Telescope Reviews: Jupiter with two moon shadow transits and GRS

To all

What a night for Jupiter! Two simultaneous moon shadow transits of Ganymede and Calisto with the GRS thrown into view for good measure! I could just see several other hollow ovals to the right of the GRS. I assume one of them closest to the GRS is the JRS. (Refer to my rendering) I showed this view through the eyepiece to several neighbors for their first time. I believe I have turned another neighborhood into new astronomers. They cannot wait for the Perseids peak night next week when the local astronomy club will provide many large telescopes 25 miles east of Portland Oregon for their viewing pleasure. This usually draws hundreds of the public to experience their first views through quality optics- Next Monday night will be Jupiter and the first quarter moon again.

In this view tonight at 6:45 UT:

Equipment: 10.1” Coulter Odyssey Dobsonian purchased in 1987- Never collimated.
9.7mm plossl and 6mm Orthoscopic eyepieces to produce 192X and 125X magnification.
Seeing was shaky under a light breeze at first, approx 5 ~ 6/10, then improving to 8 ~ 9/10.

I assembled a Photoshop image in large detail and an accompanyng image below as the apparent size as observed through the eyepiece.

Well I must thank all of you for your inspiring sketches of Jupiter because you got me so intrigued that I even ran in and out of the house from the telescope eyepiece to the computer to render this Photoshop image. This is rather unconventional for me as I really like to use old world mediums like pastel chalks where I get dirty with chalk dust and pigments under my fingernails. So this is just a hiatus for me as I recuperate from a torn muscle. I have swapped my true left hand sketching to instead, the mouse in the right hand and Photoshop for awhile.

I am not sure if Calisto and Ganymede were actually transiting one another or that Calisto was actualy over the planets surface. Can someone confirm that?

Thank you,

-Mark

Edited by markseibold (08/06/08 03:18 AM)

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