Cosgrove’s Cosmos Metablog Update #11!
July 24 2023
Hi Folks,
I thought it was time to share an update on what has been happening with Cosgrove's Cosmos since the last Metablog post
Table of Contents Show (Click on lines to navigate)
Cosgrove’s Cosmos is Now Two Years Old!
I can’t believe two years have passed since I launched the Website!
Since then, I have created hundreds of new posts and increased the number of imaging projects completed to 125!
I personally have enjoyed creating and working on the website. It gives me control of what I share and how I share it. And it has given me the opportunity to interact with many members of the global astrophotography community that I might not have otherwise.
At his point:
We have visitors from every country or geopolitical entity on the globe
During the last Metablog, I reported that we averaged 150 visitors a day - I am glad to report that this is now over 200!
Most of our visitors come direct (via saved bookmark or direct URL) or through organic search!
There are now almost 100 search terms where Cosgrove’s Cosmos will show up in the first 5 items returned by Google search.
I looked at the performance of the website during its first year and compared it to the second:
Year #of Visits #of Page Views #of Unique Vistors
1 14K 31K 14K
2 60K 76K 41K
Total 74K 107K 55K
For such a niche subject area, I am surprised at both the absolute numbers and the year-on-year growth!
At any rate, I will keep on doing what feels right to me, and hopefully, the website will continue to be seen as a resource to those learning astrophotography.
Again, I have to thank everyone for their support as I continue my Astrophotographic Journey!
New Images Since the Last MetaBlog
2023 has not been the most productive year when it comes to astrophotography!
The weather has continued to be an issue. Then, recovery from my surgery placed physical constraints on me. And now it seems huge portions of Canada are ablaze, and the smoke has shut down the skies!
But I did have two nights where I could catch some photons! Even these were impacted by the smoke! But here are the newly captured imaging projects that have been completed so far:
I really hope that the summer skies improve and I can capture many new targets before the year runs out!
Reprocessing Projects
Since I have not been able to capture much new data, I have undertaken a program of revisiting old data and seeing if I can’t find a better image somewhere in that!
Over the years, I have acquired new and superior tools, developed new and better processing strategies, and added some experience under my belt!
I found that I was able to make dramatic improvements with these efforts.
It has been a lot of fun seeing what could be accomplished. I have saved these new versions as their own Imaging Projects.
This respects the original version (especially as some of the older images were published in that form) and allows me to share the new processing methods that I used to create the new version of the images.
Social Media Milestones!
Besides hitting the 2-Year Milestone for the website, we have been celebrating some other key milestones as of late!
YouTube:
We recently hit the first-year mark for the YouTube channel!
For the first third of the year, I was only using this for hosting private videos used by the website - but then I decided to post everything as public videos - and since that point, we have had slow but growth as I figured things out.
We also just hit our first 1,000 Subscribers milestone!
We also hit the 30K views milestone
and finally, we are close to having 2K Viewing Hours
Facebook:
We recently crossed the 4K Followers milestone!
Twitter:
Growth on Twitter has slowed dramatically since Elon Musk took over Twitter - in fact, many in the astrophotographic community announced that they were leaving Twitter. But I have stuck with it, and I am slowly growing my follower list - we just crossed the 2K Followers point!
Image Publications
Since the last Metablog, several more of my images have been selected for publication. I’ll summarize those below.
A Profile in Amateur Astrophotographer Magazine #111, published in April!
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This profile also published several of my images, which are listed below:
M16 (The Eagle Nebula)
M63 (The Sunflower Nebula)
NGC 6888 (The Crescent Nebula)
M27 (The Dumbbell Nebula)
C49 (The Rosette Nebula)
NGC 7000 (The North America Nebula)
M57 ((The Ring Nebula), and
NGC 4565 (The Needle Galaxy)
My Reprocessed Messier 27 Image was published in Several Places!
NASA APOD for May 30, 2023:
This was my very first APOD!
