Eratosthenes

There have been a few clear nights over the last couple of weeks which is a big improvement on a pretty grim winter. The best night coincided with the last new moon which was great for being back at the eyepiece but not so great for creating material for this blog. Last night was clearer than usual - barely a hint of cloud and very still. I was optimistic.

Since it was one month since my last lunar observations (this is becoming something of a theme...) I was, yet again, presented with the usual targets of the first-quarter moon. I started with the old favourite of Eratosthenes last visited here.

I had a bit more time since I wasn't cloud dodging and produced a number of images both with and without the 2x Barlow. The best ones are these:


This is much crisper than the image in my previous Eratosthenes post. Montes Appenninus always look impressive and the distance from the termintor is perfect for enhancing the detail without everything being swamped in shadow. The exterior shadow from Timocharis shows up nicely as well (top left).


This image with the 2x Barlow really shows the detail inside the crater. I'm still working on adjusting the focus during video capture when using the higher magnification. This could help to sharpen the images a little although there is always a natural limit to how sharp the image can be. A green filter might help as well but I haven't tried that yet.