On last night’s (4th April 2011) Meridian Weather, Simon Parkin showed the Leo Trio image acquired at the New Forest Observatory.  Video footage Copyright Meridian News and Weather.  View the video here.

The New Forest Observatory image of the Markarian Chain of galaxies made an appearance on Simon Parkin’s Weather programme on Meridian TV both last night at 6:20 p.m. (I missed that one) and today at 3:55 p.m. (caught that one as you can see here).  Video footage Copyright Meridian TV.

Apparently Simon Parkin showed the Markarian Chain of galaxies (now crossing your southern horizon) acquired at the New Forest Observatory, on his weather slot on Meridian TV tonight.  Unfortunately I didn’t see it – damn!!

Got phoned up by Radio Solent this morning to make a few comments on UFOs – aired live about 10:40 a.m.

Well what can I say?  To quote Arthur C Clarke “You haven’t seen a UFO unless you got the Mars Licence number”.  I saw TONS of UFOs when I lived in Dartmoor National Park, the skies were so dark (when it was clear) – but although they were unidentified as far as I was concerned, this doesn’t make them extra-terrestial craft.  And it seems odd that the thousands of amateur deep-sky photographers (like me) that are out imaging every clear night have nothing to report – lots of satellites, plenty of planes, and even the odd asteroid – but sorry – no UFOs.

This isn’t too surprising, as (read below) space is BIG.  The Universe could be teeming with life and we would simply never cross paths – the probabilities are just too small.  And if there are life-forms similar to the Borg out there, maybe this is for the good

Don’t get me wrong – I would LOVE to see a real UFO – but as far as I am concerned we have never (yet) been visited by an intelligent extra-terrestial, and given the vastness of space and the probabilities involved – we never will be

Simon Parkin showed the recent Jupiter and Mercury close encounter image on his Weather slot on Meridian TV recently.  Video footage Copyright Meridian TV.

The International Space Station image taken last night (and shown in the post below) made it onto Simon Parkin’s weather programme tonight  Footage Copyright Meridian T.V.

A very lively party at Sir Patrick’s last night, all the usual suspects present.  This was a double celebration of the 700th Sky at Night, and Sir Patrick’s birthday (which was the day before).  Sir Patrick had supposedly invited 70 people – I think there were at least 270 in the Marquee.

No photos of this event from me I’m afraid as some self-appointed bunch of knob-heads who were helpfully blocking the way in for Patrick’s guests made it clear that “the organisers” wanted no photographs to be taken (and no autographs to be asked for either)!  Who “these organisers” were I have no idea (and frankly I couldn’t care less) but I’m pretty sure that if Sir Patrick knew that his party had been hijacked in this way he would not have been too happy.

Other than that, great to see Sir Patrick again and looking forward to seeing the 700th edition of the Sky at Night this evening.

The Sun track pinhole camera image made it into the Daily Mail online   Not exactly an accurate representation of what went on but I am rather used to it by now

Gave a talk on “The Magic of Photography” yesterday to the Rhinefield Probus Group.  Nice turn out and some very good questions!

You will see a new Page Heading above, namely APODS/EPODS where I have listed all the APODS/EPODS published since I started submitting images in 2007.

Also on this Valentine’s Day – you can hear the Radio Solent interview where I discuss the pinhole camera photograph of the Sun’s tracks over a 6-month period.  Tune in to Radio Solent at 4:55 p.m. to listen in