Mars & Saturn 24th February 2012

[MGTechDVP]

Hi Everybody,

The weather was horrible this "summer" so I didn't have the opportunity to play with the scope for almost 3 months... needless to say I was hanging for it. I got my opportunity on the nights of 21st-22nd and 23rd-24th... I tried to image Mars and Saturn... images from the 22nd were soft and hardly worth posting but on the second night I got some good detail (good detail for me... still nowhere near as good as some I've seen here on IIS)

I used my Nexstar 8"SCT on a CGEM with DMK618, RGB filters and a 3X Barlow lens. Surprisingly images were sharper and more detailed with the 3X barlow lens then the 2.5X powermate the night before. (last image posted is with the powermate from the first night, the others are through the barlow.)
Perhaps the position of the powermate/barlow made a difference... the powermate was between the filterwheel and the CCD whereas the Barlow was between the filterwheel and the OTA.

Comments and advise on improving welcome.

cheers,
Mariusz

[Saturn%5]

A very nice collection you got there:cool:

[MGTechDVP]

Thanks Graeme,

I just wish I had more opportunities to use my scope and practice my imaging skills. This summer was a joke... surely it has to get better soon, at least in the astronomy side of things.

With Mars opposition fast approaching, I was hoping for a nice night of imaging either on the 3rd March or within a few days of it... but looking at the weather forecast I think I'm out of luck until next Thursday at the very earliest.