Philip Pugh's Astronomy Blog: March 2022

March 31st 0715 GMT Sun

After 4 days, the weather cleared to show a great sunspot pattern.

March 27^th 2000 GMT Melotte 111

I took a few shots of the open star cluster Melotte 111. I stacked the best 7 to get a nice result.

March 27^th 1200 GMT Sun

I bin scanned the Sun using my filters. The sunspot pattern had changed again and one was especially large.

March 26^th 0800 GMT Sun

I bin scanned the Sun with my filters and found that the sunspots had rotated and changed shape.

March 25th 0725 GMT Moon

The Moon was low and it was full daylight. Despite my best efforts, the result was somewhat patchy.

March 24^th 1200 GMT Sun

There were a few clear days but, unfortunately, there had not been any sunspots since March 14^th. New activity rotated on and I saw a sunspot in my binoculars and filters.

March 23^rd 0550 GMT Moon and Venus

The Moon was waning gibbous and low in the west. I snapped it with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/500 second exposure.

I also snapped Venus at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/320 second exposure.

March 22^nd 2000 GMT Constellations and Disaster

My plan was an hours worth of shots in the direction of Leo. However, the connection on my intervalometer broke off and I was unable to use it. I took a few frames manually instead.

I caught a meteor on my 2nd frame.

A few frames stacked to show Leo and some surrounding stars.

March 20^th 2100 GMT Meteor Hunt and Constellation Shoot

There was a short period of darkness between dusk and moonrise. I aimed my camera at Gemini and Canis Minor in hope... I used 18mm focal length, ISO 6400 and 6 seconds exposure.

At 2124 GMT, I caught a short, but bright, meteor trail in Orion.

The constellation shots were marred by dirty lenses and, perhaps, suggested that there was a lot of sensor cleaning to do. On the other hand., by cropping out affected areas, the first set of 40 images showed a decent Gemini.

The second set of images produced a wider field. It also showed Canis Minor and Cancer.

The third set maybe came out a bit better.

As the next set was very similar to the previous one, I had another go at concentrating on Gemini. The result was not as good as I had hoped.

Gemini had started to rotate from view but Cancer and Canis Minor were still showing well.

The next was a closer shot of Cancer and Canis Minor.

March 19th 2100 Moon and Betelguese

If anything, Betelguese seemed a shade brighter than the evening before but conventional wisdom suggests that the human eye cannot detect brightness differences of less than magnitude 0.1 and I am inclined to agree. So, yes, let's say the magnitude was 0.3 again.

I used a slightly longer exposure of 1/1000 second exposure for the Moon, otherwise I used the same settings as the evening before.

March 18^th 2110 GMT Moon

The Moon was higher in the sky and very bright. Through the camera viewfinder, the Moon appeared full but the photo showed a thin terminator to the right. I used my camera at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/1250 second exposure.

March 18^th 1900 GMT Betelguese

It was mid-dusk but some of the constellations were visible. The Moon was low but bright, being just past full. As most comparison stars were visible, I estimated the brightness of Betelguese at magnitude 0.3.

March 17^th 0800 GMT Sun

Although there were some sunspots on the professional observatory images, they had faded and I could not detect them with my binoculars and filters.

March 16^th 2140 GMT Moon

The Moon was high in the sky and nearly full. Few stars were visible, despite the lack of clouds. There was only one sensible visual or photographic target, namely – the Moon. I took a few shots at 300mm focal length., ISO 100 and 1/250 second exposure with my DSLR.

March 15^th 0605 GMT Venus

I hadn’t got a good shot pf Venus in recent weeks but it hard with a DSLR, even with a zoom lens. It is like trying to photograph the Moon with a 10mm lens. I took multiple exposures at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/320 second exposure.

March 14^th 1915 GMT Moon

I had a better shot of the Moon in complete darkness.

March 14^th 1620 GMT Moon

The evening forecast was less than encouraging, so I took some shots of the waxing gibbous moon at 300mm focal length, ISO 400 and 1/500 second exposure.

March 14th 1200 GMT Sun

Conditions were far from perfect but I finally managed to see more than one sunspot, with one about to rotate off of the solar disc, plus a cluster of three.

March 13th 2050 GMT Moon

It finally cleared in mid-evening and I snapped the moon at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/400 second exposure. It was slightly over-exposed.

March 12^th 1255 GMT Sun

I bin scanned the Sun through moving cloud. Despite the presence of sunspots on the Learmonth images, I did not see any through my binoculars and filters.

March 12^th 1430 GMT Sun

I bin scanned the Sun in poor conditions and saw a single, large sunspot.

March 10^th 0640 GMT Venus

I took a look at Venus with my binoculars in the dawn sky. The phase appeared to be a thick crescent, with a 45% phase, but the apparent size was quite small as the planet retreated from Earth.

March 8^th 0610 GMT Venus

Venus was low in the dawn sky. Through my camera viewfinder, it looked like a thick crescent phase. I snapped it with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/200 second exposure.

March 7^th 2025 GMT Moon

I snapped the Moon in full darkness at 300mm focal length, ISO 100 and 1/200 second exposure. I did not get the focus I was hoping for but managed a half-decent shot after processing.

March 6^th 1650 GMT Moon

I photographed the Moon with my DSLR at 300mm focal length, ISO 400 and 1/200 second exposure. Honestly, it was overexposed but processing sorted it out.