Venus, Mercury and Meteor – 10 January 2015Venus, Mercury – 10 January 2015
Object Name (Venus and Mercury)
Object Type (Plante conjunction and meteor)
Location (Artignosc-sur-Verdon France)
Date (Jan 10th 2015)
Media (watercolor, white paper, inverted after scan)
January the 10th the two inner planets of our solar system are very close. Following the nice pastel sketch made by Frank Jan 6th (ASOD Feb 2nd) I will take the opportunity to compare its view with this I made 4 days later.
While my watercolor session, a probable Quadrantide meteor produce a brilliant flash.
The two planets are easily seen in the field of my UWA EP.
Conjunctions of Venus, Mars and Uranus – 11 March 2015
Object Name (Venus, Mars, Uranus)
Object Type (Planet conjunctions)
Location (Artignosc-sur-Verdon – Provence, France)
Date (11/03/2015)
Media (graphite pencil, watercolour pencils, white watercolour paper, Paint.net)
I always have issue to find Uranus, without GoTo, it’s not so easy…and I don’t like facility…
Thinks are moving in our planet system. It’s why “planetos” in Greek means “vagabond”.
So I use the opportunity of this double conjunction just a week from each other to find Uranus and its so nice colour.
The Venus-Uranus separation was 5.2’ Venus was 10’000 more brilliant than Uranus, while the separation between Mars and Uranus, one week later was 16.25’
The faint K star between Mars and Uranus is HIP 4325 mag=9.5, so no Uranus satellites were visible with my material.
I sketch the two fields on white watercolour paper with inverted method using a chromatic wheel, orange for Venus, blue for Mars and crimson red for Uranus then I just have to invert the two sketches after scanning. The deal is to manage the colour values in inverted mode.
Clear sky to you all, and for some of you I wish you a nice eclipse on Mart 20.
Media: drawing on picture, edited and enhanced with Gimp
Nikon binoculars 15×70 IF HP
SeeIng: 2/5. Some clouds
This drawing shows the planetary alignment in these days. As the picture taken with the phone was very bad, I decided to draw a picture that showed the beauty of the image.
The brightness of Venus is seen against the weaker yellow Mercury. The red glow of Mars came a bit latter and sharing view with it, the star Iota Aquarii showed its pale white light.
I observed Venus & Mercury together in the same FOV on January 10, 2015 from 14:30 to 16:00 hr MST here in Tucson, Arizona USA with a Celestron Nexstar 11 f10 GPS stopped down to 4.5″, a 2″ diagonal and a 2″ University Optics 32mm Ultra Wide eyepiece (AFOV 80 deg). The field of view was 0.95 and Venus & Mercury fit into the same FOV comfortably. Venus was a bright, white, full orb and Mercury appeared as a very small disk with a pinkish – white color. It appeared that 3 Mercurys could fit across the disk of Venus. Seeing was very good around 3:15 PM so centered on Mercury and increased the power to 259X using a Meade Ultra Wide 8.8mm AFO 84 deg eyepiece. Mercury showed a nice quarter phase with a nice pale pink disk; moving over to Venus and the full phase, white disk showed very well. The color sketch was done using Paint.net application to record the observation.
Conjunction Venus, Mars and moon – 20 February 2015
Object Name: Venus, Mars and moon
Object Type: Conjunction
Location: Mystków, Poland
Date 20.02.2015, ~17:00 UT
Media: graphite pencil, white paper, PhotoFiltre 7
Hello everyone.
This is my latest sketch conjunction of Venus and Mars. The planet was near the moon, one day after the new moon. You can see the moon was light gray. When sketching, the sky was clear, visibility was very good, light wind was blowing.
Conjunction of Venus and Mercury – 18 January 2015
Living in Eastbourne, I am lucky enough to have the famous cliffs at the end of the South Downs close by; the panoramic views they afford are ideal for watching sunrises and sunsets, which are frequently rendered even more beautiful by dramatic coastal clouds. On Sunday 18th January I was driving back from a visit to the beach further east at Normans Bay, when I noticed a break opening up in the blanket of cloud to the west. Instead of heading home I made the short detour up to Beachy Head, where I was treated to this wonderfully picturesque celestial scene.
