Mars with Phobos and Deimos, 30th November 2022

[lukebl]

Here's a capture of Mars with 12th magnitude Phobos and 13th mag Deimos this evening.

I managed to capture the two moons at Mars's last appearance two years ago, but I think this is a better result.

I saw that Phobos and Deimos were both near their greatest elongations simultaneously this evening, so I had a go at capturing them using my ZWO ASI290MM Mini, 5x Televue Powermate and 250mm f/4.8 Newtonian. You have to be quick with Phobos as it orbits three times a day! This was a capture of 568 frames at an exposure of 120ms. Despite high cloud I was amazed that I could just make out both of the moons on the screen with such a relatively short exposure. The ASI290 is amazingly sensitive. I was lucky that they weren't in the diffraction spikes. Stacked in Registax and a bit of processing in Photoshop. Mars is obviously heavily overexposed. Well pleased with the result!

labelled:

The view on Sky Safari:

And with a properly exposed Mars. This was the result of 15513 frames, 0.36ms exposures, 270fps. Processed in Autostakkert and Registax.

I really must use this camera a bit more on Mars even though it's a mono cam, as it shows way more detail than I can achieve with my colour camera. I guess that's due to the really short exposures I can manage with it. Incidentally, you can see Olympus Mons as the pale patch at about the 2 O'clock position close to the limb.

Edited December 1, 2022 by lukebl

[maw lod qan]

Great capture on two small moons!

[Astroscot2]

Well done Luke, I didnt think imaging the moons would be possible without some sort of way to mask the brightness of Mars, I need to try capturing these moons also .

 

Mark

[lukebl]

1 hour ago, Astroscot2 said:

Well done Luke, I didnt think imaging the moons would be possible without some sort of way to mask the brightness of Mars, I need to try capturing these moons also .

Many thanks!

I've only attempted it when both moons are at their greatest elongation. An hour earlier or later and Phobos would have been too close to Mars.

[Space Hopper]

Great job Luke 👍🏼

[callisto]

Excellent, well done 👍

 

Mark.

[geoflewis]

Superb 👏

[Mandy D]

Impressive, indeed! Even though I have a 250mm Newt, I'm certain I could not achieve what you have done here. That's not to say I haven't thought about it, because I have. One day, maybe I'll try. Thank you for sharing your inspiring image with us. 💫