Moon close-up

The Moon and Mars

The air is very steady here at the moment

Nico

Nico:

It's helluva difficult trying to capture both Mars and the Moon - the difference in brightness is huge!

These are straight-out-of-the camera shots on a Nikon D70 with a 300mm lens and 1.6 teleconverter, exposed at about 1.6 secs, f-something-or-other.

Bob Shaw

I know what you mean Bob, I exposed 1/30 s @ f30 on a 10D and 70 mm lens,for the Moon-Mars shot (ISO 100, temp 5200K)

I made some others but I'm having a hard time getting proper focus

Nico

another shot


Nico

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This Is SKY & TELESCOPE's AstroAlert for Occultations
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1. Passage of the Moon across the Pleiades Monday evening for North
America and northern South America.

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1. Passage of the Moon across the Pleiades Monday evening, Jan. 9

On Monday evening, January 9, less than 24 hours from now, the
82% sunlit waxing gibbous Moon will pass over the Pleiades cluster
for observers in North America and northern South America. The Moon
will miss most of the bright stars for observers in Canada and the
northwestern USA, but will occult Merope, Alcyone, Atlas, and/or
Pleione for most of the southern and eastern USA and Mexico.
Predictions for the occultations of these stars computed for
hundreds of North American cities are on IOTA's Web site at
http://www.lunar-occultations.com/iota or, directly, at
http://www.lunar-occultations.com/iota/200...am/pleiadna.htm .
In the Caribbean, Central America, and northern South America, other
bright Pleiades stars will also be occulted; Spanish-language
information and predictions for these events for the major cities in
the region, set up by Claudio Martinez of the Occultation Section
of LIADA (Liga Iberoamericana de Astronomia), are at

http://www.espacioprofundo.com.ar/verartic..._Pleyades..html

In the USA, the grazes of the bright stars will be on the
Moon's sunlit limb and, at such a bright gibbous phase, will be
unobservable. Some observers have predictions for the graze of
Alcyone and Atlas, but even those bright stars will be overwhelmed by
the bright side of the Moon. So observers in the USA will either
have to be content with observing the numerous total occultations
(several 8th to 6th-mag. stars will be occulted in addition to the
"big 4") from any convenient location, or try to observe a graze of
one of these fainter stars, which will be quite difficult due to
proximity of sunlit features. In a notice I distributed last night
to Mid-Atlantic observers, I mentioned a grazing occultation of
ZC 564 that will occur about 60 miles south of Washington, DC.
The latest Astro Meteo (Clear Sky Clock) forecast shows that it will
be clear across most of Maryland, DC, and northern Virginia, but
cloudy in a band just covering the ZC 564 path, and south of it.
So I do not plan to undertake an expedition for that graze.
Other areas that should have a clear, or mostly cloud-free, view of
the Pleiades passage include WV, s.PA, NJ, NYC, Long Island, s. OH,
s. IN, n. KY, e. MA, CT, RI, & s.e. NH in the northeastern USA, and
all of the southwestern USA except California north of Napa Valley
and Chico.