Author Topic: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images  (Read 215137 times)

ColinM

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #615 on: December 09, 2020, 20:58:04 »
Here are a couple of moon rises behind Alaska Range in mid September,

These are really evocative Øivind.

Last night, the crescent moon had waned to a thinner version and was hovering above the church next to where I live.
I considered a photo but was too tired to get my tripod etc out & go out into the cold so postponed any shots

Tonight is the last night I will spend in this house before moving home......and it's cloudy & raining :(

Øivind Tøien

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #616 on: December 12, 2020, 14:08:11 »
Thanks Colin and sorry you did not get a last clear night.

I have been watching the weather here for the Jupiter-Saturn conjunction that is occurring December 21. They will appear as close to each other as they have been for 800 years, and we will be long gone all of us before next time! They will be only 1/5 moon diameter apart and are already pretty close. Stellarium tells me that they already would fit within the frame of my 300PF+stacked TC-14E and TC20-EIII on the D500, or only with TC20-EIII on the AW1. They are visible on the south to south-west sky after sunset. Unfortunately they are less than 5° above horizon here so I do not expect any good closeups with so much atmospheric disturbance, but when I finally got a view today I was a little surprised they were not closer to the horizon; I just barely got to include some mountains with the 300PF only mounted on the D500. In the original a couple of Jupiter moons are just barely visible:
#1



They might not seem that close in the image above, but with a wider lens they already make a nice duo:
#2

Nikon 12-24mm at 24mm, slightly cropped.


Saturn is quite a bit less bright than Jupiter so at this scale it is a little hard to see. Here is one with the 55mm f/3.5 micro:
#3



#4

(55mm f/3.5 micro, somewhat cropped)

While I had the TCs, AW1 and the tracker with me, -27°C in combination with a cold local wind did not invite to fiddle with the tracker at the location. I actually took a trip inside to my office to warm up before I did the wide captures on my way back.
Øivind Tøien

Bent Hjarbo

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #617 on: December 12, 2020, 15:45:25 »
Thank you for the images. We have not seen the until now I December, so with our luck it will be overcast on the 21st.

Akira

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #618 on: December 12, 2020, 20:20:10 »
Øivind, the last image look awesome.  I can feel the breadth of the universe!
"The eye is blind if the mind is absent." - Confucius

"Limitation is inspiration." - Akira

Øivind Tøien

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #619 on: December 13, 2020, 06:26:46 »
Thanks Bent and Akira. The last image is also my favorite among them. This has been my first opportunity here too - it is not that often that it is clear sky over the Alaska Range.

It was a useful exercise as I also got a better idea about exposure.  I was a bit surprised how much dimmer Jupiter and Saturn was compared to Mars. Part of that is all the atmosphere at this low angle. It looked like 300mm at f/4.5, 1/20sec at  ISO100 would give an exposure of Jupiter that was a little more than 1 stop away from being saturated in the red channel (perhaps with a little more margin in the raw data), so if I were to use stacked converters that takes 3 stops at ISO 160 with my AW1, I should not expose shorter than about 1/2.5 sec for optimal exposure of Saturn without blowing out Jupiter. Perhaps go up to ISO 400 to be able to expose at 1/5 second. The first exposure above intended to blow out Jupiter to clearly show Saturn was already at 1/2 second at f/4.5 and ISO 100, and histogram on Saturn approximately butting at the right edge.

At the conjunction the distance between the planets will be only about 1/10 of what it was now. Even a few days within December 21 on either side should be pretty spectacular, so do not give up and make sure to use an early or late opportunity. Planets sure move slowly relative to each other when seen from earth. (Conjunction between our moon and the planets is an entirely different matter.)

The shrinking Mars
To illustrate this point, below is a summary showing change in apparent size of Mars since shortly before its closest approach October 5, and opposition October 13 (slightly further away) to December 11. Remember how popular media was talking about Mars becoming so much bigger the last week before closest approach? The change does not appear to be linear - not much change around that time but it is shrinking pretty fast week by week now. I am not sure if I will continue this Size of Mars imaging project with literally smaller returns now, so the results are presented here.



