Observing Archives

February 20, 2015December 23, 2015 by Bob King

How to Photograph Tonight’s Spectacular Triple-Play Conjunction

Last night's one-day-old Moon photographed a half-hour after sunset. Details: handheld camera ISO 400, f/2.8, 1/15". Credit: Bob King

Tonight the thin, 2-day-old crescent Moon will join Venus and Mars in the western sky at dusk for one of the most striking conjunctions of the year. The otherworldly trio will fit neatly with a circle about 1.5° wide or just three times the diameter of the full moon. No question, this will catch a lot of eyes around the world. Why not take a picture and share it with your friends? Here are a few tips to do just that.

Moon, Mars and Venus around 6:45 p.m. (CST) on Feb. 20 in the western sky. Be sure to look for the darkly-lit part of the moon illuminated by sunlight reflecting off Earth called earthshine. It’s a beautiful sight in binoculars. Source: Stellarium — Moon, Mars and Venus around 6:45 p.m. (CST) on Feb. 20 in the western sky. Be sure to look for the darkly-lit part of the moon illuminated by sunlight reflecting off Earth called earthshine. Source: Stellarium, author

You won’t need much for an easy snapshot. In bright twilight, point your mobile phone toward the Moon and tap off a few shots, taking care not to touch the screen too hard lest you shake the phone and blur the image. The phone’s autoexposure and autofocus settings should be adequate to capture both the Moon and Venus. Mars is fainter and may only show if you can steady your phone against something to allow for a longer exposure without blurring. Assuming you use your phone in its default wide view, the Moon, Venus and Mars will form a tight, small group in a larger scene.

Last night, Feb. 19, Venus and Mars were 1 degree apart. Tonight they'll be even closer at just over 1/2° with the Moon a degree or so to their right. Credit: Bob King — Last night, Feb. 19, Venus and Mars were 1°apart. Tonight they’ll be even closer at just over 1/2° with the Moon about 1° to their right. Details: 65 minutes after sunset (mid-twilight), camera on tripod, 35mm lens at f/2.8, ISO 400 and 6 second exposure. Credit: Bob King

Phones provide the highest resolution in their wide setting. If you zoom in, the Moon will be bigger but resolution or sharpness will suffer. Someday phones will be as good as digital single lens reflex cameras (DSLRs) but until then, you’ll need one of these or their cousins, the point-and-shoot cameras, to get the best images of astronomical objects.

You’ll also need a tripod to keep the camera still and stable during the longer exposures you’ll need during the optimum time for photography which begins about 30 minutes after sunset. That’s when your photos will capture all three objects without overexposing the Moon and making it look washed-out. Ideally, you want to see the bright crescent contrasting with the dim glow of the earthshine.

Venus and Mars photographed in mid-twilight with a 100mm telephoto lens at f/2.8. To prevent trailing of the planets, I cut the exposure in half to 4 seconds and increased the camera's ISO to 800. Credit: Bob King — Venus and Mars photographed in mid-twilight with a 100mm telephoto lens at f/2.8. To prevent trailing of the planets, I cut the exposure in half to 4 seconds and increased the camera’s ISO to 800. Credit: Bob King

Lucky for us, the Moon’s sharp form makes an ideal target for the camera’s autofocus. Frame an attractive landscape or ask a friend to stand in the foreground. Set your lens to its widest open setting (usually f/2.8-3.5) and the ISO (your camera’s sensitivity to light) to 800. The higher the ISO, the shorter the exposure you can use to capture an image, but high ISOs introduce unwanted noise and graininess. 800’s a good compromise. If you can manually set your exposure, start at 4 seconds.

Compose your photo and then focus on the Moon and gently press the shutter button. Check the image on the back screen. Are you on target or is it too dark? If so, double the time. If too bright, half it. As the sky gets darker, you’ll need to gradually increase your exposure. That’s when the Moon will start to wash out and the beautiful deep blue sky turn black or the color of your local light pollution. Around here, that’s pinkish-orange. I’ve got lots of orange sky photos to prove it!

The key to good photos in twilight is balancing the different types of lighting - dusk, the sunlit crescent, the earth-lit portion and the planets. Shoot pictures at a variety of exposures between about 30-60 minutes after sunset when the western sky is still aglow but the Moon is bright and obvious. Credit: Bob King — Mercury and the Moon on Jan. 31, 2014. Besides finding a scene you like, the key to good photos in twilight is balancing the different types of lighting – dusk, the sunlit crescent, the earth-lit outline and the planets. Shoot pictures at a variety of exposures starting about 35 minutes after sunset when the western sky is still aglow but the Moon is bright and obvious. Credit: Bob King

All told, you can use a mobile phone to shoot from about 25-40 minutes after sunset and a DSLR from 25 minutes to 75 minutes after. If you’re shooting with a standard 24-35mm lens, keep your exposures under 20 seconds or the Moon and planets will start to streak or trail. The Rule of 500 is a great way to remember how long a time exposure you can make with any lens before celestial objects start trailing. So, 500/24mm = 20.8 seconds and 500/200mm (telephoto) = 2.5 seconds. That means if you plan to shoot the conjunction with a longer lens, you’ll need to up your ISO to 1600 or even 3200 in late twilight to get a tack-sharp, motionless photo.

