Venus, Lunar Crater Humboldt
Posted: 20 October 2013
The observatory was opened Saturday, 19 October 2013, at 1755 MST, 82°F. The sky was clear. At 1800 MST, viewed Mercury, very low in the western sky, 83X and 222X. Then Saturn, even lower, 222X. Next, was Venus, 222X, a better view since it was higher in the sky. Switched to a 206X eyepiece + moon filter and did some afocal iPhone 5s video recordings, handheld. This is a cropped frame from one of the videos:
I then resumed Venus observing, 206X + moon filter. At 1825 MST, as Venus got lower in the sky, the view began to worsen. Switched to 77X + moon filter. At 1839 MST, the eastern sky was noticeably brighter from the rising moon, one day past full. It actually rose at 1819 MST, but had not yet appeared over the hill to the east. I took my last look at Venus at 1844 MST.
Slewed the 8" LX200-ACF to the moon, which still hadn't risen over the hill. Starting at 1859 MST, I watched the moon rise over the hill, 77X + moon filter. The moon took about 3 minutes to rise above the hill. It was fun watching the rising moon through the telescope. A slight terminator was visible. Crater Humboldt looked interesting tonight. Switched to 222X (without a moon filter) and viewed Humboldt. The moon was still being viewed through a tree near the observatory and was too low for imaging. At 1925 MST, took a tour of the terminator, 222X.
At 1929 MST, took some photos of the moon using the D7000 DSLR, f/11, various shutter speeds, ISO 100 and ISO 400, 300mm. This is a cropped image from a 1/320sec, ISO 400, photograph:
Beginning at 1947 MST, I used the iPhone 5s to take some handheld video recordings of crater Humboldt through the telescope. This is a frame from a slo-mo video, 222X:
Mouseover (or tap) the image to see a label showing Humboldt.
I also did some handheld iPhone 5s video recordings at 77X + moon filter. This is a frame from one of the videos showing the crater Tycho at the left and the terminator along the limb (as with the image above, this image appears reversed, as seen in the eyepiece):
Took a last look at the moon, 83X, at 1959 MST.
The observatory was closed at 2010 MST, 63°F.
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