Category: Planetary Moons

Saturn and Enceladus

Saturn and Enceladus- June 20, 2013
Saturn and Enceladus – June 20, 2013

I have not sketched Saturn this go around until now because of extremely poor weather so far this year. On Wednesday evening the atmosphere cooperated and I had a scope outside cooling down. I did not have access to any Saturn templates because of a computer crash. So I took out my old mechanical drawing equipment and made an ellipse of the approximate eccentricity of Saturn’s rings and sketched from there. It’s a bit crude but reasonably close to the view. Seeing was good and the atmosphere was transparent. I was able to see Mimas but it was just beyond the way I framed the sketch for posting. Enceladus was about 12th magnitude.

Sketching:
Date: 06/20/2013, 01:45 – 02:45 UT
Sky Conditions: Partly cloudy
Transparency: 3/5
Seeing: Pickering 7/10
For sketching I used 10” x 12” Canson black paper, white, gray, charcoal and black pastel pencils, powdered Conte’ crayons, white Pearl eraser, blending stumps.
Equipment: 18” f/4.95 Dobsonian with a 9mm ortho eyepiece for 250 x.
Neodymium filter and single polarizing filter
Frank McCabe

Saturn and Moons – April 14, 2013

Saturn - April 14, 2013
Saturn – April 14, 2013

SW BD 120ED a 300x (Baader Genuine Ortho 6mm y Barlow TeleVue x2) Filter Neodymium

14 April 2013 23:30 h. UTC (civil time 15 April 2013 02:30 h)

Height above the horizon 36 º Observation at sea level in Barcelona (Spain)

Media: pencil in white paper, Microsoft Paint

Notes:

Horizontal image investment because used diagonal mirror.

The predominant color on the planet is a very pale yellow (at other times showed an intense golden) contrasting with some greyish belts with ill-defined irregularities. It clearly shows the shadow of the planet on the rings.

The Cassini Division shows a high contrast and a black is intense and well defined.

I could clearly see the satellites Titan, Rhea, Dione. Tethys only very weakly.

Enceladus, I’d be on the limit of this equip, but It was not possible to distinguish. Mimas is beyond the scope of this opening.

Saturn – March 3, 2013

Saturn - March 3, 2013
Saturn – March 3, 2013

Hello friends of the planets,

yesterday the weather was the first time very good. And the night was great. After many deep-sky-impressions I waited for Saturn and the air was as good as possible.

It is my first Saturn sketch in 2013 and I sketched the ring-planet without any helps. So I need about 20 minutes for the ring system only. It is very hard to sketch it quite well and it needs little work in the warm living room after the session. 😉

Location: Germany, near Tauberbischofsheim
Altitude: 360m over sea level
Temperature: – 4°C
Air: very good
Telescope: TMB 115/805 on Vixen SXD Mount 160x- 200x

CS Uwe

Jupiter – February 8, 2013

Jupiter - February 8, 2013
Jupiter – February 8, 2013

Object Name Jupiter
Object Type planet
Location Hungary, Göd
Date 08-02-2013 UT 17 30
Media graphite pencil, white black paper
Equipment: MC 127/1500
Eyepieces: Baader Hyperion
magn: 166x and 122x
Filters: green (500 nm) and blue (470 nm)
Conditions: -1 deg.
Seeing & clarity: cloudy sky

Left 166x and green filter

Right 122x and blue filter

Jupiter and Moons - February 8, 2013
Jupiter and Moons – February 8, 2013

2012 Saturn

Saturn - March 23, 2012
Saturn – March 23, 2012

Hallo!
This is my last sketch of Saturn.

Object: Saturn
Equipment: SCT 5″
Eyepieces: TS Expanse 8mm / NED 8mm
Filters: Moon & Skyglow,
Date: March 23rd, 2012
Place: Warsaw, Poland
Conditions: Clear skies, light wind.
Seeing & clarity: Unstable. Sometimes bad, sometimes very good.

Greetings!
Aleksander (Wimmer)
http://astro-art.com.pl

Io Transit in the Mist

Io Transit of Jupiter - November 18, 2012
Io Transit of Jupiter - November 18, 2012

Object Name: Jupiter
Object Type : Transit of Io
Location: Wilp, The Netherlands
Date: November 18, 2012
Media: White paper, graphite pencil, Photoshop

Last night a nice transit of Jupiter’s moon Io was visible from Europe. The transit of Io (and its shadow) started when Jupiter was still very low in the East, but it rose very quickly. Seeing conditions improved and more details became visible. It was a very foggy evening in the Netherlands, but Jupiter just peeked through the mist. The tiny black dot of Io’s shadow was immediately visible. The moon itself became visible when it moved more to the limb of the planet (due to the edge darkening of Jupiter).
I made a small (2″ diameter), quick sketch of the view through my 16″ Dobson at 225x. I later enhanced the contrast and colorised it a bit with Photoshop, to match the actual view through the eyepiece as much as possible.

(It is one of my first sketches of Jupiter, so I sketched it a bit too small. Next time I’ll try to sketch a bigger planet, maybe 4″.)

Clear Skies,

Roel Weijenberg
www.roelbog.nl

Jupiter Greets The Hyades

Jupiter and Hyades
Jupiter and Hyades

Hello!
I would like to show you my latest sketch made with binoculars 10×50. On the right side are Hyades, and in the left-top part shines the Jupiter.
I used the graphite pencil on white paper. Then sketch was inverted. There are some little corrections in GIMP.

Best regards!
Aleksander Cieśla (Wimmer)

“Vivid” sketch of Jupiter & Io

Jupiter and Io - November 18, 2012
Jupiter and Io - November 18, 2012

Dear reader,

Last night (November 18) Io was transiting Jupiter. I made a sketch of the event from 19:30 – 20:00 UT. The telescope used was an Astrosib 250 mm f/8 Ritchey-Chretien, with magnifications between 91x and 370x (Vixen LVW 13 & 22 mm + Barlow). The sketch has been made behind the telescope and drawn with a 3B graphite pencil. However, I played with it in Photoshop (CS4) to mimic the seeing.

Best regards,

Maurice Toet
Zoetermeer, Netherlands