Sunlight on the edge of crater Halley.

This photo taken way back in 2009, with a 6 inch refractor, a wonderful telescope for imaging the Moon. 

Having viewed the Lunar features with several telescopes I have to say that six inch refractor was the favourite. 

Why I ever sold that refractor is a mystery!

 Skywatcher 150mm/f8 refractor - Nikon D50 DSLR

Here is a close up of sunlight on the edge of crater Halley, from the above photo.

Even though the telescope magnification was low on the original photo, I was able to further increase magnification via some simple software.  

A bit of tweaking with copy and paste can have many uses when it comes to chasing down the craters of the Moon. 

Tonight's Moon.

Went for a stroll tonight, just before nightfall.  

The Moon was most evident over towards the Preseli mast. 

Loads of rooks were circling nearby fields. The stars slowly made their appearance.

It was one of those memorable Pembrokeshire evenings, great to be outside, and part of the slowly darkening night. 

I grabbed myself a photo of the Moon, framed in the branches of a nearby tree.  

No telescopes this evening, none were needed, the naked eye views alone had this astronomer mesmerised.

The Plough.

 

It was a quick walk this evening, out and about before the mist rolled in. 

In that time I did manage a few attempts at photographing the Plough. 

This is my first attempt at imaging with our Samsung A71. So far so good, the results are promising.

By setting the camera to four second exposure, and an ISO of 3200 I captured the above image.

I will have to make myself a tripod for the phone, that way I'm sure the images will be a lot sharper.

Can't wait to try my hand at capturing the Milky Way.

Moonrise & Bats over Pembrokeshire.

Harvest Moon - 20h17m BST

Oh boy was this Moon a wonderful sight to behold! 

This year's Harvest Moonrise near Crymych was exceptional, luckily I was prepared.

My trusty 42x12 binoculars were sat on a nearby fence post, trained on the Moon, and the phone camera was placed (afocal) near the eyepiece.

A couple of seconds later the rising Moon was captured.

Some nearby bats were enjoying the Harvest Moon as much as Helen and I were, their presence was confirmed on our bat detector.  

The sky was now dark, and every so often a bat silhouette could just be made out swooping towards and then hastily away from us. 

The Moonrise was beautiful and the nearby bats added to the magic of the night.

The bat detector's squeeks and chirps made it all the more fun. 

Hydrogen Alpha - August 29th 2022

"Science is a way of thinking much more than it is a body of knowledge".

Carl Sagan

Hydrogen Alpha - August 26th 2022

 

“We are like butterflies who flutter for a day and think it is forever.”

― Carl Sagan, Cosmos

Hydrogen Alpha - August 25th 2022

 

Ha - August 4th 2022

Yesterday's giant prominence was still showing well this morning. 

Though it does look as if the maximum was sometime in the hours of darkness last night. 

Still, as proms go, this is a beauty.

-----------------------------------------------------------

SOLAR WARNING

Never look directly at the Sun with the naked eye or with any optic (unless you have the proper solar filter). 

Permanent and irreversible eye damage may result.

------------------------------------------------------------

Ha- August 3rd 2022

 

“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe.”

― Carl Sagan, Cosmos

Hydrogen alpha - July 20th 2022.

Currently there is a beautiful prominence on the solar limb.

Earlier this evening I captured a few Ha images with the PST. 

The Sun also has filaments, plages and sunspots a plenty at the moment.  

All good news for the solar astronomers.

The phone camera I use is good at capturing prominences, but terrible at revealing any surface detail.

Time for a new type of camera I guess... Hmmm... I wonder!

Old typewriter Mars observation - 14/10/20

Recently found this on my external hard drive. 

I've just realised I hadn't put the year of observation in the details.

 Mars apparition 2020

I used to often type up my observing sessions on the typewriter. I will have to dig through my journals to find a few more to post on blogger.