I screwed this photo up of the Moon, Jupiter and Mars by overexposing the sunlit crescent. Credit: Bob King — I screwed this photo up of the Moon, Jupiter and Mars by overexposing the sunlit crescent. It’s all part of learning the ropes, a task made much easier nowadays by simply checking the view screen of your camera and trying a different exposure. Credit: Bob King

Telephoto images are a bit more challenging, but they increase the size of the pretty trio within the scene. When shooting telephoto images (even wide ones if you’re fussy), shoot them on self-timer. That’s the setting everyone used before the selfie took the world by storm. Most timers are pre-set to 10 seconds. You press it and the camera counts down 10 seconds before automatically tripping the shutter, allowing you time to put yourself in a group photo.

In astrophotography, using the self-timer assures you’re going to get a vibration-free photo. If it’s cold out and you’re shooting with a telephoto, vibration from your finger pressing the shutter button can jiggle the image.

Good luck tonight and clear skies! If you have any questions, please ask.

February 18, 2015December 23, 2015 by David Dickinson

Black Moon: Why the New Moon on February 18th is Special

Did you hear the one about last month’s ‘supermoon?’

Yeah, we know. The hype was actually for an event that was less than spectacular, as it revolved around the first New Moon of 2015 on January 20^th. Said suspect Moon was touted as ‘super’ (we prefer the quixotic term proxigean) as it occurred 18 hours prior to perigee.

Not that the first lunar perigee of 2015 was an especially close one in time or space at 359,642 kilometres distant. Is every New and Full Moon now destined to become branded ‘super’ in the never ending SEO quest to get eyeballs on web pages?

But wait, there’s more. We’ve noticed as of late that another popular term is creeping into the popular astronomical vernacular: that of a ‘Black Moon’.

Black Moons for the next decade. Created by the author.

We’ve written lots about Moons both of the Black and Blue variety before. We’ll also let you in on a small secret: astronomers rarely sit around observatories discussing these Moons, be they Blue, Black or Super. At most, astronomers note the weeks surrounding New as the ‘Dark of the Moon,’ a prime time to go deep for faint objects while the light polluting Moon is safely out of the sky. And yes, terms such as ‘Super’ or ‘Black Moon’ have dubious roots in astrology, while the term Blue Moon comes down to us via a curious mix-up from Sky and Telescope and the Maine Farmer’s Almanac.

Simply put, a Black Moon is the New Moon version of a Blue Moon, and is either:

A month missing a Full or New Moon… this can only occur in February, as the lunar synodic period from like phase to phase is 29.5 days long. This last occurred in 2014 and will next occur in 2018.
The second New Moon in a month with two. This can happen in any calendar month except February.
And now for the most convoluted definition: the third New Moon in an astronomical season with four.

We bring this up because the February 18^th New Moon is ‘Black’ in the sense that it meets the requirements expressed in rule 3. The fourth New Moon of the season falls on March 20^th, just 13 hours before the northward equinox on the same date.

Credit: David Blanchflower. — An extremely thin crescent Moon against a low contrast twilight sky. Credit and copyright: David Blanchflower.

Such are the curious vagaries of the juxtaposition of the lunar cycle on our modern day Gregorian calendar. Unfortunately, this doesn’t mean you’ll win the lottery or be lucky in love: any Earthly woes are strictly your own affairs to deal with, Black Moon or no. Continue reading “Black Moon: Why the New Moon on February 18th is Special”

February 17, 2015April 26, 2016 by David Dickinson

Catch a ‘Conjunction Triple Play’ on February 20th as the Moon Meets Venus & Mars

The Moon passes Mars and Venus last month... this week's pass is much closer! (Photo by Author).

Fear not, the chill of late February. This Friday gives lovers of the sky a reason to brave the cold and look westward for a spectacular close triple conjunction of the planets Mars, Venus and the waxing crescent Moon.

This week’s New Moon is auspicious for several reasons. We discussed the vagaries of the Black Moon of February 2015 last week, and the lunacy surrounding the proliferation of the perigee supermoon. And Happy ‘Year of the Goat’ as reckoned on the Chinese luni-solar calendar, as this week’s New Moon marks the start of the Chinese New Year on February 19^th. Or do you say Ram or Sheep? Technical timing for the New Moon is on Wednesday, February 18^th at 23:47 UT/6:47 PM EST, marking the start of lunation 1140. The next New Moon on March 20^th sees the start of the first of two eclipse seasons for 2015, with a total solar eclipse for the high Arctic. More on that next month!
Continue reading “Catch a ‘Conjunction Triple Play’ on February 20th as the Moon Meets Venus & Mars”

February 8, 2015December 23, 2015 by Ken Kremer

Gorgeous Sunrises, Auroras, Landscapes, and More from Space Station Crew

Almost disappearing behind the solar panels before sunrise: the US East coast from DC to Boston. #HelloEarth. Credit: NASA/ESA/Samantha Cristoforetti

The Expedition 42 crew aboard the International Space Station (ISS) continues to delight us with stunning views of ‘Our Beautiful Earth from Space.’