(First image Sept 29 with AF 300mm f/4 and TC-301 only, the next TC-14E + TC-301 stacked, thereafter 300PF with TC14E + TC20EIII stacked. Image scale compensated for 2% difference in effective focal length between AF300 and 300PF, and for lack of the 1.4x converter in the first one. All images captured with AW1 at ISO 160 in burst of 15 frames per second. Irregular interval between imaging mostly caused by suitability of imaging conditions.)

A little side note here is that at the Cloudy Nights (CN) forum there have been a number of posts lately showing images with signs of dust storms embracing large parts of the southern hemisphere of Mars. If one looks very closely at my November 17 and December 04 captures near the southwestern edge (and perhaps on the south-eastern edge too in the first of the two) there is a blueish-grayish area not present in the earlier captures (not talking about the south pole). I could to some degree correlate them with captures on the CN forum and Mars maps. This might well be those dust clouds. I never dreamt that I could record weather on Mars with a regular 300mm lens and some stacked converters.
Øivind Tøien

Nasos Kosmas

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #620 on: December 13, 2020, 14:16:43 »
very nice Ovid, I will also make a try if the whether permits, it must be higher in the Horizon in my place :)
I still have unedit videos from October

Øivind Tøien

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #621 on: December 13, 2020, 14:25:47 »

Thanks for the comment Nasos. Best luck to all of us!
Øivind Tøien

HCS

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #622 on: December 18, 2020, 10:54:17 »
Very nice deep sky images, i could never match that  :(

A different view from my side, the Pont d'Arc near Vallon-pont-d'arc (duh) in France. Very, very popular destination in south of France, over crowded during day time, but surprisingly quiet during night time (once it's dark). Light on the foreground from headlights, since a road runs right by this location. 11 image stack (10 sky, 1 foreground). Sky in Sequator, composite in Affinity Photo.
Hans Cremers

Øivind Tøien

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #623 on: December 18, 2020, 13:16:23 »

Very nice Hans, foreground well balanced, great depth. Could you indicate date of capture? I notice that the EXIF indicates 2019, but perhaps that is the foreground and the sky is from a recent Jupiter-Saturn approach capture ?
Øivind Tøien

HCS

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #624 on: December 18, 2020, 13:56:52 »
Very nice Hans, foreground well balanced, great depth. Could you indicate date of capture? I notice that the EXIF indicates 2019, but perhaps that is the foreground and the sky is from a recent Jupiter-Saturn approach capture ?

Thank you Oivind!

I captured this in the summer of 2019, July 30th (actually, some the 31st because after midnight). All images used are from the same outing. So, it is a composite, but all the images were shot then and there.
Hans Cremers

Nasos Kosmas

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #625 on: December 18, 2020, 19:47:15 »
very nice Hans
Trying to see the stars today I show this, maybe are occupied by the Moon?

Jakov Minić

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #626 on: December 21, 2020, 10:03:30 »
Øivind, i do not know where to begin. First i was fascinated by the Jupiter/Saturn images, the you showed the Mars images project!
I thoroughly enjoyed reading through the series and the Astrophysics involved, thank you!
Hans, Hans Hans.
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armando_m

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #627 on: December 21, 2020, 17:52:44 »
Shot from last night
V1 500mm f5.6
Armando Morales
D800, Nikon 1 V1, Fuji X-T3

ColinM

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #628 on: December 21, 2020, 18:13:45 »
Shot from last night
V1 500mm f5.6
Thanks for this Armando.
I still love seeing Saturn's rings on shots taken with "ordinary" photographic lenses (as opposed to telescopes)

Plus, its been cloudy here today and yesterday so I'd never have seen them live.

Akira

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Re: [Theme] Show us your best moon (and solar system) images
« Reply #629 on: December 21, 2020, 18:34:57 »
Shot from last night
V1 500mm f5.6

Wow, you did it, Armando!  You captured not only the ring of Saturn clearly but also the satellites of Jupiter!
"The eye is blind if the mind is absent." - Confucius

"Limitation is inspiration." - Akira