Quote:
Originally Posted by rmcpb
Mars is moving away from us very quickly so detail is not really possible at present. Couple of months ago it was OK but never good this time round. I saw it on Saturday and could resolve a disk with hints of darker bit but that was about it, or was that wishful thinking?
Keep looking up  |
That's an interesting comment rmcpb - and no, I'm not doing one of my "stirs" - "mind mechanics" have quite a lot to say about how profoundly preconception influences our sensory perception.
We all talk on this forum about how our ability to discern detail etc (particularly planetary) "improves" as we continue to observe, both within the interim of one ob session and as we re-observe over time. Some of this (during the one session) undoubtedly owes an enormous amount to dark adaptation of our eyes; and of course as with anything visual, fine nuances etc become more apparent as we gain familiarity with a subject.
This does not, however, negate the fact that nearly all of us have some very strong pre-conceptions/images of what we expect to see; and I wonder where we can actually draw the line sometimes.
Before (or pre-empting) any indignation about "knowing what I can darn well see" etc occurs, let me add that last night, with very good seeing (and no flamin' wind) Saturn and Jupiter provided me with 2 somewhat contrasting experiences in my 10" dob: at approx 350x Saturn was becoming more and more visually detailed whilst Jupiter really yielded its' best at about 114x. (Saturn with GSO 9mm plossl and 2.5x barlow and Jupiter with 11mm T6 Nagler.
Now I appreciate the mantra about Saturn and higher mag (though seeing it so well at 350x was pretty darn good!) versus Jupiter/lower power but it all just made me reflect on what we see, what we expect to see, and what we actually get to see!
I should add that I wasn't doing any tracking, so Saturn zanging across my FOV would've made the detail discerned even more interesting.
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