Daytime shots of Venus and Mars with the
Orion 10" f/3.9 Newtonian Astrograph
December 27, 2016
Uploaded 12/27/16



            
 Here are
            a few shots taken around 2pm today with a clear blue sky over
            head, and the Sun just past the meridian. To find the planets
            in the day sky, you first put an aperture mask on the 10 inch
            to stop it off axis down to about 1.5 inches. Pointing it at
            the Sun, the projected image is centered and focused for arms
            length from the eyepiece. This gives the output beam a near infinity
            focus beam for when we are ready to look for the planets directly.
            Recapping the scope, we then set the large manual setting circles
            on the mount for the Suns RA and Dec per the charting program
            Cartes du Ciel. Next, the coordinates of Venus were dialed in
            and the scope aperture cover removed. In the eyepiece was Venus,
            and nearly in focus! I went ahead and shot Venus with the 5x
            Televue powermate with both the UV filter and IR pass. Seeing
            was not good in the daytime, but these planets cannot be seen
            from the observatory after sunset as they are behind the house
            and tall pine trees. Then dialing up mars, with its tiny 5 arc
            second disk. Suprisingly, the disk had some markings! A few color
            shots with a different camera - the DMK41 CCD color cam to get
            the nice pale salmon planet against the blue sky. Here are the
            images.

            
Venus - 10"
            f/3.8 with 5x powermate and DMK51 CCD and Orion UV pass filter:

            


            
 

            
Venus - 10"
            f/3.8 with 5x powermate and DMK51 CCD and Orion IR pass filter:

            


            
 

            
Mars - 10"
            f/3.8 with 5x powermate and DMK51 CCD and Orion IR pass filter:

            


            
 

            
Mars - 10"
            f/3.8 Prime Focus and DMK41 CCD and no filter.

            


            
 

            
Mars - 10"
            f/3.8 with 5x powermate and DMK41 CCD and no filter.

            




Processing:
            50/1200 best frames, alignment in Autostakkert, Wavelets in Registax,
            Levels and Contrast Masking In Photoshop CS2,
Instrument:  Orion (GSO) 10" f/3.9 with 5x Barlow
Platform:  Astrophysics AP1200
CCD Camera:  Image Source DMK 51 and 41 (color)
Filter:  Orion IR or UV or None Pass
Exposure:  1/30 sec  12fps
Location:  Payson, Arizona
Elevation:  5150 ft.
Sky:  Seeing 1/5, Transparency 9/10
Outside Temperature:  55F