A Triple Conjunction

So over the 20th and 21st February, Venus, Mars & the Moon were all very close to each other in the sky. In fact at 1/2 a degree of separation, Mars & Venus were the closest they have been since 2008.

Visually it looked quite stunning but I wanted to capture some photographs as well which are shown below. The first two are from the 20th of February and the final two are from the 21st.

Some Widefield Fun!

So a couple of nights ago the skies cleared and I had the chance to get out and observe the skies. Unfortunately it was quite windy so I struggled to get any decent time with my telescope. However my DSLR and Red Snapper tripod wasn't really affected which meant I had the chance to take some nice widefield pictures.

First up for me was a quick single shot of Venus and Mars just before they moved below the viewing horizon. Not that inspiring an image but it was nice to capture both of them together. They will be even closer over the next few days and hopefully I can get another shot when there will also be a crescent moon to join them.

My next shot is a stack of 21 x 8 second exposures of my favourite constellation, Orion. I can only get the main body to fit in my Olympus 50mm lens but it still looks lovely with the nebula nicely showing up along with some lovely colour in the stars.

After this I moved onto the area of comet Lovejoy C2014 Q2 which was in part of the sky where I could take a picture of it with the Double Cluster or Andromeda. In the end I decided to image it with both of these famous deep space objects, the Double Cluster with 12 x 8 second exposures and Andromeda with 11 x 8 second exposures.

Finally, as I was packing up my friend mentioned the fuzzy patch in the sky near Jupiter and I realised that this was the Beehive Cluster. Never shy to grab an opportunity I took 11 x 8 second exposures of this target although the very bright Jupiter does overwhelm the image a little.

The Sun

So in my last post I described the Solar Filter I built to enable me to image the upcoming partial eclipse. Amazingly, the day after I built the filter it was a lovely clear and sunny day and I got to see how good a job my filter had done. I set my camera up with 1/250s exposure, ISO 100 and  F/10 to try and get the correct amount of light onto the sensor.

I was pretty pleased with the results and just hope Eclipse day is just as clear! You can actually see a slight amount of surface granulation and the three sun spot regions AR 2277, AR 2280 & AR 2281 are all clearly visible.

Building my own DSLR Solar Filter

So, with a partial solar eclipse (>90%) due here in West Lothian on the 20th March 2015 I decided that I wanted to see and image it if I could.

Seeing it was going to be easy as there are lots of cheapish eclipse glasses out there. I ended up picking up a pair of Baader Solar Eclipse Observing Glasses which are now sitting in my Astronomy cupboard. I have already tested them and they worked wonderfully although I wasn't able to make out any sunspots but I suspect they would need to be rather large for me to properly notice them.

However, imaging it was a different story entirely as there doesn't appear to be any official DSLR filters made to do this. I therefore had to get all DIY which filled me with dread but luckily there was a guide I found on Astronomy Log. So my first job was to pick up a cheap flower shaped lens hood from ebay which had the 58mm thread required for my Canon 55-250mm Lens.

Then I cut out two lovely rings from some left over cereal box which fit perfectly inside the lens hood. I was lucky that a glass I found in my cupboard fit perfectly into the lens hood which ensure I could use it to draw a template in the cardboard.

Next on this rather exciting building mission was some Baader AstroSolar Safety Film ND 5.0 which was the most expensive part of the entire operation. I cut off some of the film so that it was the right size for the rings I had made and then came the tricky part. I placed squares of double sided tape around the cardboard rings and dropped one on them onto the solar film. I then stuck the other cardboard ring on the other side of it to create a lovely basic filter.

The final task was to use more double sided tape to stick the ring onto the hood.

All in all a relatively easy job and I have plenty of Solar Film available to create a filter for my telescope as well if I wish.

My First Ever Jupiter Shadow Transit

So on the 3rd February 2015 the shadow of Jupiter’s moon, Io crossed the giant planet’s disc and I was determined to image it. So far, every shadow transit has been marred by cloudy weather or unhelpful times so I was desperate to see this one, especially now that I have my new planetary camera.

