Moon 21/12/13

[tich]

I never thought tonight was going to clear so I never bothered going to the dark site to set up as we were having wind & rain earlier so imagine my surprise when I looked out of the window earlier to see twinkly things in the sky.
I fired off some shots of the moon while I manually tracked it on my old EQ5 mount, I can only just get the disc to fit on the chip so tracking it was a little time consuming but worth it I reckon.

This image consists of 55 subs processed in PIPP then stacked & wavelets altered in Registax, I did finish off in Photoshop just so up the colour of the final image.

Overall I'm quite happy with the image.

[baggywrinkle]

Cery nice even exposure all over, sharp too.

[Luke]

Very nice, Tich A ton of detail. Well worth the effort of the manual tracking.

I caught some bonus clear too our way and popped out to image the moon with my undriven mount. I wasn't sure I'd get any imaging in before Xmas with the current forecast

Which scope did you image with? The C80?

[Jason71]

Very good image tich..very clear with good detail.

[tich]

Very nice, Tich A ton of detail. Well worth the effort of the manual tracking.

I caught some bonus clear too our way and popped out to image the moon with my undriven mount. I wasn't sure I'd get any imaging in before Xmas with the current forecast

Which scope did you image with? The C80?

This image was done using the 6"SCT that I brought from yourself & Sarah, it was very tricky getting it all on the chip as it filled the screen so not sure if I would be able to get a full moon image using it. I've had variable results using the SCT my first Jupiter wasn't great so I'm putting that down to seeing & my first lunar image I did using it didn't turn out very sharp either as it looks quite blurry, not sure if it was stacking, focus, seeing, myself vibrating the mount as I took pictures or all of the above. But I am quite happy on how well this one turned out as I tend to overexpose the edge of the moon.

[Luke]

This image was done using the 6"SCT that I brought from yourself & Sarah, it was very tricky getting it all on the chip as it filled the screen so not sure if I would be able to get a full moon image using it. I've had variable results using the SCT my first Jupiter wasn't great so I'm putting that down to seeing & my first lunar image I did using it didn't turn out very sharp either as it looks quite blurry, not sure if it was stacking, focus, seeing, myself vibrating the mount as I took pictures or all of the above. But I am quite happy on how well this one turned out as I tend to overexpose the edge of the moon.

Great to see you getting a nice result from the C6. I was forgetting how much bigger a DSLR chip is than my webcam! My ED80 just about squeezes the moon onto my webcam chip.

I've not had much luck with Jupiter either so far, I assume it's the conditions on the nights I've tried, as it did not look at its best through the eyepiece either.

[tich]

You're probably right about the conditions Luke I just hope I can get a decent session imaging Jupiter soon though. Interesting about the webcam & ED80 though might have to try doing the same with mine. I think my first lunar image with the C6 was my fault due to rushing so I think I was vibrating the mount as I was tracking causing it to go blurry as I were taking the shot.

As you can see not a great effort;



Last night I took my time just getting the edge of the moon out of frame using live view on the camera & when it drifted into frame I took the shot. I must admit it took a while but it wasn't to bad to do.
So I guess patience is the key!!

Another note to self is to extend the legs on the tripod so I'm not kneeling on the ground!!!

[Luke]

That looks like vibration to me, Tich, though you can see in that one too that there is promising detail there.

I do exactly the same as you did last night - let it drift into position.

Now the following may sound far-fetched, but it is absolutely true.

The other day, when using my camera tripod and mini giro and imaging (either the sun or moon, can't remember which), I noticed that me pressing the keyboard to start recording was causing a little shake on the movie!!

I tested it and it really was me pressing the keyboard that caused a little wobble. The table leg was on the same patio tile as one of the tripod legs and that little tap was enough to rock the view. :grin:

Are you using mirror lock with your DSLR? I think if not that can cause a little shake too, that seemed to be the main cause of blur when I imaged the moon with my DSLR.

[tich]

I've been using the remote shutter control on my timer on all my moon pictures but strangely enough I was using the mirror lock on the camera last night so I'll use it more from now on. It is surprising that the smallest amount of vibrations can ruin an image. Setting up on the lawn I found can help dampen out some vibration but I don't like getting soggy knees lol.