Planets

The Solar System and Planets

	This is an image of the so called 10th planet, "2003 UB₃₁₃" taken on Oct. 1, at 0400 UT. The planet, which is larger than Pluto, was discovered in 2003 by astronomers at Mt. Palomar. In this unfiltered 600 second CCD observation, the planet is fainter than 18th magnitude. The dynamic range of the image has been severely stretched in order to show the position of the planet. The *bright stars* below and to the right of the planet are themselves only 14th magnitude. Even these stars are over 700 times fainter than can be seen with the naked eye.
	This image of the moon is actually a composite of 4 images taken using the ST10XME camera on the RC-16 scope. The images were taken through an Ha filter and stitched together using Photoshop CS. The enlarged image shows a LOT of fine detail. The three major seas shown in this image are the Sea of Showers on the left, the Sea of Serenity in the center and the Sea of Crises on the Right. The large crater with the large ejecta in the lower left hand corner is Copernicus.
	This black and white image of Saturn was taken on Dec. 16, 2002, the day before the maximum tilt of the ring as viewed from Earth. ST10XME at 1x1 binning, 0.5 sec, C-14 @ f/11, processed and cropped using Maxim/DL
	Click on the image to the left to go the PLUTO Sub-Page
	The Moon at it terminator on April 23, 2002. This image of The Sea of Moisture was taken through C-14 at f/11 using the ST-10ME camera at full resolution. This is an excellent example of a portion of the Moon which was flooded with magma from an older, larger impact and then cratered by numerous, and smaller, more recent impacts.
	Another image of the Moon in the Tycho - Clavius region has similar exposure conditions to the above image but is slightly further to the south.
	The Moon on Nov 21, 2001. Taken using ST-6 on C-14 at f/6.3, masked to 8" and filtered with Ha filter. Processed using MaximDL/CCD using Unsharp Mask/Kernel-Low Pass
	4Vesta is a minor planet in orbit around our sun. This is a combination of three exposures showing the movement of Vesta in a star field over a period of a few hours.
	These are photos of sun spots [they occur in pairs] taken during the outbreak in late May of 2001. These are two of the largest spots just as they are making their way away from the Earth side of the sun and moving around to the back side [this section of the Sun rotates about every 30 days]. The 0.1 sec images on the left are the raw images taken through a C-8 and captured on an ST-6 through solar and Ha filters. The images on the right are final processed images. Processing was done using API₄WIN.
	This photo of the moon taken Sept. 21, 1999. ST-6 through a C-8 at cass focus with IR filter. Aperture stopped down to 2" with mask.
	This image was taken using Fuji HG 1600 color film thru a C-14 at f-6.3 masked to 8" at prime focus. 1/250 sec exposure
	Image of Jupiter taken at prime focus on October 1, 1997 through a C-14 stopped to 8". Camera was a CWIP-12. Exposure time = 2 sec. through a blue 80A filter. Digital processing via Superfix with histogram filter and advanced loop filter [5 iterations]. This section is about 10% of the total chip area.
	This image of Jupiter was taken using eyepiece projection at ~f/70 on the C-14. Exposure time is 0.05 sec through a clear filter. Image reduction is through CCDSoft. Although I was very proud of the image above when I took it, I am more proud of this one. It was taken in Sept. of 2000 and has 3 more years of experience 'rubbed' into it. There is a small spot inside the Great Spot. I think that it is a piece of dirt on the optical window of the ST-6.
	This is one of my few tri color images. It is an LRGB version of Saturn using Johnsons-Cousins filters, V, B and R. All exposures were 0.5 sec [long exposures for a planet, I now know] and processed through Stelleimage, CCDSoft and LView Pro. Although not a top notch image, it was an interesting experiment in color combinations.
	1.5 second exposure of the Moon through an HV filter [HV z656n] at prime focus through C-14 using ST-6