Best regards and clear skies, Oli
18/01/15 18:45 UT
Soft pastels on Rembrandt pastel paper with acrylic paint for Venus
Comet C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy in conjunction with M79, a globular star cluster in the constellation Lepus -December 29, 2014
Object Name C/2014 Q2 Lovejoy and M79
Object Type Comet and Globular cluster
Location Granadero Baigorria, Santa Fe, Argentina
Date 29/12/14
Media I use pencil, paper, and Gimp to invert colour
Conjunción del cometa Lovejoy con el cúmulo globular M79, en la constelación de la liebre.
El equipo con el cual se realizo la observación es un telescopio reflector sw 150/750 con un ocular de 25.
Podemos notar un bonito “triángulo ” entre el Cometa, m79 y la estrella HIP 25045 A. Se pudo observar un color con tintes verdosos hacia el centro del cometa. No se pudo observar coma
Google translate:
Comet Lovejoy conjunction with the globular cluster M79 in the constellation of the hare.
The equipment with which the observation was performed is a reflecting telescope with an eyepiece 150/750 sw 25.
We can notice a nice “triangle” between the Comet, m79 and the star HIP 25045 A. It was observed color with greenish tints to the center of the comet. Could be observed comma
The conjunction of the crescent Moon and Planet Mars – December 24, 2014
Aloha,
Every Christmas Eve, my family treks to the top of Haleakala to feel the chill and look for Santa’s Sleigh. This year we went to the 10,000 el to find it a cold 36*, wet, and blowing rain. After a few minutes we jumped back into the car a bit disappointed, to descend the mountain. Right before the park exit the sky had mostly cleared and the winds calmed. There we hiked under the “smiling” Hawaiian crescent. Chilled cheeks and fingers, it was perhaps one of the nicest Christmas Eves ever. This sketch was drawn from my memory of the evening.
In the winter months the path of the Moon is more parallel with the horizon giving the lunar crescent in Hawaii a bowl or smile like appearance when lit from the already set sun. Ancient Hawaiian’s called this the “wet moon” because it looks like a bowl that could be filled up with rain. As the winter moves into Spring & Summer the crescent shifts to “pour” water onto the land, empties and becomes a “dry moon” once more. Wet moons occur routinely in the tropics where the sun and moon rise and set nearly vertically.
3.5 day old Crescent Moon & Mars
12/24/14 1930 HST
Haleakala National Park, Hosmers Grove
Black Canson paper with colored Conte’ Crayon and watercolor pencils
Cindy (Thia) Krach
Webmaster’s note: Wishing all astrosketchers a Very Happy New Year and looking forward to another year hosting all your wonderful observational sketches!
A conjunction of the Moon and the planet Saturn – September 27, 2014
Aloha!
I had plans to go to the summit of Haleakala to observe the occultation of Saturn by the Moon, but clouds and wind kept me closer to home. I was delighted when a patch of sky opened up and I could observe the wonderful phenomenon from home.
As I was observing Saturn get closer to our Moon I was struck by how small it appeared in comparison, appearing the size of some of the smaller lunar craters. I began sketching in the details of the Moon and noticed a few stars I wanted to include. I needed to do some erasures because one of the stars was occulted ~15 minutes before Saturn, an unexpected treat. Once Saturn made it to the limb I could not clearly time the initial ingress as conditions began to deteriorate. It was however brilliantly lit in comparison to the dark lunar limb. I noted time as 19:41:36 HAST when all evidence of Saturn disappeared. My sketch is as Saturn had partially slipped past the limb. I was unable to view egress as the Moon had slipped behind clouds by this time.
Occultation of Saturn by the Moon
Maui, Hawaii
4,000el
SV102ED 79x
9/27/14
Black paper, white & black charcoal
Photoscape to clean up sketch
Comet C/2014 E2 (Jacques) in conjunction with Struve 3053 – August 24, 2014
I found this comet in Cassiopeia the other night (August 24) near the colourful double star Struve 3053 and thought it made a nice composition. As I observed over the course of an hour I was surprised to see how quickly the comet moved against the background stars from the position I first sketched it at 11:15 local time to the position indicated by the X at about 12:10. The observations were made with a 120mm F/8.3 refractor at 42x in a 68 degree eyepiece from my Orleans, Ontario backyard.