Here’s a collection of a few of the newest sunrises, auroras, landscapes, nightlights, and more snapshots from the multinational crew of six astronauts and cosmonauts living and working aboard the ISS orbiting some 250 miles (400 kilometers) overhead.

And don’t forget that at sunset tonight (Feb. 8), a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket is due to blastoff at 6:10 p.m., EST, if all goes well carrying the DSCOVR space weather satellite about a million miles (1.5 million kilometers) away to the L1 Lagrange point.

The Falcon 9 will blastoff from Cape Canaveral, Florida, pictured below:

From Key West to the Gulf of Mexico and #Atlanta, a very nice, clear, half moonlit night. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts. KSC and Cape Canaveral launch pads along Florida east coast at right. — From Key West to the Gulf of Mexico and #Atlanta, a very nice, clear, half moonlit night. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts.
KSC and Cape Canaveral launch pads along Florida east coast at right.

Tens of millions of you are included in the lead sunrise photo of the U.S. East Coast – taken by ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti perched aboard the orbiting lab complex.

And here’s a “speechless sunrise” taken today by NASA astronaut Terry Virts. We agree!

#speechless from this #sunrise. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts

Always happy to see this lovely sight that has become familiar in #Patagonia. Credit: NASA/ESA/Samantha Cristoforetti

This, on the contrary, I've seen only once: the Strait of Magellan and la Tierra del Fuego free of clouds! Credit: NASA/ESA/Samantha Cristoforetti — This, on the contrary, I’ve seen only once: the Strait of Magellan and la Tierra del Fuego free of clouds! Credit: NASA/ESA/Samantha Cristoforetti

#Moscow shining like a bright star under the aurora. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts

#aurora over Anchorage and Fairbanks #Alaska. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts

The current six person crew includes astronauts and cosmonauts from three nations; America, Russia and Italy including four men and two women serving aboard the massive orbiting lab complex.

They comprise Expedition 42 Commander Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Terry Virts from NASA, Samantha Cristoforetti from the European Space Agency (ESA) and cosmonauts Aleksandr Samokutyayev, Yelena Serova, and Anton Shkaplerov from Russia.

Brazilian clouds showing off their #majesty. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts

L+72/73: Logbook. Wow, this has been a busy week! But we can still catch up a little bit… ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti
….https://plus.google.com/app/basic/stream/z12iczzoqovhfdo2z23odnbwmz3cir0ox04?cbp=1hmsp4t51xmr3&sview=27&cid=5&soc-app=115&soc-platform=1&spath=%2Fapp%2Fbasic%2F%2BSamanthaCristoforetti%2Fposts …

Soyuz- everyone’s ride to space and back!

#soyuz #earth #beauty. Credit: NASA/Terry Virts

Stay tuned here for Ken’s continuing Earth and planetary science and human spaceflight news.

Ken Kremer

'I wish I could bring all of you up to see this!' Credit: NASA/Terry Virts — ‘I wish I could bring all of you up to see this!’ Credit: NASA/Terry Virts

ISS Expedition 42. Credit: NASA/ESA/Roscosmos

February 5, 2015April 8, 2018 by Nancy Atkinson

A Night-Sky Timelapse You Don’t Want to Miss

Still image from the timelapse, "Illusion of Lights: A Journey into the Unseen." Credit and copyright: Brad Goldpaint Photography.

It’s an old story: a couple leave their jobs, sell everything, and live in motorhome to capture footage and imagery of the night sky.

Wait… what?

This unique story is exactly what Brad and Marci Goldpaint did. They left their jobs and traveled throughout the western US in an RV to begin educating the public about the damaging effects of light pollution. They wanted to help reconnect people with the simple beauty of the night sky and have been teaching photography workshops and gathering footage for a new timelapse called “Illusion of Lights: A Journey into the Unseen.”

With breathtaking scenes and soaring music, this video “introduces you to the concept of movement and time that visually explores our night skies,” says Brad on Vimeo.

We’ve featured images and timelapses from Brad before, and he shared how the sudden loss of his mother caused him to reassess his goals and priorities. Since 2009 he’s been working on outdoor photography and has now dedicated his work to sharing images of the night sky with others.

For this timelapse, Brad said he “spent countless nights traversing in the dark, carrying heavy camera equipment, and braving the dark unseen.” He dealt with lightning storms, dangerous winds, and up-close encounters with bears and other wildlife. Sometimes, after spending days hiking to a remote location and with optimistic weather reports, Mother Nature showed up and ruined his opportunity to get the shot.

