Full Moon experiment

[madjohn]

Here's the result of a project I started way back in Febuary this year when I heard that the full Moon's of the months of March and October 2011 coincided with pretty much the furthest and shortest distances in the Earth and Moon's orbit.

I used excatly the same equipment on both nights (my Miniborg ED45 and Modified 450D) and in March I was lucky to have a crystal clear night when the Moon was at its closest, however two nights ago on the 11th Oct it was wall to wall cloud and I was getting despondent worrying that I would't get the shot but then a small gap developed and I managed to fire off a half dozen or so in the few seconds allowed !

In my haste the focus was slightly out but I got the shot I wanted, namely the Moon at its furthest point and here's the result of the project.

I'm astounded how much difference there is! there was no cropping beforehand - this is how much the Moon varies in its orbit around us, well pleased with the result!

[RogerTheDodger]

Excellent work, it's an amazing difference...

[Jannis]

wow, that's huge! i thought it was a lot less. So much less it was barly possible to see, but man was i wrong!!

[Nibor]

Interesting project - thats quite a difference!!

[garethmob]

it is astounding at the distances

one question i have and its no doubt a stupid one on my part but has the moon photos been rotated at all in the picture?

puts D hat on head:P

[LukeSkywatcher]

Nice little project you did there. I dont think ive ever seen a side by side comparison. Quite something.

[madjohn]

Hi all,

Yes I must admit when I put the two images together I thought that was a huge difference, luckily I wasn't the only person doing this project and my good friend David Putland sent me his images and the alarm bells started ringing!

it turns out I had left my focal reducer in the telescope in my haste to get my image in the gap in the clouds!!

So the smaller Moon image is too small, by .85 as thats my focal reducer! sorry for the confusion, it may be possible to correctly size it up in photoshop and I'll do this in due course.

Sorry!

[LukeSkywatcher]

My mother just rang tonight to tell me that there is a VERY big Moon out tonight (i knew this already).

So thinking of this thread, i tried to explain it to her over the phone.

I told her that the Moon orbits the Earth in an eliptical rather then a spherical motion. So at some point the Moon is closer to the Earth then at other times and this is why it appears bigger.

Just when i thought she may actually be grasping the concept.............she said "OK i have to go now because Eastenders in on".

I think i'll have to sit her down and show her the Father Ted clip on youtube of the cows in the field "These cows are near............but those cows are FAR away"

[spaceboy]

Very interesting to see the difference.

[madjohn]

Hi here's my friend David Putlands image which got my alarm bells ringing after speaking to my other mate Neil who noted the huge size difference.

Great image Dave!

[Stu]

Still a much bigger difference than I would have expected to see. Very interesting, and nice images

Stu

Sent from my GT-I9000 using Tapatalk

[yeti monster]

I was worried at the first set, as surely such a huge difference would have been really obvious, even to the average Joe Public. The second set is more what I would have expected, although still a big difference.

Excellent comparisson.

[Jannis]

Still a larger difference then i expected, and great pic your freind took there, btw