Mars - Red Storm Rising?

starfinder · Post by **starfinder** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 1:21 am

According to a Sky & Telescope article on their website, there is now a storm brewing on Mars:
http://skyandtelescope.com/observing/at ... _110_1.asp

During the peak of the last Opposition in 2003, a perfect storm arose on Mars at the wrong moment for observers, and blanketed the planet. That ruined things, I remember.

Tonite, we had pockets of clear skies at last in S'pore, after a week of continuous cloud cover and haze. I therefore decided to observe Mars and other objects.

I wonder if it is my imagination, but I think the surface of Mars looks smoother and flatter now than 2-3 weeks ago. Is that the storm I see, esp in the upper half of the globe?

I took "a" photo of it with a Philips Toucam Pro II webcam using my LX-90 8" SCT barlowed 3x to f/30 (511 frames stacked with the fantastic free program Registax, and then "unsharp mask" sharpened with Photoshop Elements). No IR filter used. Amazing results with CCD imaging!

Here are the details of the state of Mars when photographed, according to S&T's Mars Profiler applet obtainable here:
http://skyandtelescope.com/observing/ob ... _997_1.asp#

Fri 21 Oct 2005 Time:1620UT
No. of days to Opposition: 17
Mag.: -2.1
Illumination: 98%
Angular diameter: 19.9 arcsec
Central Meridian-longitude: 180 degrees

Anybody out there see Mars gathering dust? Hope a repeat of 2003 doesn't happen.

Also, I think the south polar cap has almost melted away. It is tiny now compared to 3 weeks ago. Or is it just facing away?

river · Post by **river** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 1:51 am

woow... great picture! can you include just one frame of raw pic for me to compare?

I was focusing on mars for an hour or two, try to capture some photo with many different setting and filter. mars is bright but look soft regardless how I focus it. But I can see M45 is sharp and clear!? Maybe is the high cloud or the red storm like what you say.

Have not download my pic from camera to PC yet, will do it later... now just want to zzZZZZ

have fun tonight!!

siahheng · Post by **siahheng** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 10:59 am

Hi, saw Mars last night too with my CPC 800 and my new 5mm LVW. Mars looks almost featureless on southern half. Being summer there, the polar cap has almost melted away, could hardly make it out. Lets hope tonight is another good night.......

siahheng

hlyf · Post by **hlyf** » Sat Oct 22, 2005 11:12 pm

yeah observed mars last night too. could only make out one distinct band at the upper half of mars, maybe a hint of the polar icecap, no other surface features. remember a few weeks back could see the sharks fin shape of syrtis major very clearly..

starfinder · Post by **starfinder** » Sun Oct 23, 2005 1:28 am

river wrote: can you include just one frame of raw pic for me to compare?

I was focusing on mars for an hour or two, try to capture some photo with many different setting and filter. mars is bright but look soft regardless how I focus it.

Hi river,

Ok, here is one extracted frame from the 511-frame .avi file.

What camera/imager are you using? From what I understand, for the planets, it is best to do CCD imaging (such as with a webcam) where you capture the image using a video format, i.e. where many frames are taken per second, and then stack these frames with a program such as Registax. If you use a digital SLR, the mirror slap will cause too much vibrations, and it will be too taxing on your camera to take hundreds of frames.

Also, the advantage of using image capture via the PC is that you can see a large video image "live" on the 12" or so PC screen, and then focus precisely.

wucheeyiun · Post by **wucheeyiun** » Sun Oct 23, 2005 1:26 pm

Last night i tried to image Mars with the mewlon 210, it was too "white and plain " even as i set to the lowest light seeting and highest contrast...did not rip any imge though...Will try again tonight.

river · Post by **river** » Mon Oct 24, 2005 6:17 pm

Hi starfinder,

Your Raw frame is much better than mine. I am trying eyepiece projection on Mars using Canon S45 digital camera fit on Celestron 15mm with scoptronic digi-t system, also using a diagonal. I hope to capture more detail with eyepiece projection but I am far away from getting the technique right, any advice?

Considering getting a ToUcam too but need to phsco myself to carry a notebook out for imaging,

Below is an image taken on 22 Oct with 5" F/15 Mak , 15mm EP with 2xBarlow, Canon S45 on 0.5sec exposure.

NGC 5139 · Post by **NGC 5139** » Tue Oct 25, 2005 11:48 am

Yeah, I got about the same results that night too. The image was not extremely sharp and it was very difficult to make out surface detail such as even the polar cap in an 8-inch with a 7mm ocular.

Post by **Airconvent** » Tue Oct 25, 2005 11:15 pm

here's a tip I learnt from Shaun (an MIA Singastroian who own an N8!).
Most of the time, its because you do not have a good focu due to the small size. Use your optical PLUS digital zoom to get an as large image as possible. then focus on that, once done, exit from digital zoom...your images will be easier to focus this way...
rich

river · Post by **river** » Wed Oct 26, 2005 8:57 am

Thanks, will keep trying it.