Conjunction of Venus and Jupiter – August 18, 2014
Object Name– Venus, Jupiter Object Type Conjunction of planets Location Pesaro, Italy Date 18th August 2014
I woke up early at 5:00 o’clock to take a look at this marvelous conjunction. It was still night at the time and I was surprised with a mighty view of the rising Orion. I waited on my balcony for until the planets were visible over the roofs in front me. I quickly took my pencil and drew what I saw on the eyepiece of telescope, but the seeing was awful and just two moons were visible. The view of this two small lights dancing together over the roof in the cold morning was much more intriguing, so I tried to sketch the whole landscape. Never tried this kind of astronomy sketch before, probably my first landscape since I was a child.
July 4-8, 2014 – Conjunction of Moon with Mars, Saturn and SpicaJuly 4-8, 2014 – Conjunction of the Moon, Mars, Saturn and Spica
* Object Name (Moon, Mars, Saturn)
* Object Type (Conjunctions)
* Location (Artignosc-sur-Verdon – Provence – France)
* Date (2014 from 4 to 8 July)
* Media (Watercolour, white paper, paint.net to invert the result)
From July 4 to 8 Moon played with planets. From a purely astronomical point of view the Moon showed us some beautiful conjunctions, Mars, Spica and then Saturn. By the way the game was a little complicated with the clouds. What a season!
On July 5, the moon was still visible behind heavy clouds. The next day, I have not even been able to detect the moon light ! I had to invent the sky. July 7, when the Moon approaches Saturn, clouds returned to disturb the magic of the moment. I’m a bit fed-up about this weather, and I think not being alone!
The advantage of astro-artist on the astro-photographer is that we can complete our design. This time I have to add the missing lunar position on the view. And to capture those irritating clouds, I painted a hazy wash around the Moon as was the case on July 5.
The small hilltop village that served as a foreground is called Artignosc-sur-Verdon. I confess to being quite happy by this view. Artignosc is just halfway to two now well-known astro-spots “The Blaque” in Varages and the OAB in Bauduen. And ‘cause we are nevertheless in Provence, believe me above the clouds the sky is very dark!
Still … what a season!
To do this watercolour, I went out on my terrace at ten PM every night, sometimes before the storm, sometimes after and once during, being passionate or you do not. Every time I sketched some sketches in a hurry, and took two or three pictures allow me to keep the shades. At the workshop, I started by gathering the different positions of the stars and their locations relative to the village. In less than a week, only the Lunar race was noteworthy, Mars and Saturn are much quieter than the stars. Then I realized in reverse mode (colors and contrast) this watercolour. I just had to scan my sheet and reverse the colors.
The conjunction of the Moon and Venus – January 2, 2014
I got a quick walk up the hill behind the house this afternoon with 8×32 Nikon binoculars, I scanned for Venus at 16.20ut and was surprised to see a very thin crescent moon in the same fov, also even in the binoculars Venus was a sharp and beautiful crescent, I walked home quickly and made a memory painting in watercolours to try and capture a totally exquisite sight 🙂
Conjunction of the Moon and Jupiter – April 14, 2013
Moon in corona and Jupiter in Conjunction (14-04-2013)
The lunar light diffracted by water drops, gave a beautifull spectacle of colored ring around the Moon just – like an aureole ! Near shone the the largest planet in the Solar System with his four Galilean moons!
Jupiter and Moons were also in small halos 😉
It was remarkable and unforgettable conjunction!
Yours Robert!
Sketch details:
Object Name: Two beautiful phenomenons in one
Object Type: The Conjunction
Location: Poland, Oborniki
Date: 14-04-2013
Equipment: APO 80/480
Power 12x, field of Swan 40mm, details of the Moon -ES 16mm and 8mm HD BST
Object Artist: Robert Twarogal (Ignisdei)
Planetary conjunction at dawn: Mars in The Beehive (M44)
Graphite drawing on white paper (inverted Ps).