A few highlights: at about 2:00 there is an exploding meteor with a persistent train that is stunning. You’ll also see strange lights on Mount Rainier. Brad explained these lights are from people climbing the mountian at night in hopes of reaching the summit by sunrise the following day. The white lights you see are from their headlamps. “Can you imagine climbing up a mountain in the middle of the night?” he asks?

Another still from "Illusions of Light." Credit and copyright: Brad Goldpaint Photography. — Another still from “Illusions of Light.” Credit and copyright: Brad Goldpaint Photography.

For more about this film see their website.

Illusion of Lights: A Journey into the Unseen from Goldpaint Photography on Vimeo.

February 4, 2015December 23, 2015 by David Dickinson

By Jove: Jupiter Reaches Opposition on February 6th

Jupiter +Great Red Spot as seen on January 22nd 2015. Credit:

Did you see the brilliant Full Snow Moon rising last night? Then you might’ve also noticed a bright nearby ‘star’. Alas, that was no star, but the largest planet in our solar system, Jupiter. And it was no coincidence that the king of the gas giants is near the Full Moon this February, as Jupiter reaches opposition this Friday on February 6^th at 18:00 Universal Time or 1:00 PM EST.

As the term implies, opposition simply means that an outer planet sits opposite to the Sun. Mercury and Venus can never reach opposition. Orbiting the Sun once every 11.9 years, oppositions for Jupiter occur once every 399 days, or roughly every 13 months. This means that only one opposition for Jupiter can happen per year max, and these events precess forward on the Gregorian calendar by about a month and move one zodiacal constellation eastward per year.

Starry Night. — The apparent path of Jupiter through Spring 2015. Created using Starry Night Education Software.

Through a telescope, Jupiter exhibits an ochre disk 40” in diameter striped with two main cloud belts. The northern equatorial belt seems permanent, while the southern equatorial belt is prone to pulling a ‘disappearing act’ every decade of so, as last occurred in 2010. The Great Red Spot is another prominent feature gracing the Jovian cloud tops, though its appeared salmon to brick-colored in recent years and seems to be shrinking.

Jupiter rotates once every 9.9 hours, fast enough that you can watch one full rotation in a single night.

Jupiter near opposition in 2014. Photo by author.

It’s also fascinating to watch the nightly dance of Jupiter’s four large moons Io, Europa, Ganymede and Callisto as they alternatively cast shadows on the Jovian cloud tops and disappear into its shadow. Near opposition, this shadow casting activity is nearly straight back as seen from our perspective. Here is the tiny ‘mini-solar system’ that fascinated Galileo and further convinced him that the Earth isn’t the center of the cosmos. Jupiter has 67 moons in all, though only 4 are within range of modest sized telescopes… Even 5^th place runner up Himalia is a challenge near the dazzling disk of Jove at +14^th magnitude.

Also watch for a phenomenon known as the Seeliger or Opposition Effect, a sudden surge in brightness like a highway retro-reflector in the night.

Opposition 2015 finds Jupiter just across the Leo-Cancer border in the realm of the Crab. Jupiter crossed from Leo into Cancer on February 4^th, and will head back into the constellation of the Lion on June 10^th. Jupiter then spends the rest of 2015 in Leo and heads for another opposition next year on March 8^th.

Jupiter will also make a dramatic pass just 24’ — less than the diameter of the Full Moon — from Regulus on August 11^th, though both are only 11.5 degrees east of the Sun in the dusk sky. Jupiter also forms a 1 degree circle with Regulus, Mercury and Jupiter 14.5 degrees east of the Sun on August 7^th.

Jupiter reaches a maximum declination north for 2015 on April 7^that 18 degrees above the celestial equator. We’re still in a favorable cycle of oppositions for Jupiter for northern hemisphere viewers, as the gas giant doesn’t plunge south of the equator until September 2016.

Looking farther ahead, Jupiter reaches east quadrature on May 4^th, and sits 90 degrees elongation from the Sun as the planet and its moons cast their shadows far off to the side from our Earthly perspective. We’re still also in the midst of a plane crossing: February 5^th is actually equinox season on Jupiter! This also means that there’s still a cycle of mutual eclipses and occultations of the Jovian moons in progress. One such complex ballet includes (moons) on the night of February 26th.

February 26th. Starry Night — The close grouping of Io, Callisto and Ganymede on the night of February 26th. Created using Starry Night Education software.

And yes, it is possible to see the Earth transit the disk of the Sun from Jove’s vantage point. This last occurred in 2014, and will next occur in 2020.

But wait, there’s more. Jupiter also makes a thrilling pass near Venus on July 1^st, when the two sit just 0.4 degrees apart. We fully expect a spike in “what are those two bright stars?” queries right around that date, though hopefully, the conjunction won’t spark any regional conflicts.

Jupiter, Regulus and the rising waning gibbous Moon on the evening of February 4th. Credit: Stellarium.

Solar conjunction for Jupiter then occurs on August 26^th, with the planet visible in the Solar Heliospheric Observatory’s (SOHO) LASCO C3 camera from August 16^th to September 6^th.

