Venus Transit 2004 .. I found another picture.

Goodbye Venus ..See you in 2012

Yesterday I was looking through one of my old astronomy log books, and I found the above picture.

I've always thought I had just the one picture of the 2004 Venus Transit....It looks like I was wrong...  :0)


Time to attack it with Macintosh software........

After a bit of photo manipulation using iPhoto...  I managed to obtain 

the following image...

Hidden in a drawer, I have some video footage of the 2004 transit. In total I think I have the last 15 minutes of the transit.  

If I convert this footage from analogue to digital I will be able to exam more closely the individual frames..

It seems yesterday morning I had one photo of the 2004 transit....  this morning I now thankfully have two....  If the video footage can be transferred to the computer ...  I'll hopefully have a lot more images of the event to look through....

Fingers crossed that the video footage is salvageable....  :0)

Clear Skies 

Mark 

Pembs Astronomer 

First watercolour sketch of Mars...

11th of May 2012
21:30ut 

Up until this morning all my Mars images have been rendered using the PaintShop Pro software....

But....I decided last night to try and sketch Mars, using just the mediums of watercolour and pencil.

The above image is my first attempt.

Mars is noticeably moving into a gibbous phase... at the moment it's 98% illuminated.

After digging out some observing blanks this morning, I noticed that the 95% illuminated blank gave a more accurate rendition of my Mars observation from last night..

What's amazing to me is that Mars is only 9.2 arcsecond in size... but my tiny Tal scope is still delivering surface detail,.....Not bad I thought for a 110mm mirror.

Notes:

Hellas was most striking, if I didn't know any better I would have guessed it to be the South Polar cap.

Syrtis Major was very prominent.

There was also a fleeting glimpse of light shading in the area around Libya and Isidis Regio, not sure what that was...although it may have been a product of an overactive imagination...  !!   :0)

The seeing during this observation was easily Antoniadi II , sometimes closer to Antoniadi I .

Hopefully tonight I will be able to capture another watercolour image... fingers crossed....


Clear Skies

Mark

Pembs Astronomer.

Waiting for the evening star.... Hellas and Syrtis Major

Tal1.... waiting for the evening star....

Pembrokeshire's weather forecast promised sunny weather today...followed by an evening of cloud free sky...  The forecast was right.....

I decided to take the Tal out of the shed and give it a bit of exercise in the back garden...  

After set up I spent the next 20 minutes observing the beautifully large sunpot grouping AR1476 and captured the following image using the 25mm plossl and an afocal capture with my small digicam.

afocal image

Using the 25mm plossl with my Tal X3 Barlow, I was able to capture the following image of Active region 1476.   

Luckily it seems I may have captured my second Lightbridge of the year....  : 0)

Looks like a Lightbridge to me.....

I had a few things to do around the house, so I was in and out periodically to check out the Sunspots...

The other day I tried out a bit of solar photography with our 300mm telephoto lens, this evening I thought I would give it another try.

With the following result:

Nikon 300mm Telephoto lens 

Looks like the 300mm lens will possibly be of use photographing the Venus transit .....

Tal1 patiently waiting to snag the evening star

The back garden doesn't get used that often for astronomical observing, it's a pity as it affords some lovely views of the inferior planets .

Tonight though it was time for the Tal1 to be let loose on Venus. 

I simply parked up the scope and waited for the night to draw in...

About an hour later the sky was still blue, but Venus shone brightly......

......time to put the Tal into  action....

Firstly I took this image with just the 25mm plossl and the zoom on my digicam:

Afocal image.. with simple digicam

Then I connected our Nikon D50 via a camera adapter to the Tal's focuser using the prime focus method...

It took a few attempts to capture a decent image, but finally I managed the following image.

Nikon D50 prime focus plus x3 Barlow

Not the best shot in the world, but at least it gave me a record of the current Venusian phase...

In my next post I'll be putting together my Venus images.


It was a beautiful evening the seeing was Antoniadi II but I would guess sometimes the clarity hinted at maybe an Antonadi of I........  the best seeing for many months I reckon....

Because of the good seeing I was able to make a lovely observation of Mars, Hellas was well defined as was the Syrtis Major. The North Polar Cap was noticeably smaller, as was the entire planet.

It's really now apparent that Mars is moving into a gibbous phase..

I've made a small sketch, but will be adding a more detailed drawing in my next post.

I say drawing as I intend my next Mars drawing to be done without the help of Paintshop Pro..... just old fashioned pencils and maybe a bit of watercolour.

Hopefully tonight the weather will hold and I'll be able to take some more Saturn, Mars, and Venus observations........

Until my next post...... clear skies everyone....


Mark    Pembs Astronomer...

Sunday morning 8:00am UT Hello Sol....

What a beautiful sunny morning here in Simpson Cross, the birds were singing, the skies were blue... 

I was to be found in the observatory, rolling back the roof, eager to observe old Sol..

Sol did not disappoint...!!

 

 

The Sun returned some wonderful clear sharp images of the latest active regions.  

The above active region had me mesmerised for many minutes. 

It's always a delight to see sunspots near the solar limb...

  

 

 

Venus transit preparation

Tal1, mylar solar filter, afocal digicam, 25mm plossl/yellow filter,

As we all know, the Venus transit is nearly upon us. 

So with that in mind I thought it time to prepare for the event.

Above is a picture of this morning's Sun, taken with the Tal Newtonian.

The Tal is more than able to capture a photo of Venus as it wheels across the solar disc....

BUT... this setup is not that portable.

On the day of the transit Helen and I will be on our motorbike, either trying to find a high vantage point to capture the rising Sun...or half way to Sussex to visit friends....

Either way carrying the Tal telescope on the motorbike might prove a little awkward..... :0)

 

With that in mind,  I thought I had better carry with me a small portable solar imaging platform, namely our Nikon D50 and 300mm telephoto lens....

I wasn't sure if the telephoto lens would be up to the job......this morning I gave it a first try-out by simply holding my solar filter in front of the telephoto lens, and firing off some frames..... 

Here's the result of that test....

I'll soon be sending off for some mylar sheet, and then I'll make up a dedicated solar filter for the 300mm telephoto lens. 

By making a dedicated filter, I hope it will help make focusing that much easier....

Fingers crossed for some transit photos next month.......


Clear Skies

Mark...  Pembs Astronomer...  :0)


I'll leave you with my one and only transit image from way back in June 2004.....    :0)