Looking Up

Just after Sunset yesterday I could see there was a fairly clear view of the Moon so I lugged the 70D with 100-400mm lens plus tripod outside for a few shots:



Then I happened to spot what, at first, I thought was a bright star. There was too much light in the garden to see much else so I had a go at photographing it to see how it would turn out. Every time I took a shot I could see what looked like reflections or refractions on the photo which I couldn't see in the sky:



I tried different positions and extra shade in front of the lens until the penny finally dropped. That was no star. It was Jupiter and with the camera taking about a 1/3 second exposure it was also picking up four of Jupiter's moons which I couldn't see with the naked eye. Probably Ganymede, Callisto, Io, and Europa. The above is quite a small crop from the full photo. Definitely an improvement on my last attempt in November 2010 when I failed completely to get any recognisable still shots of Jupiter.

Great Tit, the Moon and Jupiter

The Great Tit is roosting in the nest box for the tenth night running.

Great Tit by day and by night:
Still plenty of feathers left over after last week's scrap.


Jupiter is quite bright at the moment. Two nights running I have tried to photo Jupiter and its moons. Still photos were a complete failure. The length of exposure needed meant that  the planet moved across the sky by a small fraction of a degree but enough to make the moons appear more like UFOs. In the end I set up the Panasonic SDR-H80 on a sturdy tripod, switched it to night vision and full 70x optical zoom. The resultant video clip is a bit jerky with the slow shutter speed of night vision and the rotation of the Earth.

Jupiter with four moons, Ganymede, Callisto, Io, and Europa. Three are easy to spot. The fourth is much dimmer and further off to the left of Jupiter and comes into view on and off.



I did manage some still photos of the Moon. Being a lot brighter the exposures were much shorter.