Nik271

It may be worth using a Barlow for larger image scale, this will put more separation in pixels between the glare of the primary and the dim companion. Currently the separations of Rigel AB and Sirius AB pairs are very similar about 10''

I noticed you have the double Tau Geminorum on your list. Splitting this one will be very tough, since the magnitude difference is more than 6 and the stars are so close together. It was first spotted by Burnham in 1881 and he had access to some big refractors. Here are two other famous doubles in Gemini for small refractors: Castor ( Alpha Gem ) and Wasat ( Delta Gem), both are wonderful targets for a four inch scope!

The moisture is most likely condensation: the cover gets very cold at night and water condenses both on the outside and on the inside. Only solution is to take it off during the day and dry it in the sun or indoors.

Last evening I managed to see all the seven planets in the space of an hour, from 4:30 to 5:30pm! I was having a late afternoon walk with my partner and we could already see the crescent Moon, Jupiter and Mars just after sunset. The western horizon was exceptionally clear and soon we could spot Venus shining brightly over the distant line of hills. I knew that Mercury is still near elongation and close to Venus, so we waited until it got darker. At 4:45pm when Venus had disappeared behind the hills, we could just about spot the faint sparkle of Mercury only 5 degrees above the horizon. By that time Mars, Jupiter and Saturn were of course prominent in the sky, together with the Moon they were plotting the line of the ecliptic for all to see. When we got home I took out the binoculars and we quickly bagged Neptune (conveniently near Jupiter) and Uranus (making a triangle with Sigma and Omicron Arietis) It was 5:30pm 🙂 I've seen them all before but never in one evening and so well placed, just in time for dinner!

I love the bino bandits! I have three pairs permanently attached to my binoculars.

I had a good look at it this morning at 6am with my 20x80 bins. It's already easy to find - currently 2 degrees northwest of Epsilon CrB and slowly moving north. I estimate the magnitude at 8 and the coma radius at 4'-5'. I didn't see any tail but the transparency was poor. This comet should get better and better in January!

Thanks! I remember looking at the Sun on that day in white light and noticed the prominent light bridge through the big sunspot, clearly seen in the third image.

Yes, I see it clearly. Looks a bit like Peter rabbit.

Or perhaps the fox had help from a grouse . This one: Nah joking ... only had a cup of tea at the time The hardship of morning observing, no alcohol allowed

Yes, this is the one I saw but at the scope it looked slightly different, it was facing me. The shadows probably change too fast to capture it in the simulated view on the hour.

That's already pretty good detail! It's not realistic to expect to resolve detail under 1 arcsecond even with perfect guiding. The seeing will not allow it with 5 minute exposures. You could try binning the data to improve the SNR, but you probably know that...

The shadows change shape within minutes so close to the terminator, the fox must have shapeshifted 🙂

Or maybe it's a dog? I was observing briefly at 7am this morning. Very cold, but dry, there was some wave-like disturbance in the seeing occasionally but it was good in brief moments of stability. For example I could resolve the two largest craterlets of Catena Davy. I was using my Skymax 127 and 8mm EP, so about x185 and was enjoying the view of Ptolemaeus, Alphonsus and Arzachel crater trio, when I spotted a fox face looking at me 🙂 It was made of shadows and light patches immediately west of Arzachel. This is the simulated view from svs.gsfc.nasa.gov: It looked better in real life actually, seemed that the fox was staring at me and looking mischievous. I checked my lunar maps and this area is dotted by small crater satellites to Parrot. It looks nothing like this in different illumination. Quite happy to catch this 'fox' despite my freezing fingers afterwards. (A manual AZ mount has drawbacks in the cold, it does not need batteries but then hands cannot stay in pockets all the time...) If you want to check this out, look for the fox around the 21day old Moon. Clear skies! Nik

Thanks, Kon! It turned out better than I expected when trying to focus on the camera display this morning. I'm really puzzled why the seeing is not good, usually high pressure and dry air over UK is a winning combination. Well, there are a few more clear nights ahead, perhaps it will improve.