Emerging into the dawn sky, Jupiter then passes 0.4 degrees from Mars on October 17^th and has another 1.1 degree tryst with Venus on October 26^th.

Looking for Jupiter in the daytime near the waxing gibbous Moon. Credit: Stellarium.

Let the Jovian observing season begin!

-Wonder what a gang of rogue space clowns is doing at Jupiter? Read Dave Dickinson’s original tale Helium Party and find out!

January 30, 2015December 23, 2015 by David Dickinson

This Comparison of Comet 67/P With Other Solar System Bodies Will Blow Your Mind

There’s darkness out there in the cold corners of the solar system.

And we’re not talking about a Lovecraftian darkness, the kind that would summon Cthulhu himself. We’re talking of celestial bodies that are, well. So black, they make a Spinal Tap album cover blinding by comparison.

We recently came across the above true color comparison of Comet 67/P Churyumov-Gerasimenko adjusted for true reflectivity contrasted with other bodies in the solar system. 67/P is definitely in the “none more black” (to quote Nigel Tufnel) category as compared to, well, nearly everything.

Welcome to the wonderful world of albedo. Bob King wrote a great article last year discussing the albedo of Comet 67/P. The true albedo (or lack thereof) of 67/P as revealed by Rosetta’s NAVCAM continues to astound us. Are all comets this black close up? After all, we’re talking about those same brilliant celestial wonders that can sometimes be seen in the daytime, and are the crimson harbingers of regal change in The Game of Thrones, right?

There was also a great discussion of the dark realms of 67/P in a recent SETI Talk:

As with many things in the universe, it’s all a matter of perspective. If you live in the U.S. Northeast and are busy like we were earlier today digging yourself out from Snowmageddon 2015, then you were enjoying a planetary surface with a high albedo much more akin to Enceladus pictured above. Except, of course, you’d be shoveling methane and carbon dioxide-laced snow on the Saturnian moon… Ice, snow and cloud cover can make a world shinny white and highly reflective. Earthshine on the dark limb of the crescent Moon can even vary markedly depending on the amount of cloud and snow cover on the Earth that’s currently rotated moonward.

Earthshine or the 'Old Moon in the New Moon's arms' from earlier this week. Photo by author. — A brilliant Earthshine, or the ‘Old Moon in the New Moon’s arms’ from earlier last week. Photo by author.

To confound this, apparent magnitude over an extended object is diffused over its surface area, making the coma of a comet or a nebula appear fainter than it actually is. Engineers preparing for planetary encounters must account for changes in light conditions, or their cameras may just record… nothing.

For example, out by Pluto, Charon, and friends, the Sun is only 1/1600th as bright as seen here on sunny Earth. NASA’s New Horizons spacecraft will have to adjust for the low light levels accordingly during its historic flyby this July. On the plus side, Pluto seems to have a respectable albedo of 50% to 65%, and may well turn out to look like Neptune’s large moon, Triton.

Triton as imaged by Voyager 2: a dead ringer for Pluto? Credit: NASA/JPL.

And albedo has a role in heat absorption and reflection as well, in a phenomenon known as global dimming. The ivory snows of Enceladus have an albedo of over 95%, while gloomy Comet 67/P has an albedo of about 5%, less than that of flat black paint. A common practice here in Aroostook County Maine is to take fireplace ashes and scatter them across an icy driveway. What you’re doing is simply lowering the surface albedo and increasing the absorption of solar energy to help break up the snow and ice on a sunny day.

A high albedo snow cover blanketed New England earlier this week! Photo by author.

Ever manage to see Venus in the daytime? We like to point out the Cytherean world in the daytime sky to folks whenever possible, often using the nearby Moon as a guide. Most folks are amazed at how easy this daytime feat of visual athletics actually is, owing to the fact that the cloud tops of Venus actually have a higher albedo of 90%, versus the Moon’s murky 8 to 12%.

Venus (upper left) by daylight. Photo by author.

Apollo 12 command module pilot Richard Gordon remarked that astronauts Al Bean and Pete Conrad looked like they’d been “playing in a coal bin” on returning from the surface of the Moon. And in case you’re wondering, Apollo astronauts reported that moondust smelled like ‘burnt gunpowder’ once they’d unsuited.

The surface of the Moon closeup: darker than you think! Credit: Apollo 12/NASA.

Magnitude, global dimming and planetary albedo may even play a role in SETI as well, as we begin to image Earthlike exoplanets… will our first detection of ET be the glow of their cities on the nightside of their homeworld? Does light pollution pervade the cosmos?

And a grey cosmos awaits interstellar explorers as well. Forget Captain Kirk chasing Khan through a splashy, multi-hued nebula: most are of the light grey to faded green varieties close up. Through a telescope, most nebulae are devoid of color. It’s only when a long time exposure is completed that colors too faint to see with the naked eye emerge.

