Mars from this morning

[legion48]

I had to work a night shift last night. I started at 20:00 and, typically, the skies where pretty clear but by just after midnight it began teaming down. By the time I finished at 06:00 it was clear again, only now it was REALLY clear. The sky seemed to be just full of stars with Mars outshining them all to my south west. I couldn't help myself, I had to set up and try and get an image of Mars. I had to be quick as I was nearly dislocating my jaw with yawning by then and I had to be quiet as bitter experience had taught me that waking Mrs Legion at that time in the morning was to be avoided at all costs.

I wasn't really prepared for how small Mars is. I tried the x2 barlow, too small, then the x4, still too small. I settled on EP projection with a 10mm lens and got the blurry image below. The last thing I tried was stacking the x2 and x4 barlows but I'd left it too late and the sky was brightening by then and the image was too dim to be worth the bother.

[markystars]

Maybe small but lots of detail there, good shots!

[Doc]

Great photo. You can see ice cap and alot of other surface detail.

[brendant]

A good result Tony, nice detail on the planet, should be happy with that one - a small target at the moment. Well done.

Brendan

[legion48]

Thanks guys.

[Clayton]

Well done Tony.

Lots of detail. Colour and exposure look good too

[geoff_k]

Given the size of the image (and Mars is never that big) the detail you have managed is mightly impressive.

I've seen it once visually, but the weather down here is pants for astronomy for the moment.

I only hope I can do that well when I eventually get around to having a go myself.

Geoff

[FranckiM06]

It's very nice and very good shot that you did.

We can see lot of details.

Franck

[Sam]

Tony, you've captured lots of detail and the polar region really stands out, excellent image!

Sam

[legion48]

Thanks for all the encouraging comments everyone. It appears that they last time I imaged Mars back in December 2007, Mars was better placed than now and about a 3rd larger than at the moment.

I've found a neat animation of the orbits of Earth and Mars that shows when the 2 planets are closest. It looks like the end on January will be most favourable, and at a reasonable time too.

Animation here: Mars's Orbit

[Starflyer]

Cracking image Tony, a good amount of detail too, you must be pleased with that

Nice find on the link too - bookmarked for future use.

[markystars]

Great link, good find thanks

[Taff]

Hi Tony' that's a nice capture of mars.Mark