July 2020

July 30^th 1905 GMT Moon

I had an early start the next day, so I snapped the waxing gibbous moon before sunset using my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 400 and 1/400 second exposure.

July 30^th 1710 GMT Sun

I bin scanned the Sun and the sunspot was close to rotating off.

July 28^th 2230 GMT Moons, Comet and Meteor Hunt

I repeated the shot of Jupiter’s and Saturn’s moons from the previous evening.

The comet was partially obscured by cloud, so I just took shots at 70mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 10 seconds exposure.

I tried another set of shots at 5 seconds exposure, as the sky background was bright.

I then aimed my camera at Cassiopeia to take multiple exposures at 18mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 6 seconds exposure in an attempt to catch early Perseid shower meteors.

At 2249 GMT I caught a sporadic meteor.

Seconds before midnight, I bagged my first Perseid meteor of the year.

July 28^th 2105 GMT Moon

I photographed the Moon with my DSLR at 300mm focalo length, ISO 100 and 1/320 second exposure.

July 28^th  1605 GMT Sun

I bin scanned the Sun through thin moving cloud and noticed that the sunspot had rotated.

July 27^th 2230 GMT Moons, Comet and Deep Sky

I set my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 2 seconds exposure and aimed at Jupiter and then Saturn.

I then checked out COMET NEOWISE F3, firstly at 70mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 10 seconds exposure, then reduced it to 150mm focal length and 5 seconds exposure. I then reduced it further to 300mm focal length and 3 seconds exposure.

I then had an ambitious pot at M4.

I had a pot at M3.

I finished with good old Melotte 20 with 3 seconds exposure.

Unfortunately, none of these attempts worked.

July 27^th 2115 GMT Moon

I snapped the Moon with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/250 second exposure.

July 26th 0940 GMT Sun

There was some moving cloud about but I managed to see the sunspot that I had seen 3 days previously.

July 25th 2230 GMT Comet and other stuff

I had a look for Comet NEOWISE. Maybe the conditions were too hazy but I could not see it well and it looked like a fuzzy patch with a very short tail. I also checked out Jupiter's moons and saw two. Saturn did not show any moons. Antares was low but I could still see the globular cluster M4.

July 25th 2030 GMT Moon

It had been very wet and cloudy but I had a stroke of luck during dusk. The Moon was in a clear patch of sky and I snapped it with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/100 second exposure.

July 23rd 2030 GMT Moon

The afternoon and evening had been cloudy, so I bagged a lucky Moon shot with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/100 second exposure.

July 23^rd 1030 GMT Sun

I saw a sunspot on the Big Bear images, so bin scanned it myself. It was cloudy but I was still able to see it and record it. I made a drawing on my computer to record its size and position.

July 22nd 2230 GMT Planetary Moons and Comet

I could not see Comet NEOWISE F3 from my back garden, so I took my trusty 15x70 bins out and saw it immediately. Although the tail should have appeared much longer, it appeared short because it had faded a lot in ten days. I estimated its magnitude at about 4 to 5.

Out the front with my camera, I snapped Jupiter’s moons at my usual settings of ISO 6400, 300mm focal length and 2 seconds exposure.

I then tried Saturn’s moons with the same settings but did not even detect Titan.

I reduced the focal length to 150mm to get both Jupiter and Saturn into the same field of view.

Then, the comet. I used the same settings as for the Jupiter with moons shot. Although the focus was slightly out, I captured the blue/green hue of the coma and there is a hint of an ion tail.

July 13^th 0200 GMT Comet

I just checked for Comet NEOWISE F3 and it was low below a bank of cloud. I took a series of shots at 300mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 2 seconds exposure.

July 13^th 0100 GMT Moon

Comet NEOWISE was hiding behind the clouds and the viewing conditions had deteriorated generally. At least the Moon was visible and I took its photo using the same settings as the night before.

July 13^th 2315 GMT Planetary Moons and Meteors

Although the main stars of the major constellations were out, there was a lot of thin cloud and twilight about. Comet NEOWISE F3 was not visible, possibly due to a neighbour’s tree as much as the clouds. But an astronomer has to do what an astronomer has to do and there was rain and thicker cloud forecast for later in the week.

First stop was Jupiter and Saturn and I was hoping to catch Saturn’s moons, as well as Jupiter’s. I used the usual settings.

I think I caught a couple of Saturn's moons.

This time, I THINK I had my camera set up right for some meteor shots, using 18mm focal length, instead of 55! I took some test shots of Bootes, which seemed OK. However, this time I aimed the camera at the Aquila/Pegasus region, as some minor showers were active in the area, as well as the chance of catching some sporadic meteors.

I caught Corona Borealis with Bootes.

