dramatic difference between the partial eclipse portion and the total eclipse portion.  Not to sound trite, but it is literally a night and day difference.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zzm6GRg-S84

It was during the dark portion of this time lapse video clip that we were able to look up directly at the Sun and see the corona extending out from it. Since I did not capture any images during totality, Thom Pfeil has allowed me to post the following image he captured, which is an excellent reminder of what we saw as we looked up that day...
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​In spite of the initial morning cloudy skies, the trip was well worth it. I'll never forget what I saw as I looked up during totality, and I enjoyed experiencing the images from the DS2.3+ both in real time and later as captured images.​
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So, in seven years I’ll be ready to apply what I learned and do this all over again.  Who knows what advances we will see in video astronomy in seven years!

​I then dropped the exposure time to 10 seconds and turned on real time stacking of 3 frames.  Thus the stacked image represents 3x10=30 seconds of information.  Since it is stacking three frames in real time, it updates the screen every 10 seconds using the last three 10 second images. The above 30 second exposure is smoother, while the stacked image below highlights some of the details.  This is the only time I used stacking during this viewing session. 

Video Astronomy fills the area between visual observing through an eyepiece and impressive images produced by Astrophotography.  Each of these three areas are important, and each fulfill the needs of Amateur Astronomers in different ways.  To me, Video Astronomy extends the visual observing experience to a new level allowing you to see things from your backyard well beyond what you can see through an eyepiece. It is different from Astrophotography since you are not trying to produce picture perfect images – you are simply looking to see what you can see.  You can experience the thrill of finding and seeing several galaxies, clusters and other deep sky objects in a single evening.   
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 In November 2015 I had my MallinCam Xtreme (X2) upgraded with a new XT828 sensor in a sealed CCD chamber containing Argon gas plus other additions that effectively converted it to an MC Xterminator.   Recently I had the new electronics and Aerogel Insulation added like is in the Xterminator-II.  The Aerogel simplifies setup since it eliminates the need to use cooling fans. The first upgrade which added the XT828 sensor greatly increased the sensitivity, and the latest upgrade increased it even more.   What this all means is you can see Deep Sky Objects from your light polluted back yard using the shortest exposures for real time video observing than with any other camera. 

I typically use 3-15 sec exposure update intervals (and occasionally 20-30 seconds) with no filter. I use the Miloslick Mallincam Control application to control the camera settings, perform real time processing adjustments and view the image on my laptop.  All images shown here are screen captures with no further post processing or touch up.  My laptop has a really good LCD screen and displays the live images well, but the web images will give you a good feel of what a viewing session can be like.  

