Thursday, April 30, 2015

The Moon during last night's great seeing...

So, I've finished processing the moon images and came up with a few.... I had such fun last night as the weather was excellent for astronomy. I wish the light pollution would be as obliging. Anyway the planets aren't as effected by that.
They are all from your viewpoint as seen here on earth using my Explore Scientific 102mm Refractor at a FL of 700mm and a 2.5x Televue Barlow.
The camera was a ZWO ASI120MM monochrome CCD


 This shows the Sea of Tranquility with the Sea of Fertility belowand the Sea of Crisis above.



This view shows the Alpine Valley Rift on the lower right edge and the round smooth interior of Plato Crater at 280x.
The Sea of Iridium is to the bottom and the merging of the Sea of Cold (right) and Bay of Dew (left) is above Plato.


The ejecta from the impact crater Copernicus (dia: 58miles/93 km) is clearly seen in this image while also showing the center mounds of crater Eratosthenes ( dia: 36miles/59km) to it's right, also at 280x.
Keith


Wednesday, April 29, 2015

Jupiter and it's moons was spectacular last night!

Because it was so mild last night, I got out my 102mm refractor and set out to photograph Jupiter and it's moons. It seemed exceptionally clear and the seeing was as good as I've seen it all year!
 I also took some images of the moon that I will process and try to get on the blog today. I spent some time scanning it's surface. 
The pertinent data is on the image.



C'mon guys (and ladies) let's get some imaging done while the weather is nice. Soon it will be hot and the sky will be in terrible turmoil again ~ it looks like this coming week will be good!
Keith