Hadley, Tycho and Clavius with Skymax 180

[Nik271]

Last night (22 March) the seeing was superb despite the light mist. I spent an hour gazing at the Moon with my Skymax 180 using about 300x magnification and still enjoying steady views. I thought I even got a glimpse of parts of the elusive rille running through Vallis Alpes! I was so impressed that I took the trouble to attach my DSLR and shoot two 2minute videos (about 3000 frames each) at prime focus. After the usual processing this is what I got. I think the Skymax did well for a 7 inch scope

 

Tycho and Clavius near the terminator:

 

Vallis Alpes was on the edge of the frame and did not come out as sharp but still I think there is a hint of the central rille:

 

And finally Montes Apenines with Rima Hadley. It looked just as good visually

Lets hope for some more good seeing like this 🤞 

 

Clear skies!

 

Nik

Edited March 23, 2021 by Nik271

[CraigT82]

Some cracking shots there. Visually must have been incredible 

[Roy Challen]

Superb! Definitely a hint of the rille in Vallis Alpes.

[callisto]

Nicely captured 

[neil phillips]

Could see seeing was superb its nearly always when theres mist. Lovely shots. 

[kirkster501]

Excellent pictures. well done.

Were you using a barlow or was this at native?

[Nik271]

15 hours ago, kirkster501 said:

Excellent pictures. well done.

Were you using a barlow or was this at native?

Thank you! I didn't use a barlow, so the focal distance was 2700mm. I'm focusing manually and I found that when I use a barlow then its much harder to get the precise focus because the mirror shift becomes very noticeable. The scope is at F15 and my DSLR pixels are 3.7 microns, so I thought it may be a bit undersampled for lucky imaging. So I tried the x1.5 drizzle in Autostakkert and it worked well on the first image. Still learning this stuff

[kirkster501]

9 hours ago, Nik271 said:

Thank you! I didn't use a barlow, so the focal distance was 2700mm. I'm focusing manually and I found that when I use a barlow then its much harder to get the precise focus because the mirror shift becomes very noticeable. The scope is at F15 and my DSLR pixels are 3.7 microns, so I thought it may be a bit undersampled for lucky imaging. So I tried the x1.5 drizzle in Autostakkert and it worked well on the first image. Still learning this stuff

Yes it worked very well.  Well done.

[Mr Spock]

Lovely set of images.

[Saganite]

A great set of images Nik, but I particularly like the last one, Montes Apenines, and you have got the Hadley Rille superbly, excellent....👍