The Dutch Observatory

Yesterday I also ran some imaging tests.  I should have done this a lot earlier, but better late than never .  I used the Williams Optics which I have used a lot lately and replaced the Celestron Shorty which produces pretty weak images with the Meade 140 2x.   I used this barlow almost 2 years ago to run some tests on Jupiter and I was pleased with the results.  However, the tests than were made with a borrowed barlow and I was not able to find one to purchase.  I now have acquired one and shown are some test results.  The 4 images are made with the CPC925 on a wedge, the DMK21AU04.AS and the Meade 140 2x barlow and the WO 2x barlow on extention rings of variable lenght as noted.  It shows that not only this is a good barlow for me for Jupiter as in last year’s tests, but also for Mars.

Another image of Mars before the weather turns again.  In fact, a number of thin, high level clouds moved through  during this session.  This was the best image of the 4.  Someone corrects me if I am wrong, but I believe to see clouds  over Arcadia, Olymous Mons, and Tharsis.  Don’t know if the light spots (green) North of Solice Lacus are just albedo or anything else.

Jim Soboleski called me to take a look at his SBIG camera. However, I wanted again take the opportunity to image Jupiter first.  Here Jupiter on the evening of November 8th.

Here in Georgia we are in a period of clear skies and relative good transparency.  However the seeing could be a lot better.  Got up this morning for Mars and here my first image of this morning. In subsequent images Mars was jumping around quite a bit.  The cloud cover South of Utopia seems much less than on previous days and the polar cap visible in all filtered images. 

The weather conditions sterted to change.  Here Jupiter with the GRS just past the meridean on the evening of October 18, 2009.

Well, 4 of us, Frank Garner, Dan Schmitt, Jon Wood (Yes Jon!!) and I, setup scopes this mornig early to image the LCROSS impact. However at 5:00am we were covered with a blanket of clouds. Eventually they went away, but just about 5 minuts before the impact, a thin blanket of clouds moved in. The first avi 1/2 minute after the impact was reasonable but the others became worse as time went on.  The processed images did not look different than the once I took two days ago for the trial run, except the quality was a lot worse.
Shown here is an animated sequence covering a period of 5 minutes.  From Two minutes prior, to 3 minutes after the impact.  The only change in the images is the level of overexposure caused by the density of the clouds moving through.  The target area is just inside the crater and a little left of the overexposed area on the left. (Click the thumbnail to activate the animation).  Don’t forget to look at the movie I made of this event on YouTube.

     

Watching NASA afterwards, it looked like we did not miss anything, because all visible observations they showed did not show a plume either.  I wish NASA would not have made such a hipe out of the LCROSS mission and get all those kids involved in observing. It must be a let down for them not to have seen a plume.

Tomorrow the LCROSS will impact the crater Cabeus on the South Pole on the moon.  Dan Schmitt and I spend some time last week getting familiar with the area where the impact will happen.  This morning I made a trial run of the event.  Here are two of the images made of the crater and impact area.  The Centaur upper stage is anticipated to impact at 7:31:30 and LCROSS is following at 7:35:45 Easter Time.  In the left image the impact location is in the right wing of the dark area a little left of the center, just behind the brighter spot.  (Reminds me of a soaring Eagle)  Tomorrow I intend to use another barlow whith a little more magnification and center around this area.  Keep my fingers crossed that not in the last minute a cloud will obscure the event as 4 months ago when a 1/2 hour storm came though as I was ready to image an ISS transit of the Sun.

Reprocessed images of Mars from September 29 and October 1st.  Click the image for the full size.  (Images are at 200% of original).

The weather was turning again and the conditions were not good, so setup and imaged Jupiter again. The GRS and the shadow of Ganymede are visible.

Tonight was the night with the best seeing conditions of the year so far.  Transparency and seeing was well above normal altough it could have been better.  I made imags over a period of 45 minutes with the Williams Optics barlow.  these images have been used in the animation (middle thumbnail).  Two of them are shown as individual composites (bottom two thumbnails).  I than made two images using the Celestron 2x barlow, which gives a longer focal ratio.  I had to stop the exposure speed to 1/19 sec. and limit the number of frames to have sufficient light for a good histogram and to limit the rotation blur of the planet (top thumbnail)

Here the images from the evening of September 30th,  (October 1 UT)