The sky this late afternoon is partly clear and I was able to image the Sun with both AR2797 and 2798 Sunspot Groups through Ha and white light wavelength. AR2797 and 2798 Sunspot Groups are very small and dull in white light but comes alive in Ha wavelength. Smaller AR2798 Sunspot Group shows bright flaring activity while AR2797 Sunspot Group ejects a long dark filament! I was also able to image white light full disk to show how small the 2 groups are.
The sky this evening is partly cloudy but I was abkle to get a few shots of the Waning Gibbous Moon through my Borg 76ED refractor using Canon EOS M6 Mirrorless Camera as well as ZWO ASI120MM Mini mounted on Vixen Porta 2 mount for my 1st astro image for the year 2021!
The sky this evening is clear so me and my son setup our Borg 76ED refractor mounted on Vixen Porta 2 mount to image the last Full Moon for the year 2020. I use a Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera with Borg 76ED refractor to image it with 1/1250sec exposure at ISO 100.
The sky this morning is partly clear but I was able to setup my Borg 76ED refractor with ZWO ASI120mm mini on Vixen GPDX mount to image the 2 sunspot groups namely AR2894 and 2795 despite having trouble with mount tracking problem which I later diagnosed to be a bad battery power output of less than 10.5V even after recharging it. Nevertheless, I'm still happy to get probably my lat solar image for the year 2020. I was only able to image in white light because of the tracking problem as well as cloud cover.
As expected, the weather this evening is almost clear and together with my son KC, we were able to image again the Jupiter and Saturn Great Conjunction. The separation is now slightly a bit farther than the past 2 days and this will probably be my last documentation of this conjunction.
I initially use my Borg 76ED refractor with Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera at prime focus of 500mm f/6.5 to image the event but seeing the weather is a bit forgoing, we opted to switch to the Celestron C90 Maksutov-Cassegrain with an effective focal length of 1350mm f/13.8 on the Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera to get more amplification and it was again mounted on my old reliable Vixen GPDX mount.
Wide field image was taken using Huawei P40 Pro at 27mm (35mm equivalent) at f/1.9 with 1/20 sec exposure at ISO 3200. Close up were taken using Celestron C90 Maksutov-Cassegrain with an effective focal length of 1350mm f/13.8 on the Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera at 1/30 sec exposure at ISO 800 while the overexposed Saturn and Jupiter with Jovian Moons were exposed at 1/8 sec exposure at ISO 800.
The sky today was very cloudy and honestly, I didn't have plans to do any imaging of the conjunction as it looks very impossible to get any shot at all. But after I got home at 5:30pm, I look out of our house window and some possible cloud breakup where Jupiter and Saturn are located so I quickly setup my Borg 76ED refractor with Canon EOS M6 mirrorless camera mounted on Vixen GPDX mount and patiently waits. As soon as I saw the 2 planets from my wide field shot at 6:03pm from my Huawei P40 Pro at 27mm (35mm equivalent) at f/1.9 on 1/20 sec exposure at ISO 2500, I quickly fired away a few shots before clouds started to interfere again. Images was taken at prime focus of Borg 76ED refractor at 500mm f/6.5 at 1/30sec at ISO 800 while the one showing overexposed Jupiter with Jovian Moons and Saturn ere taken at 1/2 sec exposure at ISO 1600.
The sky this evening is very cloudy and actually I already lose hope of seeing it as today is the closest separation between planet Jupiter and Saturn with less than 0.6 deg apart.
Actually, I started to wait for clearing since 5:45pm and I only was able to get a glimpse of then first with my Huawei P40 Pro smartphone at 6:51 pm with a low altitude of 11 degrees! I got to snap it at 27mm focal length (35mm equivalent) at f/1.9 1/17 sec at ISO 4000. I also tried to image it through the Borg 76ED refractor at 500mm f/6.5 prime focus at 1/3 sec at ISO 3200. The image is already muddy at less than 10 degrees but I can still see Jupiter and Saturn obviously. Sometimes, astronomy is a test of patience as the time you spend waiting for the clouds to open up might not come out successfully.
Nevertheless I'm still happy to capture them despite the worst condition that I had. Hope to capture it tomorrow at a higher altitude and better weather.
