ECLIPSES

2019 Jan. 21: Total Lunar Eclipse Observed from Rousay, Orkney.

A very challenging early morning's work with cloud in various forms coming and going resulting in having to image the event through thin cloud and a sprinkling of light rain from time to  time!

It was therefore impossible to use the preferred instrument, a 100mm refractor (except in the very early stages) but instead we had to resort to faster, shorter focal length telephoto lenses in combination with a D300 SLR. Neither the 800 mm f/7 nor the 400mm f/5.6 were equatorially driven resulting in less sharp images than with the telescope equatorially driven at lunar rate.

Mid eclipse at 05h 12m UT required exposures of 5 sec. with a 400mm f/5.6 lens imaged through medium cloud density resulting in poor image quality.

Dense cloud cover terminated the observations at 05h 40m UT, 3 minutes before the end of totality.

1): 03h 45m 12 minutes into the umbral phase: 100mm achromatic refractor 45x, F200 Minolta digital camera.

2): 04h 44m 4 minutes into commencement of totality: 400 mm f/3.5 (with 2x converter) Nikkor lens D300 SLR.

3): 05h 12m at mid-eclipse: 400mm f/5.6 Nikkor  lens D300 SLR.