John Thorpe

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Viewing 20 posts - 1 through 20 (of 42 total)
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  • in reply to: Congratulations to Dr Andrew Wilson #625327
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Congratulations Andy!

    in reply to: Wil Tirion, 1943–2024 #623763
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Very sorry to hear. I recall my excitement at seeing Wil at a BAA meeting in the 80s. He had recently published his Sky Atlas 2000.0 and was signing copies for members. This remains my favourite, along with his more recent Cambridge Atlas. Great reference works and a joy to peruse.

    Very sad news.

    • This reply was modified 4 months, 1 week ago by Andy Wilson.
    in reply to: Wow! What an auroral display! #622847
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Missed the display in Kent, but my nephew Jamie in Canada sent me this photo from his roof in Vancouver:

    in reply to: Observing Vulcan at the eclipse next week #622388
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Thanks Paul for this hilarious and clever article. Just as I was thinking that Ali Frolop had eluded me this year!

    in reply to: New satellites of Uranus (and Neptune) discovered. #621855
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Great idea! Would certainly put even more smiles on teenage faces during astronomy lessons 🙂

    in reply to: Roger Pickard #621056
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    A great shock. Roger was a great help to me when I joined the VSS, never treating any of my novice requests as trivial. I have a treasured memory from some years ago when I came over from Australia and attended a Christmas meeting chaired by Roger as President. As proceedings got under way, to my amazement Roger gave me a formal welcome. How pleasantly surprised I was!

    A sad loss. Roger will be greatly missed.

    in reply to: Rare vertical alignment of Jupiter’s Moons #620283
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Thanks for making me aware of this. Completely clouded here, but some great images here:
    https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/415732-jupiter-14-nov-2023-interesting-moon-alignment-missed/

    in reply to: Sky and Telescope magazine #618430
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    I cannot speak for S&T, but my experience is that the worldwide postal services have never really recovered from the COVID disruptions. Until a year ago, when I was living in Australia, the BAA Journal took at least 2 months, and Christmas cards were still arriving in April.

    in reply to: Eclipses and Transits #617814
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Great picture Steve! I have not seen this before. Thanks for posting.
    John

    in reply to: Historical section meeting #617474
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    All the presentations at the meeting look really interesting. Just wondering if there is a chance any of them will be available online or in the Section Newsletter?

    Thanks

    in reply to: Constellation British Crown #617206
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Following Nick’s comment, I was pleased to see that Penny Mordaunt’s holding the ceremonial swords for more than an hour was chosen on the BBC News site as the number one “Top Coronation Moment”.

    in reply to: Evening Stars #616066
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    That is such a dramatic shot, Grant. Well worth all the effort you must have made to get it. Congratulations!

    in reply to: Bob Evans #613570
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Sad news indeed. I never met Bob Evans, but was fortunate enough to be in Sydney in 1982 and share with members of the Sutherland Astronomical Society in the excitement of his early supernova discoveries. With his amazing knowledge of the sky, he often reminded me too of George Alcock.

    in reply to: Project Apollo #612171
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Some of the photos are also in the Guardian’s “Saturday” supplement this week (Aug 27), with an article by Tim Peake.

    in reply to: FITS to animated GIF #612027
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    I have plenty of experience of GIFs but none of FITS files so I am on very unsure ground here. A Google search, however, tells me that the downloadable program realConverter will convert FITs to JPGs or GIFs. Whether this runs with Linux I am unsure, probably not.

    https://www.reaconverter.com/convert/fits_to_jpg.html

    Once in this format they may be processed as animated GIFs. I use Photoshop for this but there are plenty of free GIF makers on the web.

    in reply to: New website – members’ full names #610076
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    On the subject of profiles, my photo now appears as very faint. Possibly this is intended? The full colour is resumed in the editing page.

    in reply to: New website feedback #608093
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Hi
    I just entered a post which appeared for a while then disappeared. It was to say that my profile (Account –> Member Album) is now followed by a load of formatting info eg Normal 0 false false false EN-AU ZH-CN X-NONE /*.

    Cheers John

    in reply to: New website feedback #608092
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Hi
    No major hassle, but I notice that when I select Account -> member album, my profile info comes up with a lot of formatting information eg Normal 0 false false false EN-AU ZH-CN X-NONE /*
    Cheers
    John

    in reply to: Logging in to the new website #607957
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Hi Andy
    A bit of trouble logging in the first time. I kept getting the screen to update the login details and then found I was still not logged into the site. The secret seemed to be to click the word “login” in the menu rather than either of the dropdown items.
    Great look to the site though, and I really appreciate all the effort that must have gone into it.
    Cheers
    John

    in reply to: J-BAA Electronic #584979
    John Thorpe
    Participant

    Currently living in Oz, I value both the print and electronic journals. During covid, the mail has been very slow taking at least a month. So it is great to read on computer, and then have the pleasure of reading all over again once the paper copy arrives. Once I have the paper version, it is a permanent feature by my bedside, permitting me to read, revisit articles, discover bits I missed etc. What better way to relax at the end of the day?

Viewing 20 posts - 1 through 20 (of 42 total)