All strange thoughts to consider as we scout out the dark corners of the solar system. Will the Philae lander reawaken as perihelion for Comet 67/P approaches on August 13^th, 2015? Will astronauts someday have to navigate over the dark surface of a comet?

I can’t help but think as I look at the duck-like structure of 67/P that one day, those two great lobes will probably separate in a grand outburst of activity. Heck, Comet 17P/Holmes is undergoing just such an outburst now — one of the best it has generated since 2007 — though it’s still below +10^th magnitude. How I’d love to get a look at Comet 17P/Holmes up close, and see just what’s going on!

January 28, 2015April 26, 2016 by David Dickinson

iPhone Astrophotography: How to Take Amazing Images of the Sky with Your Smartphone Tonight!

All photos credit and copyright: Andrew Symes.

Got a smartphone and a telescope?

It’s a sight now common at many star parties. Frequently, you see folks roaming through the darkness, illuminated smartphone aimed skyward. Certainly, the wealth of free planetarium apps has done lots to kindle a renewed interest in the night sky.

Inevitably, after peering through the eyepiece of a telescope, the question then arises:

“Can I get a picture of that with my phone?”

The short answer is yes, with a little skill and patience.

Now simply aiming a camera at the eyepiece of a telescope — known as afocal astrophotography — and shooting without removing the camera lens and physically coupling it to the telescope is a tricky balancing act. Back in the olden days, the Moon and perhaps the brighter planets were the only bright target within bounds of afocal film photographers, and only then after a lengthy set of estimations to hit the correct focal length. The advent of digital cameras and ‘live preview’ means that you can now simply aim, shoot, and throw away or delete anything off center or out of focus. Digital ‘film’ is cheap, and most folks simply use trial and error to get the ‘keepers’. The Moon is an especially bright and easy target for beginners to practice on.

Of course, your typical smartphone, like a webcam, has an imaging chip much smaller than a DSLR. This is why astrophotographers are often tempted to take out a second mortgage (“we don’t really need that second car, do we?” is a common spousal refrain) in pursuit of excellence. Another drawback is that through a smartphone, a planet may look like an overexposed blob. A simple but effective way to get around this is to affix a light reducing filter to the eyepiece. In fact, I’ve used a variable polarizer during live broadcasts of the Virtual Star Party to great effect. And as with webcam imaging, smartphone astrophotographers now often use automated stacking programs to clean up images and tease out detail. Being an old timer, my faves are still K3CCD Tools and Registax, though many young guns out there now use DeepSkyStacker as well.

Telescope — Andrew Symes’ imaging setup.

Now, I’ll admit, I’m an ‘Android guy,’ and I have put most of my efforts over the years into planetary imaging with a homemade webcam. We therefore sought out in-the-field expertise from someone on the forefront of iPhone astrophotography. Andrew Symes has been taking images of the solar system and beyond with his iPhone coupled to his Celestron NexStar 8” SE telescope for years. He also has one of the few handles on Twitter that we’re envious of, @FailedProtostar. He also ventures out into the chilly nights frequent to his native of Ottawa, Canada to practice his craft, as he observes in temperatures that would drop a Tauntaun.

We caught up with Andrew recently to ask him about some tips of the trade.

An ‘iPhone Sun’ shot in hydrogen alpha through a Coronado PST.

Universe Today: I know from doing webcam photography that acquiring, centering and focusing are often more than half the battle. Any tips for accomplishing these?

Andrew: Acquiring, centering, and focusing the objects I’m photographing is definitely the big challenge! To speed and simplify the process, I have a dedicated eyepiece that I use in association with my phone and adapter. Before even heading outside, I attach the adapter to this eyepiece, insert my phone, and hold the unit up to a light source to see if the camera lens is properly aligned with the eyepiece. It usually takes a bit of fiddling to get things set properly because if the adapter and eyepiece are not perfectly aligned, nothing will show up on the camera screen. It’s better to get that process out of the way in a lit environment than outside in the dark. I then set that unit aside, and use a separate “adapter-less” zoom eyepiece to locate and center the object in the telescope. Once I’ve acquired the object and am successfully tracking it, I remove my zoom eyepiece and drop in the eyepiece/adapter/phone combo. At that point, the object is usually visible on screen but out of focus since the focus required for the iPhone is different from what works for my eyes! To ensure proper focus, I display the object on my phone’s screen using a live video app called FiLMiC Pro and adjust the focus until it is sharp. I use that app because it has a digital zoom function that lets me get a closer look at the object than the standard iPhone video camera view. Only once I’m confident that I’ve achieved good focus and am tracking the object properly, will I start to record video or shoot individual frames.

A comparison of the first image of the Orion Nebula (M42) shot in 1880 (left) with a modern iPhone image.

Universe Today: A question I always like to ask everyone… what was your biggest mistake? Are there any pitfalls to avoid?

