16 December 2006 Photos
Here are two photos I took around 0615 EST, 16 December 2006 -- the crescent moon and a bad photo of Saturn. I included the bad photo of Saturn to illustrate what often goes wrong.
Crescent Moon; 0620 EST; 16 December 2006
Orion XT-12 12-inch Dob reflector, 1500mm f/l
TeleVue Panoptic 35mm eyepiece, 43X mag
Kodak EasyShare C300 camera, one exposure
Fuzzy, out-of-focus photo of Saturn.
0630 EST, 16 December 2006.
Orion XT-12 12-inch Dob reflector, 1500mm f/l.
Nagler Type 6 5mm eyepiece, 300X mag.
Kodak EasyShare C300 camera, one exposure.
As I looked at Saturn through the telescope, the view was crystal-clear. I could make out two dark bands on Saturn. The Cassini Division -- the space between the inner and outer rings -- was a definite black line separating the inner and outer rings. Four moons were visible and the planet with its rings stood out clearly from the black background of space. However, when I tried to take the photo, it turned out as you see here -- why? Because at 300X, when I held the camera up to the eyepiece, I slightly bumped the eyepiece and that caused just enough shake to make the image blurry. I plan to try again tomorrow and will take several photos at 300X to see if I can get a clear one.
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| More photos through the telescope | |
| 29 May 2006 | Moon and Jupiter: good shot of the moon; photo of Jupiter is no good |
| 10 December 2006 | Moon and Saturn: The Moon and Saturn passed very close to each other; here are two photographs -- not bad for simple equipment. |