Moon 3rd March - very steady seeing

[geeklee]

This started as an observing session with my Skyliner 200P but when my 5mm eye piece (x240) actually showed a fairly steady and sharp view for a change (I can count on my hand the number of times this eyepiece has been used) I took some photos with my phone at the eyepiece and then put my ASI 533 on the dob (all manual, no tracking so limited stack size and using AOI in PIPP to get frames with target).

Some really good shots for me to spend time viewing and comparing to maps after processing.

Full Disc (~100 frames stacked)

Mare Imbrium - Montes Apenninus, Archimedes, Cassini etc (~75 frames stacked)

Clavius, Maginus, Tycho (~75 frames stacked)

Below is Clavius again, but through the eye piece with a phone - the visual view was much much sharper (proper "wow" sharp that night)

Edited March 8, 2020 by geeklee

[geoflewis]

Lee, those are all excellent images. What phone did you use for that pretty stunning Clavius pic and was that hand held or do you have a phone adapter?

[geeklee]

3 hours ago, geoflewis said:

Lee, those are all excellent images. What phone did you use for that pretty stunning Clavius pic and was that hand held or do you have a phone adapter?

Thanks Geof.  The phone is a Google Pixel 2 XL and I had the adpater on the eye piece yeah.  It's a tricky thing to use (as it's not the best quality!) but if you take 5 minutes to get the lens fully over the eye piece opening, you can then use the digital zoom to concentrate on focusing as best you can then frame and (before it drifts out of view!), settle, and tap very gently on the "take photo" button 😅

There was some magnificent detail showing that night - these are another two quick crops/resizes from the phone - the detail on the terminator is lovely although not that sharp in the photo!

Interestingly, the focus/clarity falls off sharply  away from the centre with the phone at the eyepiece (really shows in the second full disc image).  Could be user error 😁

Edited March 8, 2020 by geeklee

[geoflewis]

Hi Lee, thanks for the phone / adapter info as I've tried taking hand held images with virtually zero success. I think I'm going to get one of those adapters to try some some quick grabs with my iPhone. Thanks also for posting those additional phone images, they're better than some of my early images taken with a DSLR at prime focus of my former 10" Meade LX200...!!

[geeklee]

33 minutes ago, geoflewis said:

Hi Lee, thanks for the phone / adapter info as I've tried taking hand held images with virtually zero success. I think I'm going to get one of those adapters to try some some quick grabs with my iPhone. Thanks also for posting those additional phone images, they're better than some of my early images taken with a DSLR at prime focus of my former 10" Meade LX200...!!

No problem.  Without an adpater (manual or tracking) it's time consuming as you're trying to move the camera over the eye piece and you're watching on your phone as the exit passes a bit then back again then 90% then 10% etc.  The adapter at least lets you attempt to move it into position little by little and with a logical, step by step approach until you're happy.  Then it should be solidly in place and you can concentrate on focus and framing.  Take plenty of shots like you would with a DSLR and one or two should catch the seeing right too.

It always seems to end up looking better with the eyeball though! 😅