Occulation of Io

At exactly 20h30UT the moon Io entered occulation. Below two pictures taken afocal with iPhone 6 on Dobson 12" and 9mm oculair.

Solargraph ready?

It's almost summertime. This is the moment the sun reaches the highest altitude and from now on the sun will be each day lower at the sky untill the lowest point at december 21st. So a good time to install your pinhole camera for a nice solargraph. This year I will install two cans - one 50 cl and one 70cl. Both have Ilford non shining photopaper. If you want to make one yourself - see my blog DIY solargraph. Goodluck

M13 Hercules Cluster

Ring Nebula M57

Ring Nebula M57 using AS224MC on TAL200K f/10 and stacking using RegiStax6.

Saturn 3 days after opposition

Saturn was opposite the sun in Earth's sky on June 15th, and is seen during the entire night. Typically the best moments to observe planets like Mars, Jupiter, ... are those moments of opposition. However, as Saturn shows up only 17° above the horizon, conditions to observe are rather poor.

This morning I was able to make some pictures of Saturn using TAL200K and ASI224MC. Stacking was done using both RegiStax as AutoStakkert!

The Cassini division can be observed which is about 4500km wide and located between ring A (outer) and ring B (inner) and seen as a dark "line". Also some sort of shape is seen on the planet's surface. 

Below you can find a presentation of Saturn's Rings geometry over a long period.

Jupiter and GRS

Yesterday evening the sky was clear and seeing was good with a relative humitidy of 90%.  Using Sky & Telescope I was able to know when the Gread Red Spot (GRS) on Jupiter faces directly to earth. This was around 20h20 UT. I made  observations using my Dobson 12" and 9mm oculair and immediately recognized the big spot. Using my TAL200K and ASI224MC I took some pictures  and movies of Jupiter and the GRS.

Photo Nightscape Awards ESO

The Photo Nightscape Awards are for those amateur astrophotographers who want to compete. The contest is open till august 15th, 2017. See for more information here.