Astronomy Log

At last I managed to get outside last night, after what seems like weeks of constant rain and cloudy skies.

I managed to take some more photos of the full moon, my first visible in my telescope. I was amazed at the sharpness and crispness of the view of the moon through my Meade Bresser 130N telescope. The most interesting sight was the crusty type of craters at the edges of the moon, which made the moon look really 3D through the eyepiece.

I am still getting blurry images of the moon, but that must be due to the constant movement, or just because I am holding the camera up to the lens as opposed to having it fixed to the telescope.

I included the image below as I liked the colour it gave the moon, the image was really a mistake as I took the photo on auto on the camera and it left the flash on.

The first night I ever used my telescope I found Saturn without any help at all and the feeling was amazing, so was finding out how fast that it went out of view.

I tried taking a photo of it, but below is all I got, a blurry picture. I shall have to try again the next time the conditions are improved.

You can just about make out the rings, but I was expecting some more magnification and some clearer pictures, hopefully as I learn more I should get some better pictures - watch this space.

I am trying to conquer taking pictures of the moon first. I have tried taking pictures using my Canon IXUS 500 by just positioning the camera up against the lens of the telescope. I have also tried using my 2 megapixel Nokia mobile with a little less success. But hey it’s a cheap way of taking photos!

The first photo above shows a greater shadow, with more grey and more definition, I think that is coming from not lining up the camera lens exactly with the telescope lens, whereas the second photo is an exact shot.

I am looking forward to trying a webcam adaptor with my logitech webcam if it will fit and then taking some video and trying out some of the astronomy freeware software to manipulate the images.

I am finding the moon amazing, especially the way that as the moon gets fuller how much brighter it becomes, nearly blinding! I think I also need to get myself a moon filter to take away the brightness.

These are my first ever photos of the moon, which appears to be in one of it’s early phases.

What an amazing site, seeing the moon for the first time up close from your own telescope. The clarity of the moon in the eyepiece is very good. I could stare at it for ages and ages.

After many months of being interested in telescopes and looking at various websites including ebay and other telescope retailers, I discovered that I live very close to the new location of Scopes N Skies showroom and warehouse.

After a couple of hours discussion with the team I decided to purchase a Meade Bresser Messier 130N Telescope. I originally thought I would come home with a Meade ETX80 with the autostar system, where the computer does all the work, but after finding out more, I instead went for a manual telescope.

When collecting the Meade Bresser Messier 130N I could not believe that it came in two boxes, one for the mount and one for the telescope itself. Now my girlfriend was going to be shocked that I had purchased another hobby item that is very large and takes up a lot of room, especially as one of my other hobbies is playing the drums.

Anyway it’s my first telescope and taking some time to get used to, but as the weather has been so bad lately I have only been outside once, but have decided in the last few nights to use it from a spare bedroom window on the moon.

This is my new blog about Astronomy, a subject which is now one of my many new hobbies. I hope to update this blog on at least a monthly basis, but that depends upon the weather.

I hope to review some equipment, show off my telescope images, review astronomy books and much more and generally keep my own digital astronomy log/diary.

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