First Saturn sighting of the year

Posted by Wesley on
Saturn taken with SX50 HS (left) and iPhone 6 Plus (right)

As Saturn now rises before midnight, it becomes possible to see the planet well above the horizon before it disappears into the morning sky. Seeing that the weather was getting good, I decided to wake up early and see it for myself for the first time this year. I bought a new Celestron NexStar 6SE telescope some time ago and I could use it to pick it out of the southern sky with relative ease.

Unfortunately, one of the collimator screws on the telescope is stuck, preventing full calibration. I attached my DSLR to take some photos, but it did not come out well. So instead, I made a couple of quick shots using my iPhone 6 Plus through the eyepiece, which for some reason came out looking slightly better.

Not to waste the opportunity, I then took out my SX50 HS and photographed Saturn as I've done since two years ago. The result was the best the camera has produced so far, I think.

[Left]
Device: Canon SX50 HS
Settings: 1200mm (2x enlarged) - ISO 160 - 1/30s - f/6.5
Filters: None
Time: 2015-03-23 05:35 KST
Location: Naju, Korea
20 photos stacked with RegiStax 6.1.0.8

[Right]
Telescope: Celestron NexStar 6SE + 25mm eyepiece + 2.5x barlow
Device: iPhone 6 Plus (afocal)
Settings: 29mm - ISO 125 - 1/10s - f/2.2
Filters: None
Time: 2015-03-23 06:02 KST
Location: Naju, Korea
Defined tags for this entry: , , , , , , , ,

Trackbacks

Trackback specific URI for this entry

This link is not meant to be clicked. It contains the trackback URI for this entry. You can use this URI to send ping- & trackbacks from your own blog to this entry. To copy the link, right click and select "Copy Shortcut" in Internet Explorer or "Copy Link Location" in Mozilla.

Wesley's Tool-Box on : Removing stripped collimator screw

Continue reading "Removing stripped collimator screw"
Anex ANH2-065 stripped screw extraction kit I've mentioned earlier that one of the collimator screws on my Celestron NexStar 6SE telescope was completely stuck, preventing proper calibration. It was so bad that the screw's head became stripped in the att

Wesley's Tool-Box on : Jupiter photo from iPhone's video shoot

Continue reading "Jupiter photo from iPhone's video shoot"
Processed image of Jupiter from an iPhone 6 Plus video recording Lots of planetary photos from amateur astronomers seem to be derived from a small video camera attached to the telescope. I do have lots of smartphones that could serve a similar purpose, s

Wesley's Tool-Box on : iPhone camera burst mode snaps Saturn

Continue reading "iPhone camera burst mode snaps Saturn"
More details become visible in this Saturn shot Last attempt to photograph Saturn with my iPhone was far from optimal. But the conditions were much better this time and I hoped to get a clearer picture. I had the Snapzoom adapter hold the iPhone 6 Plus o

Comments

Display comments as Linear | Threaded

more on :

Today, I went to the beachfront with my kids.
I found a sea shell and gave it to my 4 year old daughter and said
"You can hear the ocean if you put this to your ear." She put the shell to
her ear and screamed. There was a hermit crab
inside and it pinched her ear. She never wants to go back!
LoL I know this is entirely off topic but I had to tell someone!

Add Comment

E-Mail addresses will not be displayed and will only be used for E-Mail notifications.

To prevent automated Bots from commentspamming, please enter the string you see in the image below in the appropriate input box. Your comment will only be submitted if the strings match. Please ensure that your browser supports and accepts cookies, or your comment cannot be verified correctly.
CAPTCHA

Enclosing asterisks marks text as bold (*word*), underscore are made via _word_.
Standard emoticons like :-) and ;-) are converted to images.

Copyright (C) 1996-2024 Woo-Duk Chung (Wesley Woo-Duk Hwang-Chung). All rights reserved.