Hello + my first ever moon pics

[teh_orph]

Hi there,

I got bought a cheapo telescope by my girlfriend over the xmas period and have used it as much as I can so far! I've been pointed to these forums to learn more and just thought I'd share my first ever extra-terrestrial pics!

This is from the moon last night, at a about midnight. Viewed from London, about -1 deg C at the time

Any thoughts? They've been cleaned up slightly with the GIMP. One thing that's quite noticeable in the original is that there is colour spitting all over the images, from the cheap lenses. Are there any tools I can use to remove this in a smart way and bring in extra detail?

Cheers for the help!

Simon

[johankj]

Well done Simon.

How did you capture the images? What scope did you use?

I assume you converted the images to B/W. You are correct that colour splitting (chromatic aberration) can come from the lenses, but it can also be a result from the atmosphere itself.

A moon filter will bring out a little more contrast I've heard, since it dimms the bright moon a little, at least for visual observations.

But I think the best thing to do for you is to wait for the moon to wane a little, so that it is not so bright. The interesting features of the moon will appear along the terminator, the line that sepparates the illuminated from the dark part of the moon. This will be full of contrast.

[teh_orph]

Ah cheers for the advice, I'll take a look at it over the next few days and see if I can bring out the detail on the centre of the moon

I'm using a (nasty) National Geographic 70mm refractive number in conjunction with holding up a Pentax Optio S50 in front of the eyepiece! What's the normal way of photographing through a telescope? I see that you can buy expensive CCD slot-in devices but surely there must be an easy way to connect a camera to a mount?

[johankj]

No problem.

What you have done there is commonly called 'eyepiece projection', and it is a perfectly fine way of imaging. This gives you the flexibility of changing the 'magnification' to suite the object you are imaging. But, more 'glass' means more (i.e. eyepiece and camera lens) image distortion, because the 'glass' cannot bend light perfectly. There are 'universal camera mounts' that allow you to attach any camera to your scope so that it is steady in front of the eyepiece.

Another common way of imaging is called 'prime focus', which involes using the telescope as a tele-lens. Here you don't use any eyepieces, only perhaps the stardiagonal. For that you would need either a CCD-camera or a DSL-camera (with apropriate T-adapter with 1.25" barrell) without a camera lens attached. This potentially yields better images because of less 'glass', but means you are stuck at one fixed 'magnification' (hence the name 'prime').

If you have web camera lying around that you don't use, you can remove its lens, and you then have a CCD-(or CMOS)-camera you can use for 'prime focus'. All you then need is some sort of fixture to allow it to slot into the star diagonal. A 35mm film canister fits a 1.25" diagonal. You would then record clips (not single pics) and stack them in a program such as 'registax'.

[teh_orph]

That's fantastic, cheers for the info! I think I'm gonna have to invest in some more kit (and some thicker gloves for the cold weather )