16 Sep 2009 – Rise: 03:20, Set: 18:23
17 Sep 2009 – Rise: 04:55, Set: 18:34
18 Sep 2009 – Rise: 06:27, Set: 18:45
19 Sep 2009 – Rise: 07:58, Set: 18:55
20 Sep 2009 – Rise: 09:28, Set: 19:07
21 Sep 2009 – Rise: 10:57, Set: 19:22
22 Sep 2009 – Rise: 12:23, Set: 19:42
The t-ring is finally here (thanks Royal Mail, for holding it up so long…) and I’ve checked the camera with the t-ring and t-adapter and it’s all perfect. Now I just need a gap in the clouds again. It’s cloudy just now but according to Weather.com, it’s going to be clear by 8pm. Might have a bash at taking a picture and see what I can get. Unfortunately I won’t catch the moon tonight since it’s not rising until after midnight, by which point I’ll be safely tucked up in bed … but I might try Jupiter.
This isn’t a patch on what I could see through the telescope, but it’s my first attempt at capturing Jupiter with the NexImage:
Jupiter through NexImage
In the telescope, I could make out the four main moons of Jupiter as well, but NexImage didn’t pick them up. In fairness, it’s not a great night – quite a lot of light clouds around, so not the best night for photography!
Still no t-ring today, so I gave Telescope Planet a ring and they said it was posted yesterday. Next day delivery it is NOT (given that I ordered on Sunday) but hopefully that means it’ll be here tomorrow.
This is at f/10.
Had another bash at Jupiter and could see the two main stripes quite clearly in the telescope. Got closer to capturing a picture of it this time, but just as I got everything lined up and started to focus … the laptop went into power saving mode and switched off!! This happened a couple of times and was really starting to irritate me, so I moved onto the moon since it had appeared by that point.
We’re forecast to have a couple of clear nights, so hopefully I’ll get out again tomorrow.
Here’s the moon video that the picture was generated from:
9 Sep 2009 - Rise: 20:30, Set: 12:54
10 Sep 2009 – Rise: 20:58, Set: 14:19
11 Sep 2009 – Rise: 21:42, Set: 15:36
12 Sep 2009 – Rise: 22:47, Set: 16:38
13 Sep 2009 – Rise: ?, Set: 08:11
14 Sep 2009 – Rise: 00:10, Set: 17:49
15 Sep 2009 – Rise: 01:44, Set: 18:09
One of my moon pictures is on the Celestron site under “images” – http://www.celestron.com/c3/product.php?ProdID=41 (I’m “carolastro”!)
The camera arrived safe and sound yesterday and I *love* it! Today the Celestron 1.25″ t-adapter arrived but still no sign of the t-ring (the t-ring and t-adapter are needed to use the camera with the telescope for prime focus photography). The t-ring was ordered on Sunday and was marked as “in stock” (and still is) on the Telescope Planet website and the delivery shows as “free next day delivery”. Therefore, I’d have expected it to go in the post on Monday and to arrive on Tuesday. Here we are at Wednesday and still no sign of it. I tried calling them earlier, but got fed up listening to their “on hold” music and gave up after 5 mins or so. Emailed them at 12.45pm today to ask if the order had been posted and haven’t had a reply.
It’s a shame really – they have a great stock, competitive prices and were helpful when I placed my first order by phone. But since then it’s been a bit hit and miss – twice I was told that my solar filter had been posted when it wasn’t even in stock. And twice I’ve sent them emails which they haven’t replied to. We’ll see if it comes in tomorrow’s post, otherwise I’ll be back on the phone to them again.
My solar filter has finally arrived and it looks perfect! Now all I need is some sunshine 
I’m expecting the camera to be delivered later today, so it’s an exciting day for parcels!
I just came across the Ultimate Astrophotography Challenge and … WOW! There’s a list of 109 objects to “acquire” including deep space, lunar, planetary and earth-related objects.
I think it’s a brilliant idea and while I’m so new to this that I’m only just getting to grips with imaging the moon, I’m setting myself the challenge of collecting all 109 of these objects.
