Hello All,
This is a new member to your group, Amar Sharma, just joined
here less than 2 weeks back. I'm currently residing in the Silicon
Valley (IT Capital of India) Bangalore and surely our group down
here wont be known to all of you. Basically am from my native at
Thane city beside Mumbai itself! We're just a new group of active
amateurs in B'lore city are named as the Bangalore Astronomical
Society (BAS) (http://www.bas.org.in). We are mainly into sky-
observations as our activity and we are also into outreach as of now.
We're yet to make our new presence felt in this city and we'll take
some time for that. Our members possess a range of scopes starting
from 4.5" Celestron (manual tracking), 6", 2-3 8inches, a 9.25"
Celestron GOTO, and recently a 12" f/4.5 Dobsonian telescope imported
from US...thus we have quite a few wonderful instruments! (http://
www.basblog.wordpress.com/gallery)

That was the small summary of our group. Here I would like to further
introduce myself and share with everyone my recent/latest personal
astronomical 'expeditions'. I'm mainly an OBSESSED deep-sky observer
since 2002 when I just entered astronomy. Since then sky observations
have captivated me like NOTHING ELSE in my life!! I entered sky-
observations first in 2002 and on my own I've been doing it only from
June 2003-July 2004 (6 months monsoons included) and again for some
time after that.

But that was when I was into the basic stuff with a 6" scope from my
house terrace, it was limited then...my real observations began since
December 2005-May 2006 and September 2006 to present! This..I mean
THIS is the MAIN turnover in my observations career! If you take into
consideration "effectively" this 1 year it's in this period only that
I've been observing VERY ACTIVELY with a friend's 8" equatorial
scope. I was so very frequent for sky observations that in this small
period, after Thursday's (15th Feb) observing session (a historic one
for me!) I've managed to observe...370+ Deep-sky objects (DSO's)!!
And the best part is I've observed of 200+ galaxies which I just
crossed that day..thats 54% of my huge total count is only galaxies!!!

If you see and count that in my webpage that around 117 of them are
itself from the few major regions of Leo (24), Ursa Major (28), Coma
Berenices (25), Virgo (21) and Fornax (19) and COUNTING!!! I
myself can't believe that I've observed, recorded and moreover
confirmed names of 200 galaxies..such a HUGE number in this short
period of EFFECTIVE 1 year..with a 8" scope THAT TOO (except for just
a handful few with a 12" scope)!!

And out of 150 globulars observable in the Milky-Way and just 100-110
visible from our latitude (others are far South below horizon), I
could observe 4 new globulars that day making my total count come to
73..that's whole 73 out of 100-110, just 30 more and I finish this
globular chapter..which I hope to do in this VERY season before 2007
May as now we have a 12" scope!!!

Hence my total object-count out of 370+ DSO's stands like this :
around 206 confirmed galaxies (there will be around 215 actually
seen!!), 73 globulars, 10 comets, 1 asteroid, 57 open clusters, 15
planetary nebulae (this last object is my weakness!). You will note
that usually open clusters are the objects what amateurs begin with,
and I'm just at pathetic 57 of them (my Messier Catalog is remaining
thanks to the opens close to Sagittarius region, I've never
concentrated and completed it!)..whereas you'll see SUCH A HUGE
number for galaxies and globulars, showing my craze for the real and
faint deep-sky stuff, galaxies and globulars.

I observe using the Cambridge Star Atlas from the British Library
here, first it was the old version and now the new version which my
friend purchased. So my next agenda would be to : cross 300 galaxies
atleast, and finish all observable globulars from our latitude (~100)
and then get on with open clusters and learn planetary nebulae to
increase my DSO count to more than 500-700 or so...actually AS
maximum as possible..all this with a 8" scope!!!!

I'm madly obsessed with comets and plan to enter comet-hunting from
India (an initiative taken by just quarter of dozen or so people from
here or mostly even NONE!!). Comets are next to my breath! (More on
this sometime later). I've observed 7 binocular level comets and 3
faint ones from January 2004 until now recently. I'm out to hopefully
discover one too, the FIRST EVER in India FROM within India, after
Dr. Vainu Bappu the legend who is the ONLY Indian to do it but from
outside India..my LIFELONG insatiable passion/obsession!!!! I'm VERY
SURE of getting ATLEAST ONE once I start comet hunting after getting
my own instruments (as of now I have one 9.5" f/5.1 dobsonian scope
but has very bad optics)!!! I could spot/observe the historic latest
brightest Comet C/2006 P1 McNaught we had, on 13th and 14th January
2007.

This year on March 17 for the first time ever I plan to enter Messier
Marathon 2007 with my friend's 12" scope and am personally expecting
to cross 90 or even 100 objects with ease due to scope's large
aperture, but without pratice!! Moreover I also plan for a "Double
Marathon" going again on a week-day just few days after that, say
20th March again to observe with the 8" equatorial scope and finish
as many expected objects as possible (say 90+ this time)...let's just
hope for best!

Please have a look at my webpage which surely has some interesting
info..my observing log, Diary section of astronomical events, trip to
Lonar Meteor Crater, trip to Kavalur Observatory (housing Asia's
largest telescope, a 2.3 metre or 93 inches one!), my few photos, and
my astro-drawings too..I'm sure you'll just love it! Comments/replies
are wanted : http://www.angelfire.com/space2/amar

You can as well join my yahoogroups "majestic_universe" which is
general astronomy based and is at times the MOST active group around!
The other is "comet_observing_india" which is evidently Asia's ONLY
comet (or minor planet related for that instance) yahoogroup!! I
infact welcome EACH and every one of you to join there and make
astronomy a more success. I've spoken more than enough for now, I'll
take leave and will wait for some replies/comments by fellow amateur
friends here. Thanking You. Amar.