Binocular 12×80 (4,2º) at 4:30 UT (height of Mars 21º over horizon)
Mars is within the cluster and framed by the four stars of
Cancer (Asellus Borealis, Asellus Australis, 31 Cnc and 33 Cnc). Its colour was bright orange between blue and white stars.
Object Name (Mercury, Venus and Saturn)
Object Type (Planets conjunction)
Location (Rocbaron Provence France)
Date (December 5th 2012 5:55 UT)
Media (Watercolour on 300gr paper plus white colour for planets)
It was quite cold this morning 1°C but I would like to see the rising of Mercury from my terrace.
Bottom-up we can see: Mercury near the chimney, Venus near alpha Libra, Saturn and Spica .
Clear sky to you all, and if possible, with warmer atmosphere !
Object Name: Pluto and Palomar 8
Object Type: Planet and globular cluster
Location: Cherry Springs, Pennsylvania
Date: July 17, 2013
Media: graphite pencil, white paper, digitally inverted
Notes: 16″ Newtonian and 8 mm Ethos ocular, 225x. West left (arrow on sketch), north down. Pluto is indicated between two vertical dashes among stars. The nebulosity is the unresolved globular cluster Palomar 8. Sagittarius. The true conjunction was around 0 UT on July 15; the observation was made around 06:00 UT on July 17.
Object Name (Mercury and Venus)
Object Type (Planet conjunction)
Location (Val d’Issole)
Date (June 20th 2013)
Media (Watercolour for the landscape and graphite pencil for the planets)
During this very “non cloudy” evening with a perfect transparency, I observed this planet conjunction from my own terrace. I use a 10×50 binocular to find Mercury as early as possible, then with my 102/1000 refractor I begin to sketch this planet that I see with a pale orange light, until masking by the horizon. Some time after, I sketched Venus, with a more blue light. The EP I used was a 40mm to find the planets and then a 10mm SWA to sketch.
What is uncommon here is the apparent diameter of both planets, they looks very similar in size but with very different colours. In fact, Mercury was close to us, nearly between the sun and the earth, and Venus was far further our star.
On the night of 11/28/2012 the Full Moon was shining brightly with Jupiter as its companion. The sketch was done while looking through an old (circa 1960’s) pair of Tasco 8-15×50 binoculars which I recently had refurbished. I used the binocs at 15x for the sketch which was done in Warren county NJ, USA on a laptop computer.
Object Name (Mars and Mercury)
Object Type (Planet conjunction)
Location (Sainte-Anastasie-sur-Issole, Provence, France)
Date (08-02-2013)
Media (watercolour)
This February 8th between 17h and 18h (UT) I wanted to watch an unusual planets conjunction and set, Mars and Mercury separated by only 15 ‘. This could be seen through the long and wide belt of Venus. I found a peak of 360° free to obstacles – 500 meter altitude. North we see clearly two winter sports resorts and South the Porquerolles Island and its lighthouse – 2 x 10 sec, so… the “M” morse letter, to celebrate our two planets M.. ?
It was cold with a strong wind, I still observed one hour. Some pictures with my little camera and two quick sketches, a complete landscape and an eyepiece vision, in order to be ready to make a watercolour, the day after.
Mercury was bright, clearly visible with a white light. Mars was 8 times less light but very red. No details with my reflector 100/500, plus an eyepiece K12mm. We can just imagine the disc-shaped appearance of the two planets. Mercury was gibbous almost full and very close the tiny and still red planet.
Tonight I was hoping to glimpse the conjunction of the Moon with Jupiter. There was a lot of moisture in the air & as I often observe here in Hawaii when there is a lot of moisture in the air there was a lovely 22 degree Moon halo. Jupiter was a mere 2 degrees from the Moon & made a lovely sight. With the extra moisture in the air there was also a hint of red in the surrounding glow around the Moon. I sat down on the porch to sketch & when I looked up could not resist including Christmas lights under the eves that were in my view. Happy Holidays & clear skies all.