At 0025 GMT, there was a faint meteor trail near Pegasus, not to be confused with the brighter satellite trail on the Cygnus/Vulpecula border.

It could have been an Epsilon Pegasid.

At 0044 GMT, another meteor appeared in almost the same position. This implied that at least one was a true shower meteor.

July 12^th 0120 GMT Moon, Planets and Comet

The Moon was even closer to Mars and the sky had cleared a bit from earlier.

First I snapped the Moon at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/200 second exposure.

I then snapped the Moon and Mars at 200mm focal length, ISO 800 and ¼ second exposure.I overlayed the Moon image above to get this.

I then repeated the Jupiter’s moons shot.

Finally, I took lots of comet shots, varying from 100 to 300mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 2 to 4 seconds exposure. The tail appeared longer than the night before.

The final shot was a stitch and stack of 29 images.

July 12^th 2315 GMT Jupiter and Deep Sky

Most of the sky was clouded out and the cloud was moving. Jupiter was in a patch of clear sky, so I tried to capture its moons at the usual settings. I stacked 8 images but the result was poor, due to cloud. I processed a single shot instead.

Even though Melotte 20 was low, it is usually worth a visit. I kept the sane settings of 300mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 2 seconds exposure. I followed up with M31 and M34.

I stacked 24 images of Melotte 20 but was amazed at the outcome.

On the other hand, M31 was a bit disappointing.

I can't remember a better M34 but have dome a few before.

I tried the Perseus Double Cluster but it was behind a patch of cloud.

July 11^th 0745 GMT Moon and Sun

I had slept for a while but was up again. The Moon was in the south west and I took some snaps with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 400 and 1/200 second exposure. Unfortunately, all images were overexposed.

I then snapped the Sun in hydrogen alpha light. I used my Coronado PST with my 15mm eyepiece. I used my DSLR afocally using manual settings at 45mm focal length, ISO 800 and 1/20 second exposure.

July 11^th 0140 GMT Comet NEOWISE F3

And there it was, low in the north east, between houses. A bright nucleus and long tail. I tried several focal lengths with ISO 6400 and 2 seconds exposure.

July 11^th 0100 GMT Moon and Planetary Conjunctions

I caught the Moon with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/250 second exposure.

I snapped Jupiter and Saturn with my DSLR at 250mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 2 seconds exposure.

I finished with Mars and the Moon at 100mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 1/5 second exposure.

July 11^th 0030 GMT Binocular Scan

I was not sure whether Comet NEOWISE was above the horizon or not. I had a look from the front of the house but could not see it. The Moon showed well, with a waning gibbous phase and was quite low and near Mars. Melotte 20 showed well, despite the moonlight. I thought about doing some photos but my camera battery had run out.

July 10^th 2220 GMT Jupiter, Saturn and Other Stuff
 

It was the first clear evening of July 2020. My first targets were Jupiter and Saturn and their moons.

I set up my Mak and DSLR at 1.54 metres focal length, ISO 6400 and ½ second exposure. I aimed at Jupiter to attempt to capture the moons.

I then adjusted the ISO to 100 and exposure to 1/100 second to try and capture some planetary detail. I caught two cloud belts but considered the result somewhat underwhelming.

I then added a 3x Barlow lens to increase the focal length to 4.62 metres. I increased the exposure to 1/30 second. The view through the camera looked great, with two cloud belts being prominent and some shading. It was better than without the Barlow lens but only by a whisker.

I then changed the ISO back to 6400 and exposure to 1/6 second to capture the moons. I did not.

However, by combining the first and last Jupiter images, by pasting the second image of Jupiter over the overexposed image with the moons, the overall result was OK.

I did not see any planetary detail on Saturn, even though the rings were clear enough. I tried the same settings again to see if I could capture anything reasonable on Saturn. Just one half-decent shot.

I ended up with Mizar and Alcor at ISO 6400, 1.54 metres focal length and 1.6 seconds exposure. Whilst I normally use ½ second exposure with this set-up, being near the celestial poles, I can increase this.

I then set up the camera to capture meteors, with 18mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 6 seconds exposure but took a few frames of Bootes first to check focus.

Unfortunately, I set the focal length to 55mm and did not get the whole constellation. I had a brief period of excitement when I saw a trail on the meteor frames but the next one confirmed that it was a satellite instead.

July 5^th 1100 GMT Sun

The Sun was quiet in hydrogen alpha light but I decided to have a go anyway. I used my PST with a 15mm focal length eyepiece (about 27x magnification) and DSLR at 40mm focal length, ISO 800 and 1/40 second exposure, used afocally. I was not planning any close-ups but it started to rain while I was putting my equipment away.

July 2^nd 2020 GMT Moon

The Moon was waxing gibbous and very low down. I took some full disc shot with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/250 second exposure.