Moon and Mercury: Check out the Earthshine!
3/11/2005, 7:35p.m.. Mercury was magnitude -0.4, 48% illuminated (like a little half moon), and about 2.5 degrees above the horizon. Moon was 3.7% illuminated, 40 hours 23 minutes old (give or take!). Note 6.4 mag star to left of moon, Delta Piscium mag 4.4 to right, and 51 Piscium to right of Mercury. The dim part of the moon is clearly visible in this shot due to reflected light from the earth: "earthshine." See another nice image from this night here: Moonsets, Earthshine, Pond Reflection Pictures - Images.
Nikon D100 DSLR, Nikon 180mm ED manual focus lens, 4 seconds at ISO 800, in-camera noise reduction, resized, quick levels and unsharp mask in Photoshop
Below: until I find a new home or make a better image: Rosette Nebula, DSLR stack:
Full Rosette image from 3/11 and 3/12 2005 moved to my new Nebula Page!
Click thumbnail for full sized image. 3/12/2005, 6:48 p.m, 8.82% illuminated, full frame, Nikon D100 with reducer, 1/40 seconds tracking at ISO 200.
Just for fun, I shot this waiting for dark on 3/11/2005. 1/1600 second, ISO 400, through the Takahashi TOA 130 telescope with focal reducer. I used a lot of noise reduction tools & tricks to get the smooth sky.
M46 and M47 DSLR Astrophotography
NHAC Pix - Dick's Main NHAC picture page
Paul Downing's Home Page (more images!)
NHAC - Link to club's page
Dick's Pix (Dick Locke's Picture & Image Page)
Astronomy Pictures: Dick Locke's Astrophoto Gateway page....
Copyright © 2005 by Dick Locke. All Rights Reserved.
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