Sky & Telescope Magazine - September 2023 Issue
BBC Sky At Night Magazine - August 2023 Issues. Selected as their “Picture of the Month”
As “Picture of the Month,” I was also asked to write some advice for beginning Astrophotographers.
A previous version of this image was also printed in Astronomy Magazine in 2022 and Amateur Astrophotography issue #111 - Making this my First Grand Slam - It was printed by every publication that I submitted it to!
New Articles
Since the last Metablog, I have also published several new articles.
Tips and Techniques
2-Minute Tutorials
Gear Updates
RocheStarFest 2023
I recently attended RocheStar Fest, put on by the Astronomy Section of the Rochester Academy of Science and held at their Farish Observatory Site.
The theme of this year’s event was Solar Eclipses. This is very appropriate as the observatory will be on the center line of the path of totality next year. It is very rare for an observatory to be so positioned for an eclipse, so there is a lot of excitement about this!
It was a great time to connect with other Astro-minded folks, attend some great talks, and enjoy an excellent dinner!
Last year I was the keynote speaker for the dinner. This year I was able to relax and enjoy the talks of others! Author Bob Berman talked about how to view Solar Eclipses best, and Dr. Valerie Rapson talked about doing citizen science around exoplanets!
I donated a framed 16x20 print of my Messier 27 image to be used as one of their door prizes. I figured this image would be interesting as it was the most published of my images. ‘‘
It was a great time with a great group!
See the great group shot below - this was shot by Peter Blackwood. Peter also donated some of his landscape images as a door prize - these were just beautiful!
Where’s waldo? You can spot me to the right - the tall guy with the blue rain coat! (Image by Peter Blackwood - used with permission)
Our eyes are ever skyward…. (Image by Peter Blackwood - used with permission)
Health Issue Update
I am glad to say that I fully recovered from my Kidney surgery last April. The pathology report indicated that the tumor was rare but benign! Much better news than I could have otherwise hoped for!
At this point, my kidney function is a little under par, and as a result, I am seeing a Nephrologist, who has put me on the MIND diet with a salt restriction of 2300 mg a day. This new diet is a bit of a challenge to master, but it is a very healthy diet that I expect will not only help preserve kidney function but will also pay off in other health benefits.
Thanks to everyone for your support as I went through this!
Now - if I could get some smoke-free skies - I would be back into action!
Observatory Project Update
I wish I had much to report here, but I am afraid I do not!
While Janet and I have been combing the listings daily and have visited dozens of properties so far this year - we still have not found something that will work for us! The “Supply” has been very low this year, and everything we have seen has had one or more problems that caused us to reject the property.
Since last year, we have greatly loosened our requirements but even so, no luck.
On another front, we have completed the observatory design and have an initial set of stamped blueprints! I even had the opportunity to have four different builders give me a quote on construction costs. The bad news here is that the costs have almost doubled!
The issue here is that I had to adapt the design to a colder climate. We can’t get away with simple slab and pier foundations. I need to have footers all around going down 48 inches below the frost line. This drives up the cost and the fact that concrete costs have soared since the advent of Covid. Despite that, we are still willing to green-light the project if we can find the right property!
So the search continues…. Stay tuned!
What’s Coming Up
I thought I would share some of the things I am planning on in the near future!
Future Processing Projects
I am still hoping that the skies will clear and I will be able to capture some fresh photons, but even if this happens, I am planning on doing a reprocess of:
SH2-157 The Lobster Claw Nebula - with NGC 7635 (The Bubble Nebula) in SHO
NGC 7380 - The Wizard Nebula - in Hubble Palette with Mixed Narrowband and RGB Filters
New 2-Minute Tutorials
I am planning on creating a few more 2-Minute Tutorials in the near future. Topics include:
Fixing Horizontal Banding Noise on your images
Using LHE with Color Masks
Using CurvesTransform for custom stretching
Wrap-Up
That’s all for now! Util the next Metablog update; I wish you clear skies and excellent seeing!
Pat