Thia Krach
Maui, Hawaii
4,000 ft elevation
Fair seeing condition making for lovely phenomenon
Black paper with chalk & oil pastel
Addendum
Something nagged me as I thought about Jupiter & the Moon last night after I submitted my sketch. I realized they were not 2* apart when I sketched them as they would have been at their closest conjunction. Earlier in the evening when the skies were cloudy is when they would have appeared to be closest.
Object Name (Mercury, Venus and the Moon)
Object Type (conjunction)
Location (Rocbaron Provence France)
Date (December 11th 2012 6:00 UT)
Media (Watercolour on 300gr paper plus white colour for planets)
It was quite cold this morning -1°C plus Mistral (north local wind)… but I would like to see again the rising of Mercury from my terrace.
Bottom-up we can see: Mercury near the chimney and Venus close to the Moon.
The watercolour was done on the spot, taking off the pigment for the planets with a brush when the paper was not yet dry. I add some hot coloration to the dark part of the very old Moon. Then I scanned the picture.
At the last day of October I sketched a beautiful conjunction between the Moon, Jupiter and Aldebaran. The building in the foreground was my holiday-resort (illuminated by a streetlight), a renovated farm from 1669. By chance: in the first months of 1669 Jupiter was also next to Aldebaran in the sky. So the first inhabitants could have witnessed a similar conjunction. To add some more history: the location was less than 10 km from Middelburg, the town where the telescope was invented!
Clear skies
Jef De Wit
Location: Biggekerke, Netherlands (51°29’ N 3°31’ E)
Date and time: 31 October 2012 around 19.30 UT
Equipment: naked eye
Medium: pastel pencils and soft pastels on black paper (A4), Jupiter and Aldebaran were brightened with Paint
Here is my ASOD contribution for ASOD. My drawing subjects should have been the 11 August Perseïdes meteor shower but…They Perseïdes were a bit disappointing on this special night. But there was something else the beautiful conjunction between-on my drawing from left to right- Venus, Moon, Jupiter and Aldebaran. This drawing/impression was made from the Philipsdam in the Netherlands in the night of 11 of August.
I hope you like it.
Hello everyone.
I’d like to show you my sketch of one of the most beautiful phenomenons I’ve ever seen. I mean Venus meeting the M45 cluster. I was very pleased because one day earlier the weather was horrible (clouds, clouds and more clouds :D) but at conjunction day the sky was without even one cloud.
Despite the full moon, the Pleiades were clearly visible and also Venus phase was visible too. It was so awesome sight…
Object Name (Jupiter, Moon, Venus and Hyades)
Object Type (occultation)
Location (Néoules Var France)
Date (2012 July 15th)
Media (graphite pencil for the moon, and watercolor for the dolmen sketch)
So early! I observed with a friend of mine from 3h to 5h AM local time.
Close to Néoules, we have a good place with a good sky to observe the rising of Sun, Moon and planets.
The telescope I use to sketch is a Bresser 1000/102.
The two first sketches were made in this place; the watercolour was made just after the occultation, 5 km further. How many occultation this megalithic dolmen has seen?
On the watercolor, we can see the planet Venus and perceive the Hyades open cluster with Aldebaran
That was very early but,… what a wonderful spectacle !
Kind regards
Conjunction - July 15, 2012 - Venus, Jupiter, Moon, Aldebaran, Pleiades and Hyades
Planetary conjunction at dawn: Venus, Jupiter, Moon, Aldebarán, Pléyades and Hyades.
Drawing made at 5:30 in the morning from the balcony of house in a village near Toledo, Spain.
July 15, 2012
Sketch made with graphite on white paper, inverted with Photoshop.
The sky was crystal clear and pristine,
Alpha
A beautiful sight for the eyes… although it should be up early enough to see.
The conjunction between Venus and Jupiter was one of the astronomical highlights of March.
At March 24, another competitor came on the horizon besides these two celestial objects: the Moon.
In the next couple of days, the Moon would climb towards Jupiter and Venus in a spectacular conjunction.
This Photoshop made sketch shows the early stage of the conjunction. At around 7:30 P.M., the Moon was in sight above the horizon. Bright planet Jupiter stood higher at the sky, and the even brighter planet Venus stood slightly above Jupiter.
The Pleiades (M45) were visible above Venus, but with some difficulty.