Andrew: There are a few pitfalls to avoid when doing iPhone astrophotography. In the past, I would attach the adapter outside while the eyepiece was in the telescope but this caused a number of problems. Often, I would accidentally bump the object out of view while attaching and adjusting the adapter and have to align everything all over again. The weather is also often cold here, and it’s VERY difficult to attach the adapter properly with gloves on, so I would either get really cold hands or spend a lot of unnecessary time fumbling with the adapter with gloved hands. For those reasons, I now prepare the eyepiece/adapter/phone unit indoors in advance as described above. I also now make sure that my iPhone is fully charged before heading outdoors as I’ve found that the iPhone battery drains very quickly when the camera is running constantly — especially in cold weather. Even with an almost-full battery, there are times here in winter when the phone will simply shut down due to the low temperature so I make sure to only start capturing photos/videos once I’m completely confident in my setup.

Yes, that’s Comet C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy shot with an iPhone!

Universe Today: You’re really pushing the envelope by doing deep sky astro-pics with an iPhone … anything else that you’re experimenting with or working on?

Andrew: My main focus is definitely still on iPhone astrophotography because I like the quick and “light” setup. I don’t need to bring a laptop outside and don’t need equipment that I wouldn’t normally have on me anyway (other than the adapter itself.) So, I want to keep pushing the envelope with what I can capture using the phone and my goal is now is to see how far I can go with deep-sky objects. I’d really like to add the Ring and Dumbbell Nebulae to my portfolio, for example, and see if it’s possible to grab even fainter ones. There are also some non-deep sky targets I’d like to try. I haven’t been successful at capturing a telescopic photo of the ISS, and would love to see if I can catch it transiting the Sun or Moon with my phone. I also still need to capture Uranus and Neptune to round out a solar system collage I put together in 2014!

Lastly, I’m continually experimenting with photo apps to see which are best at capturing and/or processing telescopic images, and have just started using both an iPhone 4S and iPhone 6 to take photos and video. Surprisingly, I still prefer the 4S for planetary imaging as I haven’t been able to properly capture the true colors of planets with the iPhone 6 yet. The 6 has better camera resolution but seems to be adjusting the exposure of small, faint objects like planets differently than the 4S, so I need to change my routine and techniques to compensate. The methods I’ve become accustomed to using with the 4S don’t seem to translate directly to the 6 so I have some learning yet to do!

Amazing stuff, for sure. And to think, we were all gas-hypering film and using absurdly long focal lengths to get blurry planetary images just a few decades ago!

-Check out more of Andrew’s images, as well as read more about how he does it.

-Got a pic, shot with a smartphone or otherwise? Send ‘em in to Universe Today!

January 27, 2015December 23, 2015 by David Dickinson

Luna vs. the Hyades! The 1st of 13 Occultations of Aldebaran Set For January 29th

The cosmos is continually in motion.

Be it atoms, stars or snowflakes from the latest nor’easter pounding the New England seaboard, anything worth studying involves movement. And as skies and snowbound roads clear, this Wednesday and Thursday evening will give us a reason to brave the January cold, as the waxing gibbous Moon pierces the Hyades star cluster to graze past the bright star Aldebaran.

During Thursday night’s passage, the Moon will be 78% illuminated. In a sort ‘cosmos mimics controversy’ irony, the gibbous Moon is doing its best to mimic a sky bound ‘deflategate’ football just in time for Superbowl XLIX this weekend.

But the January 29^th event also marks the first occultation of Aldebaran for 2015.

Fun fact: At magnitude +0.8, Aldebaran is the only star brighter than +1^st magnitude north of the celestial equator that the Moon can currently occult. Regulus, the runner up, shines at magnitude +1.4. Two other second magnitude stars — Antares and Spica — lie along the Moon’s path on occasion, and up until the 2^nd century BC, it was possible for the Moon to occult Pollux in the constellation Gemini as well.

There are 13 occultations of Aldebaran in 2015, and the Moon occults the star 49 times overall until the last event in the current cycle on September 3^rd, 2018. Aldebaran is also occulted by the Moon more often in the current 2010-2020 decade than any other bright star. You can even spy Aldebaran near the daytime Moon with binoculars, as we did back in 1996 from North Pole, Alaska.

Maps for the 13 occultations of Aldebaran by the Moon in 2015, click to enlarge. solid lines denote regions were the occultation occurs under dark skies. Credit: Occult 4.0.

Of course, the January 29^th event is an occultation only for the high Arctic, with only a scattering of villages and distant early warning stations along the northern Nunavut coast welcoming the sequence of 2015 occultations of the bright star.

The rest of us will see a close photogenic pass, as the Moon makes an end run through the Hyades star cluster every 27.3 day sidereal lunar month in 2015. The Moon will thus occult several members of the Hyades on each pass. Our best bet for North America is the occultation of Aldebaran on November 26^th, though the Moon will be just 13 hours past Full.

68 Tauri. Credit: Occult 4.0 — The occultation of 68 Tauri (a member of the Hyades) for January 29th. Credit: Occult 4.0.

