From: Milton Aupperle <milton@outcastsoft.com>

Date: January 27, 2010 8:30:16 PM MST

To: Astro_IIDC@yahoogroups.com

Subject: Re: [Astro_IIDC] Mars

Hi Alan;

Thanks for the compliment.

I was shooting with basically zero brightness gain using 19 ms exposures for luma and 33 ms for R G B. When I did it as an RGB only image, it had less detail than the LRGB did.

I would have loved to go to 10 meter focal lengths, but the skies simply were not good enough to go beyond 5 meter focal lengths. Mars was jumping or distorting +/- 6 pixels as it was.

I started to shoot the RGB for the luma shot after midnight, but turbulence started getting worse and I couldn't get the red filtered image into focus. So I packed it in.

It's clear tonight too, but Betelgeuse was twinkling pretty good at 7 pm, so I'll wait and see what happens after 10 pm. At least it won't be -19°C tonight, just -14°C.

PS:

I'm not sure which of your 2 Mars images I like better. Both look pretty natural to me. But I have very little luck with producing good Mars shots - not enough aperture and focal length.

TTYL..

Milton Aupperle

On 27-Jan-10, at 7:57 PM, Alan Friedman wrote:

Hi Milton,

That's a very handsome portrait of Mars... small, but accurate and nicely processed. There is very little to be seen from an albedo standpoint at that CM even at higher magnification, but I would have enjoyed seeing it a little bigger. Maybe you will have another opportunity sometime close to opposition.

best,

Alan

Hi Folks;

Seeing was fairly good last night, so I shot the Moon (still MAP processing them) and then Mars as LRGB.

Here is Mars at 5 meter focal length:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Astro_IIDC/files/Planetary/Mars_2010_01_26_MJA.jpg

Seeing wasn't good enough to permit me to go any longer. The CSK and the NAM forecast predicted nearly perfect skies for turbulence, but there was a high frequency erratic turbulence present.

You definitely need 10+ meter focal lengths to pick up any details on Mars.

TTYL..

Milton Aupperle