THE SPACE PAGE 4 (my photos)

Here I am with my Meade LX90 8" Schmitt-Cassegrain telescope.

Here is another view of it. It has an Autostar control handset that has a database containing coordinates for a large number of stellar objects. This makes life a lot easier, some say too easy!

    Here is a photograph that shows a suspot taken in July 2004. I took this using the Meade Lunar and Planetary Imager (LPI) mounted on the telescope. The telescope's optics are used to focus the image.

    You can see the sunspot's umbra (the dark central patch) and penumbra (light area around it). Sunspots are cooler regions on the sun's surface (~4500 ºC in the unbra) and caused by strong magnetic fields that disrupt the convection currents near the Sun's surface.

    The other dark wiggly marks are imperfections in my homemade solar filter (I have made a better one since).

Mercury and Venus are inferior planets, which means that they are closer to the Sun that The Earth. Occasionally these planets pass across the Sun's disk at it's shadow can be observed from the Earth. Such an event is kown as a transit. In the case of Venus, transits are rare events. But this photo I took during the transit of June 8th 2004.

Here are various views of The Moon. It's difficult to get good focus when photographing the moon because as well it's movement across the sky due to Earth's rotation, it also moving around the Earth at a fair lick, and the telescope has to work quite hard to keep the image in the same place.

The Monn has several large dark patches, which are known as seas. In the bottom rught corner is Mare Tranquilitatis, in which Apolo 11 crew landed. Just above it is Mare Serentatis. Towards the left is the smaller Mare Vaporum.

The prominent mountain range you see here is The Appenines. The crew of the Apollo 15 mission collected some rocks from these mountains.

Here's Jupiter. There looks to be a red blob in the centre of the dark band below the equator. That might be the great red spot, or it might just be my imagination.

Here's Saturn, my favourite among the planets. You can clearly see the Cassini divison and you can just see a band or two on the surface and the rings' shadow.

Here's a photo of Mars that I took in Ocotber 2005 when it was close to opposition. There is a hint of the northern ice cap at the bottom (if you magnfify this picture). The dark stripe is the Mare Cimmerion (I think).

Here's Venus, photographed on April 17th 2007. It was close to maximum elongation and slightly more than half is illuminated, as we see it. It appears blue on the left and red on the right. It was probably because it was quite low in the sky though and thus light of different wavelengths have been refracted through slightly different angles though our atmosphere. It's more obvious when the image is enlarged as it is below.

The French have entered the Space Age!

OK, that joke doesn't work because of ESA.

Here's a much better picture taken of Venus, taken in April 2007 while it was higher in the sky.

I took this photograph during the eclipse on August 1st 2008. Uuse my CCD camera, Starlight Xpress H16, with a 200 mm lens and Baader solar film at the front.
The camera was mounted on top of my telescope for alignment. Reflection off the telescope's tube has caused the streak at the bottom (I think).

Here's a photo I took of Comet Holmes a week after it exploded in October 2007. This was taken with the H16 camera. The exposure time was about three minutes. The H16 is a monochrome camera of limited resolution, but is very much more sensitive than the LPI.

is a photo I took with a CCD camera of the Great Orion Nebula (M42). The exposure time was five minutes. This photo was touched up using software to bring out some of the fainter nebulosity.

Here's a photo I took of the Pleiades, or Seven Sisters. The exposure time was one minute. I should probably have set a longer exposure time to bring out any nebulosity.

Here I am with my Meade LX90 8" Schmitt-Cassegrain telescope.
	Here is another view of it. It has an Autostar control handset that has a database containing coordinates for a large number of stellar objects. This makes life a lot easier, some say too easy!
Here is a photograph that shows a suspot taken in July 2004. I took this using the Meade Lunar and Planetary Imager (LPI) mounted on the telescope. The telescope's optics are used to focus the image. You can see the sunspot's umbra (the dark central patch) and penumbra (light area around it). Sunspots are cooler regions on the sun's surface (~4500 ºC in the unbra) and caused by strong magnetic fields that disrupt the convection currents near the Sun's surface. The other dark wiggly marks are imperfections in my homemade solar filter (I have made a better one since).
	Mercury and Venus are inferior planets, which means that they are closer to the Sun that The Earth. Occasionally these planets pass across the Sun's disk at it's shadow can be observed from the Earth. Such an event is kown as a transit. In the case of Venus, transits are rare events. But this photo I took during the transit of June 8th 2004.
Here are various views of The Moon. It's difficult to get good focus when photographing the moon because as well it's movement across the sky due to Earth's rotation, it also moving around the Earth at a fair lick, and the telescope has to work quite hard to keep the image in the same place. The Monn has several large dark patches, which are known as seas. In the bottom rught corner is Mare Tranquilitatis, in which Apolo 11 crew landed. Just above it is Mare Serentatis. Towards the left is the smaller Mare Vaporum.

The prominent mountain range you see here is The Appenines. The crew of the Apollo 15 mission collected some rocks from these mountains.

	Here's Jupiter. There looks to be a red blob in the centre of the dark band below the equator. That might be the great red spot, or it might just be my imagination.
Here's Saturn, my favourite among the planets. You can clearly see the Cassini divison and you can just see a band or two on the surface and the rings' shadow.
	Here's a photo of Mars that I took in Ocotber 2005 when it was close to opposition. There is a hint of the northern ice cap at the bottom (if you magnfify this picture). The dark stripe is the Mare Cimmerion (I think).
Here's Venus, photographed on April 17th 2007. It was close to maximum elongation and slightly more than half is illuminated, as we see it. It appears blue on the left and red on the right. It was probably because it was quite low in the sky though and thus light of different wavelengths have been refracted through slightly different angles though our atmosphere. It's more obvious when the image is enlarged as it is below.
	The French have entered the Space Age! OK, that joke doesn't work because of ESA.
Here's a much better picture taken of Venus, taken in April 2007 while it was higher in the sky.
	I took this photograph during the eclipse on August 1st 2008. Uuse my CCD camera, Starlight Xpress H16, with a 200 mm lens and Baader solar film at the front. The camera was mounted on top of my telescope for alignment. Reflection off the telescope's tube has caused the streak at the bottom (I think).
Here's a photo I took of Comet Holmes a week after it exploded in October 2007. This was taken with the H16 camera. The exposure time was about three minutes. The H16 is a monochrome camera of limited resolution, but is very much more sensitive than the LPI.
	is a photo I took with a CCD camera of the Great Orion Nebula (M42). The exposure time was five minutes. This photo was touched up using software to bring out some of the fainter nebulosity.
Here's a photo I took of the Pleiades, or Seven Sisters. The exposure time was one minute. I should probably have set a longer exposure time to bring out any nebulosity.