Landing Day

Today is Landing Day! I celebrate it every year, the first time humans ever walked on another world. Usually, I watch the "Mare Tranquillitatis" episode from the HBO Series From the Earth to the Moon, then perhaps break out Apollo 13.

I usually start my classes each term with a discussion about why we went to the Moon, and sadly, these days I'm usually the only person in the room who remembers. I was 10 years old and my family was on vacation in a park in Quincy, Illinois, eating lunch and listening to the landing on the radio. Even then I was a space nerd, so when I heard "Contact light. Engine stop." I knew the Eagle was safely down. We watched the first moonwalk from a motel in Nauvoo, Illinois (this little town is very important in the history of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; that's why we were there). The journey to the Moon shaped my young life and inspired my ambitions. It is a significant part of why I am a scientist today. As much as I still love manned spaceflight, going up to the ISS in low Earth orbit just doesn't even come close to the excitement I (and I think, much of the world) felt about going to the Moon.

What does this have to do with astrophotography? As I've mentioned in some earlier posts, lunar astrophotography is not something I'm very good at, but I do enjoy giving it a shot from time to time. In the spring of 2013, I decided to try to image all the Apollo landing sites. These aren't great images. I took all of them right after starting to use my Logitech c270 HD webcam and I was trying to do the capture all Mac-native. Hmm... maybe I'm going to need to try this again using SharpCap and what I've learned in the last year. In any event, in honor of Landing Day, here they are. All the landing sites, as best I can pinpoint them (using the free lunar atlas software atlun; it's wonderful) are marked with yellow cross hairs.

This is one of the first images with my modified Logitech c270 HD camera.  This has much smaller pixels than the LPI, and hence gives a more “magnified” effect.  There is still some vignetting with this camera.  Capture was fully Mac-native.  OK for a first try; seeing was poor.  The small crater just slightly above center is Armstrong.

Date: 17 Apr 2013
Subject: Sea of Tranquility, Apollo 11 Landing Site
Scope:  AT8IN + Meade 3x Barlow
Filter:  Baader Planetarium Fringe Killer (UV-IR cut)
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors)
Guiding: manual
Camera: Modified Logitech c270 HD
Acquisition: BTV+Webcam Settings
Exposure: 120 s, ~10 fps
Stacking: PIPP (Wine); Registax 6 (VMWare), best 80 frames
Processing: Wavelets in Registax 6; StarTools Contrast:Agressiveness 25; Sharpen; Deconvolute:3 pix; CS6 add crosshairs, Astronomy Tools AstroFrame.

This image of the Apollo 12 & 14 landing sites is probably a little better than one I took earlier, although at the time I took it I was just looking for the Fra Mauro site.  These two are pretty close together (about 180 km).

Date: 20 Apr 2013
Subject: Apollo 12 (Ocean of Storms) and Apollo 14 (Fra Mauro) Landing Sites
Scope:  AT8IN + Meade 3x Barlow
Filter:  Baader Planetarium Fringe Killer (UV-IR cut)
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors)
Guiding: manual
Camera: Modified Logitech c270 HD
Acquisition: BTV+Webcam Settings
Exposure: 120 s, ~10 fps
Stacking: PIPP (Wine); Registax 6 (VMWare), best 80 frames of about 1200
Processing: Wavelets in Registax 6 (“Full” settings with linked wavelets); CS6 add crosshairs, Astronomy Tools AstroFrame.

Apollo 15 is one of my favorite lunar missions (OK, I guess I liked them all).  I was thrilled to be able to pick up Hadley Rille in this image.  You can see it running left (west) from the marked landing site and looping southwest along the front of the Appenines.  No rover tracks, however.  

Date: 18 Apr 2013
Subject: Hadley-Appenine (Marsh of Decay), Apollo 15 Landing Site
Scope:  AT8IN + Meade 3x Barlow
Filter:  Baader Planetarium Fringe Killer (UV-IR cut)
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors)
Guiding: manual
Camera: Modified Logitech c270 HD
Acquisition: BTV+Webcam Settings
Exposure: 120 s, ~10 fps
Stacking: PIPP (Wine); Registax 6 (VMWare), best 80 frames of about 1200
Processing: Wavelets in Registax 6 (“Recommended” settings with linked wavelets); StarTools Contrast:Agressiveness 25; Sharpen; Track; CS6 add crosshairs, Astronomy Tools AstroFrame.

A better image than before of the Apollo 16 landing site, mostly made better by the use of the Logitech c270 HD camera and Mac-native capture with BTV.  

Date: 17 Apr 2013
Subject: Descartes Highlands, Apollo 16 Landing Site
Scope:  AT8IN + Meade 3x Barlow
Filter:  Baader Planetarium Fringe Killer (UV-IR cut)
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors)
Guiding: manual
Camera: Modified Logitech c270 HD
Acquisition: BTV+Webcam Settings
Exposure: 120 s, ~10 fps
Stacking: PIPP (Wine); Registax 6 (VMWare), best 80 frames of about 1200
Processing: Wavelets in Registax 6; StarTools Contrast:Agressiveness 25; Sharpen; CS6 add crosshairs, Astronomy Tools AstroFrame.

This is one of the first images with my modified Logitech c270 HD camera.  This has much smaller pixels than the LPI, and hence gives a more “magnified” effect.  There is still some vignetting with this camera.  Capture was fully Mac-native.  OK for a first try; seeing was poor.

Date: 17 Apr 2013
Subject: Taurus-Littrow Valley, Apollo 17 Landing Site
Scope:  AT8IN + Meade 3x Barlow
Filter:  Baader Planetarium Fringe Killer (UV-IR cut)
Mount: CG-5 (Synta motors)
Guiding: manual
Camera: Modified Logitech c270 HD
Acquisition: BTV+Webcam Settings
Exposure: 120 s, ~10 fps
Stacking: PIPP (Wine); Registax 6 (VMWare), best 80 frames
Processing: Wavelets in Registax 6; StarTools Contrast:Agressiveness 25; Sharpen; CS6 add crosshairs, Astronomy Tools AstroFrame.