Cassiopeia Observatory - Report - iPhone 8 Plus Astrophotography: Moon, Messier Globular Clusters

iPhone 8 Plus Astrophotography: Moon, Messier Globular Clusters

Posted: 25 October 2017

Open: Tuesday, 24 October 2017, 1805 MST
Temperature: 76°F

Session: 1155
Conditions: Clear, hazy, breezy

Equipment Used:
12" f/8 LX600 w/StarLock
2" 24mm UWA eyepiece
2" 50mm eyepiece
1.25" 15mm eyepiece

Camera:
iPhone 8 Plus

This was a planned short session due to an early commitment the next morning.

1813 MST: LX600 ON, StarLock OFF, High Precision OFF.

Viewed the Moon, 102X and 49X.

Mounted the iPhone 8 Plus on the 2" 50mm eyepiece for this afocal 49X photo of the Moon taken with the iOS app NightCap Camera:

I switched to the 2X iPhone lens for this afocal 49X (magnified) photo with NightCap Camera:

1828 MST: viewed Saturn, 49X and 163X. Seeing was not very good.

1830 MST: viewed M13 (the Great Globular Cluster in Hercules), 163X. I then began waiting for the sky to get darker before beginning iPhone imaging of some Messier Catalog globular star clusters for my new project: Messier Catalog iPhone Astrophotography album. While waiting I checked out some Messier Catalog globular clusters. Most were either too close to the Moon or too low in the sky to image. Viewed the following globular clusters, 163X: M14, M22, M28, M54, M69, M70, M9, M10, M12, M19, M62, M80, M107, M55, M71, M72, M92, and M56. I decided to image five of these this night.

1843 MST: the wind picked up.

Slewed to M55. Mounted the iPhone 8 Plus on the 15mm eyepiece. 1913 MST: StarLock ON. Took the following Messier globular cluster images, StarLock autoguided, afocal 163X, NightCap Camera (Long Exposure, Light Boost, ISO 8000, 1/3sec, 1 minute exposure). All were post-processed in Adobe Lightroom and converted to black-n-white images.

M55

M72

M75

M92

M56

1938 MST: StarLock OFF. Ended imaging.

Viewed M56 (globular cluster), 102X.

1943 MST: LX600 OFF.

Close: Tuesday, 24 October 2017, 1954 MST
Temperature: 70°F

Session Length: 1h 49m
Conditions: Clear, windy

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