Pluto from Suburbia or Where's Wally

[RichardJ]

After seeing Pete Lawrence on a recent Sky and Night show demonstrating how to capture Pluto I thought I would give it a try from home in suburban Sydney. I've seen Pluto visually with the 16 inch scope at Crago Observatory under a darkish sky but this is my first attempt at imaging.

15cm F5 Newtonian reflector and Canon 60D DSLR 25sec at ISO3200.
I've put a copy of the field from RealSky to the right for comparison.

RichardJ :)

[peeb61]

Nice capture Richard, did this myself a couple of years back, took 2 images several nights apart and looked for the dot that moved, I was lucky enough to capture Pluto as it hit one side of a barren dark patch of space among lots of stars and several days later it was on the other side of this patch!

Great capture!

Paul

[RichardJ]

Hi Paul,

Thanks. I'm going to image the same region again in about 3 weeks time to see how far Pluto has moved.

Richard.

[peeb61]

Nice Richard,

Then you will know out of all of the points of light in the image which one will be Pluto!

Look forward to it.

Paul

[RichardJ]

Hi Paul,

I'm pretty confident what I have arrowhead in the second image is Pluto. I've put a copy of the same field from Realsky just to the right, and the object is not present in the Realsky image. Also the position of the objects fits exactly with the prediction made by Megastar. As you say a repeat image should be definitive.

Richard.

[RichardJ]

Finally got some time to take a follow-up image.
I think this confirms that the object is Pluto.

RichardJ :)

[gavcol]

G'day Richard

Very hard target indeed. You are obviously pretty committed to look for such a target.

Not doubting you, I will just take your word! Looking at all those dots just hurts my eyes :lol:

Thanks for sharing.

Regards

Gavin

[RichardJ]

Hi Gavin,
Thanks. I just like a challenge. It is amazing what you can image from home now days.

Regards,

Richard.