As the time approached for the shadow transit to commence I was rather upset as the clouds had rolled across. This feeling got worse when it even started to snow, I was sure that once again I would miss the chance to see this spectacle. However, just by luck, as 8.30pm approached when the shadow was due to be around the centre of the disc, the snow stopped and the clouds parted.

I don’t think I have ever set up my scope that quickly and the alignment was terrible but it was set up enough that I could locate Jupiter, see the tiny shadow in my eyepiece and track it without an issue. Just seeing the tiny black dot was a great feeling although the seeing itself was pretty terrible, made worse by the odd gust of wind.

So after gazing at it for a short period I quickly got my camera out and went to work. I probably only managed 4 runs before the clouds came back over and spoiled the view again but at least I had something I could process. The best of my images I processed is below and whilst the quality of Jupiter itself is not as clean as the one I took the week before under better conditions, you can at least make out the tiny shadow of Io.

I hope to get more chances in the future to enhance my skills and maybe even manage a double shadow transit.

Lunar 100 Bonanza Night

My new Planetary camera means that I am quite desperate to get out and image things. So recently I decided to spend a fair amount of time working on the Moon and managed to see and them image 8 targets from the Lunar 100 list. This was probably my most productive night with the Moon since I started on my astronomy adventure.

The first area of the moon I looked at included a collection of four targets from the Lunar 100. The first of these is L11, a very bright cater called Aristarchus that lies in the Oceanus Procellarum. The crater is considered to be the brightest large formation on the lunar surface, with an alebdo nearly double that of most lunar features. It was so bright that when I took the image shown below, I had to force the exposure down quite a lot to try and stop the crater over-exposing.

Next up is L22, the Aristarchus Plateau which is an uplifted region mantled with pyroclastics that lies next to Aristarchus. This elevated region contains a number of volcanic features, such as sinuous rilles. One of these rilles is also on the Lunar 100 List as L17 and is known as Schröter's Valley. It is actually the largest rille on the moon and starts at a 6km diameter crater before following a meandering path until it reaches a 1km high precipice at the edge of Oceanus Procellarum. An interesting fact about this rille is that it was the planned site for the cencelled Apollo 18 mission.

The final target in the area was L86, a rille system named the Prinz Rilles which are located near the crater Prinz. These rilles are on Oceanus Procellarum itself and not the Aristarchus Plateau. These rilles are sinuous in nature and extend for upto 80km with one of the main ones originating from a tiny crater known as Vera which sits just a couple of km from Prinz's rim. To be honest, this was one of the hardest targets to view as the rilles are quite small and the glare from nearby Aristarchus is rather distracting. However, I did manage it and they are also just about visible within the image I captured.

After this interesting collection of targets, I moved on to L36. This is the Grimaldi Basin, a large basin located near the western limb of the Moon. The rim of this crater has been so heavily worn and eroded that it forms a low, irregular ring of hills, ridges and peaks, rather than a typical crater rim. The floor is very flat, smooth and featureless with a rather low albedo that contrasts with the brighter surroundings making it rather easy to locate.

Next up on my tour of the moon was an area containing two targets with the first being L42, the Marius Hills which is a complex of volcanic domes and hills located in Oceanus Procellarum. These domes are located near the crater Marius and average approximately 200–500m in height. To be honest, I found these quite hard to spot as the Moon was lit so much that they were lacking contrast. However, I did spot manage to make out an almost bobbled texture to the surface where they were located. You can't see them very well on the image I took but the bobbly effect is there, or at least to my eyes it is. One nice addition to note is that if you look above Marius Crater you should be able to see the "U" shape of Marius Rille which is quite a nice sight.

Also within this area of the moon is L57, the Reiner Gamma which is a high albedo feature lieing to the west of Reiner crater. It has a distinctive swirling, concentric oval shape that appears to have been formed due to magnetic anomalies.

Finally, I finished the night with a look at L62, a Large volcanic dome known as Rümker. The mound has a diameter of 70km and climbs to a maximum elevetion of about 1100m. Low contrast means it isn't that prominent on the image but there is an obvious bulge visible in the center of the image I took.