Here is my bit. Canon 250 DSLR at prime focus on 127 Skymax on AZ5. I took dozens of photos, and found a few sharp enough to beat the poor seeing. These are single frames with just a bit of sharpening in the generic windows photo editor. Should have taken RAW images but forgot, hopefully even the JPEGs are not too bad. Don't zoom in too much! It's very cold but at least we have clear skies, yay!!

Nice ones, Kon! I agree the seeing was on the poor side, focusing was an issue. I took some still images on my DSLR, but will have to edit them a bit, at first glance Mars is just an orange blob, no surface detail, but sharpening may reveal some. I'm very happy at least that we managed to observe it, never mind the seeing: there were no clouds!!

While testing my DSLR on my Mak in preparation for the occultation last night I noticed that the Lebniz mountains were well dispalyed on the southern limb. Skywatcher Skymax 127 and a Canon 250D at prime focus, stacked in Autostakkert and wavelets edited in Registax

FIrst I tried searching the internet but surface brightness of Mars was hard to find. Then I realised it's all simple maths: Moon has about 100 times the angular diameter of Mars this opposition. So it has 10000 larger angular area. It is also 10 magnitudes brighter, -12 as opposed to -2 for Mars. 10 magnitudes is precisely 100 squared larger total brightness. Since the Moon angular area is also 100^2 times larger than Mars it follow that they should be more or less the same surface brightness😀

I was just checking the surface brightness of Moon and Mars and it looks we are in luck: they are almost the same per unit area. It seems they both shine at about 4-th magnitude per square arcsecond. So hopefully both will be exposed almost equally next to each other.

I also don't like fiddling with composites, so planning to use my DSLR and 1500mm focal length Mak, this way the moon fills the height of the sensor and there will be room for Mars on the long side. Blown up highlights cannot be recovered, so I'm going to expose for the Moon and hope Mars can be brightened up. At 1500mm Mars will be quite small anyway. I'm going to shoot stills for better resolution and hope seeing is not too bad so I can pick a decent one. Stacking a video will mean some kind of composite since Moon Mars angular separation will change in the span of even a minute. At least the weather forecast is promising!

Fantastic observation, well done! I've never seen either moon visually. My guess is Phobos is harder than spotting Sirius B: the maximal separation is similar, about 10 arcseconds, Mars is of similar brightness to Sirius but Phobos is mag 11 while Sirius B is only 8. Keep trying! I now wonder what is the smallest aperture needed to spot Phobos. My biggest scope is a 7 inch Mak, perhaps I should give it a try if the clouds ever lift up this week.

I managed a good look at Mars at about 10pm in between banks of fog. Very good seeing, I pushed the 127 Skymax to x200 and Mars was looking tack sharp. Terra Cimmeria was visible as a dark band in the south The limitation was the AZ5 on its adapted tripod. Good for grab and go but at these magnifications gets too shaky. I think closest approach of Mars is this week. The forecast looks grim, let's hope it's wrong!

At the current state this technique is useful for imaging of stars systems, even exoplanets, accretion discs and neighbourhoods of black holes. No good for visual observation. I think the development of the telescope left visual observing a long time ago, mid 20th century perhaps. That's fine with me, still plenty of fun to be had looking at the sky.

That's pretty good considering the conditions! I was observing visually at about 11pm last night and it was hard to even spot the easiest feature, the promontory of Syrtis Major even at low magnifications. Mars was dancing too much and the wind was not helping either. We need a high pressure weather front for next week at the closest approach!

I doubt it, for adaptive optics you will need a composite miror made of several parts and this puts you in the realm of big expensive professional research telescopes, and they have no time for visual. Live luckly imaging is more likey to be in development, I think this is perfectly possible nowadays and will be a big selling point for planetary observers.