Humor and Sinus

Still experimenting with astrophotography on my newly-restored telescope, and still producing far more trash than keepers. But I think I'm making a wee bit of progress. Frustratingly, I have yet to get a Jupiter shot even close to the quality of this one I shot two weeks' back when I was just playing around. It's still insanely difficult to focus my camera accurately, even when using a variety of different Hartmann Mask focusing aids. But I persevere, staying up late losing sleep looking at the stars rather than writing. Here're two shots I got last night.



This is Mare Humorum, the "Sea of Moisture," on the moon near the terminator. That large crater in the lower right corner is Gassendi. I took this shot using my T-mounted Canon Rebel XTi with a 2x Barlowed 9mm plossl lens on a 6" f/5 Newtonian reflector for those of you keeping track at home. The focus isn't perfect, but it's close.



The crescent in the upper portion of the photo is Sinus Iridium, which opens up to the flat expanse of Mare Imbrium. The huge crater halfway down the image is J. Herschel, so old that much of its crater wall has been eroded away by other meteorite impacts. It still cuts a pretty striking image among the dark shadows of the lunar terminator. This image was captured with the same settings as the one above.

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