​I had my first chance to use my XT-828-II with the recent electronics and Aerogel upgrade a couple of nights ago.  I was using my Celestron 8" on a CG-5 mount with a MFR-5 on my XT-828-II.  I used one 5mm spacer in the middle of the MFR-5 which makes this a F/4.1 setup.  I was eager to try out a target with stars to see how the new electronics affected them, so I chose M103.  Its Visual Magnitude is 7.4 and it is 7200 light years away.  The stars definitely are a more natural round shape. I left the APC H&V set to 0.  This image of M103 was at 3 seconds. 
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Last night I had fun looking at a lot of Deep Sky Objects - 18 objects in about a 2.5 hour viewing session. The temperature was around 68 degrees and the sky quality meter showed 19.04 at the beginning and got a little better to 19.45 at the end. This is in my backyard with streetlights in the neighborhood and a city to the South. These are not dark skies! 
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I started with the Orion Nebula, M42, at 3 seconds.  Its Visual Magnitude is 4.0 and it is 1400 light years away.
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Even at this low setting, the core was fairly bright. With the new electronics, some of the brighter stars have a slightly darker center, but that does not bother me at all, and I like seeing the much more natural look of the rounder stars.  Even with the core being so bright, this effect allows you to see the Trapezium stars within the core.
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I then tried the nearby Flame Nebula, NCG 2024, at 10 seconds.  Its Visual Magnitude is 10.0 and it is 820 light years away.
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Can you see the two “death rays” coming out of the Flame at the lower left?  My telescope was pointed to the South over the city, so I surmised they may be lasers pointed at the sky. This is the first time I have ever seen this.  I came back to the Flame an hour later and observed the two “rays” in the same position relative to the Flame, even though it was now lower in the sky, so they are tracking with the Earth’s rotation.  Perhaps they are lasers being used for astronomy purposes.
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Here is M1, the Crab Nebula, at 5 second updates using 3 stacked frames. Its Visual Magnitude is 8.39 and it is 6200 light years away.
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Below is M100 using 6 second updates stacking 4 frames. Its Visual Magnitude is 9.31 and it is 52 Million light years away.
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Here I saw M108 using 10 second updates stacking 4 frames. Its Visual Magnitude is 10.03 and it is 32 Million light years away.
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Next up was an open cluster, M37, at 5 second update intervals.  Its Visual Magnitude is 5.59 and it is 4500 light years away.
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At the lower center of the next image is a spiral galaxy, M61, at 10 second exposure.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.63 and it is 40 Million light years away.
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Here is a galaxy, M60, at 15 second exposure & averaging 6 frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 8.81 and it is 56 Million light years away. Its faint companion is NGC 4647 at Magnitude 10.93. There is also a galaxy at the upper right, NGC 4667, at Magnitude 11.11.
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Here is another spiral galaxy, M66.  I used 10 second exposure updates.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.00 and it is 37 Million light years away.
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I like using the SkySafari Ap to pick a target on my iPhone and slew my telescope to it.  I noticed that M65 was nearby in the sky and used SkySafari to slew from M66 to M65.   Here is M65, at 10 second updates with 3 stacked frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.22 and it is 42 Million light years away.
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I decided it was time to move my viewing session inside, so I ran a USB extension cable from the telescope through the garage into my living room. I also moved my MS Surface laptop from outside to inside and used its Windows 10 Project function to view my targets on my 55” TV.  I continued to control the camera on the telescope from the Laptop over the USB extension cable and slew the mount from my iPhone while inside.
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Next up was M88, Visual Magnitude 9.51 and 36 Million light years away.  These are 8 second updates using 4 stacked frames.
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Here is another spiral galaxy, M90, at 15 second updates with 2 stacked frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.46 and it is 39 Million light years away.
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Here is an interesting shaped spiral galaxy, M95, at 15 second updates with 3 averaged frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.77 and it is 32 Million light years away.
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Nearby in the night sky is M96, also at 15 second updates with 3 averaged frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.22 and it is 32 Million light years away.
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The lower elliptical galaxy in the image below is M105.  I used 15 second updates averaging 3 frames. Its Visual Magnitude is 9.27 and is 37 Million light years away. You can also see NGC 3371 up and to the center, which is 31 Million light years out.  Faintly near the top is NGC 3373 at 12.03 magnitude and 63 Million light years away.
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M97 is a fun Planetary Nebula, called the Owl Nebula. It is at 10 second updates with 5 averaged frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 9.8 and it is 1700 light years away.
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Back to spiral galaxies we see M98, at 10 second updates with 3 averaged frames.  Its Visual Magnitude is 10.01 and it is 41 Million light years away.
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Last but not least, a little further over is M99, the Coma Pinwheel Galaxy. I used 10 second updates averaging 5 frames. Its Visual Magnitude is 9.82 and it is 42 Million light years away.
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So there you have it, 18 Deep Sky Objects in a 2.5 hour Video Astronomy viewing session, including the time taken in the middle to move from outside to inside.
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​There are many reasons why people get interested in Astronomy.  The Universe is an amazing place.  The vastness of our cosmos can be hard to fathom though.  Chapter two of NightWatch by Terence Dickinson takes you through 11 steps to help visualize this.  Each drawing represents a cubic volume of space a million times larger than the one before, beginning with Earth, moving out through the solar system and our Galaxy, taking in more and more Galaxies until you expand beyond our known Universe. Currently Hubble reveals an estimated 100 billion galaxies in the Universe, but this number is likely to increase as telescope technology in space continues to improve.
 
Whenever you point your telescope skyward into the Heavens, you are actually looking back in time.  Your telescope becomes a visual time machine where you look into a time in the past, depending upon how far away the object is you are viewing.  Our nearest star is Alpha Centauri, and yet it takes 4.7 years for its light to reach us.  And this is the nearest star! What we see when we point our telescope at Alpha Centauri is how it looked 4.7 years ago.

​Several years back the Hubble telescope was pointed to a very small region of the sky (about the size of a grain of salt held at arm’s length) in the constellation Ursa Major.  This area is so small that only a few stars in our own Milky Way galaxy lie within it.  Thus almost all the 3,000 objects in the image are galaxies outside ours. Later this was repeated in a small region of the constellation Fornax, producing the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field image containing an estimated 10,000 galaxies.

Being able to exploring the vastness of space, whether it is from a telescope placed in orbit, or from your own backyard, is one of the attractions of Astronomy.  Then there is the thrill of viewing deep sky objects that are visually stunning.  The Orion Nebula is an easy object to see through your backyard telescope, and using video astronomy enables you to see it in even more color and detail.  Here is an image capture of my live view of how the Orion Nebula (M42) looked 1,350 years ago. 

​These are just a couple of the reasons people become fascinated with Astronomy.  As an Orthodox Christian, my interest is primarily to learn more about God’s creation.  Many areas of Science have been explored by those who wanted to do likewise, to learn how God put this great Universe together, how the laws of physics work, what are the processes at work.  No, you do not have to be a believer in God to appreciate all this.  But if you are, it expands your appreciation, not just of the Universe, but of our Creator who designed all of this.