Why doesn’t the path of the Moon just stay put with respect to the sky? Because the orbit of our Moon is fixed at an inclination of 5.1 degrees not with respect to our equator, but to the plane of the ecliptic. This means that the Moon’s orbit is in motion as well, and can wander anywhere from declination 28.6 degrees north to south as it cycles from a shallow to steep path every 18.6 years. We’re actually in a shallow year in 2015 (known as a minor lunar standstill) after which the apparent path of the Moon through the sky begins to widen again until April 2025.

An occultation is celestial motion that you can see in real time as a star or planet is photobomb’d by the onrushing Moon like a January snowplow… but those background stars are in motion as well.

The Hyades themselves — along with our own solar system — are moving around the galactic center. The nearest open cluster to us at 153 light years distant, the Hyades provided a unique object of study for 19^th century astronomers. Astronomer Lewis Boss of the Dudley observatory spent several decades studying the proper motion — the apparent motion that a star seems to be moving across the sky from our solar system-bound perspective, measured in arc seconds — of the Hyades, and found the entire group was converging on a point in the constellation Orion near 6 hours 7’ right ascension and +7 degrees declination.

Of course, this motion is relative and demonstrates a changing perspective, as the Hyades recedes from our solar system like a defensive line rushing to sack a quarterback.

OK, enough with the sports similes. The Hyades are so close that the actual Hyades Stream — often referred to as the Hyades Moving Group — is actually strewn across the constellations Orion, Taurus and Aries and more.

Some stars, such as 20 Arietis in the adjacent constellation Aries and Iota Horologii in the southern hemisphere may actually members as well. There’s always a bit of ongoing controversy when it comes to actual moving group membership, which is usually pegged by determining proper motion, coupled with the age and metallicity of prospective stars. Growing up in the Milky Way galaxy, our Sun was once a member of some unnamed ancient open cluster that has since long dispersed, like the Hyades are in the process of doing now.

The Hyades contains hundreds of stars and ironically, Aldebaran is not a member of the cluster, but is merely 65 light years away from us in the foreground. The V-shaped asterism of the Hyades gives the Head of Taurus the Bull its distinctive shape. The Hyades are named after the rain nymph daughters of Atlas from Greek mythology, whose half daughters the Pleiades also adorn the nearby sky.

And as an added bonus, don’t miss comet C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy crossing the constellation Triangulum, also nearby. Q2 Lovejoy reaches perihelion this week on January 30th, and although it’s completing with the evening Moon, it’s still holding out at a respectable magnitude +4.5.

All reasons to get out these chilly January evenings and ponder a hurried universe continually in motion, both fast and slow.

-Check out Q2 Lovejoy on January 30th courtesy of the Virtual Telescope project.

January 23, 2015December 23, 2015 by Bob King

See a Rare Comet-Moon Conjunction Tonight

Tonight (Friday, Jan. 23rd) the moon will pass only about 1° (two moon diameters) south of Comet 15P/Finlay as seen from the Americas. This map shows the view from the upper Midwest at 7 p.m. Two 6th magnitude stars in Pisces are labelled. Created with Chris Marriott's SkyMap software

I want to alert you to a rather unusual event occurring this evening.

Many of you already know about the triple shadow transit of Jupiter’s moons Io, Europa and Callisto. That’s scheduled for late tonight.

Earlier, around nightfall, the crescent moon will lie 1° or less to the south-southwest of comet 15P/Finlay. No doubt lunar glare will hamper the view some, but what a fun opportunity to use the moon to find a comet.

Finlay underwent a flare in brightness last week when it became easily visible in binoculars.

The farther south you live, the closer the moon will approach the comet tonight. This diagram shows the view from Tucson, Ariz. at nightfall when less than 1/2° will separate the two. At about the same time (~7 p.m. local time) the moon will occult or cover up a 6th magnitude star (seen poking out from its left side). Source: SkyMap

Though a crescent moon isn’t what you’d call a glare bomb, I can’t predict for certain whether you’ll still see the comet in binoculars tonight or need a small telescope instead. Most likely a scope. Finlay has faded some since its outburst and now glows around magnitude +8.5.

You can try with a 10×50 or larger glass, and if you don’t succeed, whip out your telescope; a 4.5-inch or larger instrument should handle the job.

Just point it at the moon at star-hop a little to the north-northeast using the map until you see a fuzzy spot with a brighter center. That’s your comet. The tail won’t be visible unless you’re using more firepower, something closer to 10-inches.

Comet Finlay in outburst on January 20, 2015 shows a beautiful parabolic-shaped head. Credit: Joseph Brimacombe — Comet Finlay in outburst on January 20, 2015 showing a beautiful parabolic-shaped head. Credit: Joseph Brimacombe

By the way, the father south you live, the closer the moon approaches Finlay. From the far southern U.S. they’ll be just 1/2° apart. Keep going south and parts of Central and South America will actually see the earth-lit edge of moon approach and then occult the comet from view!

UPDATE: Although light clouds marred the view I had difficulty finding the comet this evening in my 10-inch scope. It’s possible it’s further faded or my conditions weren’t optimal or both. No luck BTW in binoculars.