Harding Springs, Fall Colors, and the Full Moon

Continuing with the thread in the previous post we have more images of fall colors in the Oak Creek Canyon area. This time, we explored a small side canyon known as Harding Springs. Although there is a trail, we chose to walk up the dry wash since the best colors were on trees in and near the stream bed. And we actually found a small trickle of water in a single location.

Fall colors in Harding Springs.
Fall colors in Harding Springs.
A thin trickle of water in Harding Springs.
A thin trickle of water in Harding Springs.

Later that day we hiked to the top of a rock formation known as Napoleons Tomb in Sedona so that we could watch the (nearly) full moon rise in the gap of Cathedral Rock. To make the image even better, hikers fortuitously positioned themselves in front of the moon. I wish I could say that I orchestrated this but it was just chance!

Moon rise above Cathedral Rock.
Moon rise above Cathedral Rock.

Perseid Meteors of 2013

Well — that was fun!

Clouds and thunderstorms during the day and evening gave way to mostly clear to partly cloudy skies after midnight. So I set up the camera to take continuous photographs then combined the best images to make this composite image. This spans a period of about 2 ½ hours in the early morning hours of 12 August.

These images were shot looking to the west at the Milky Way allowing the meteors to move from the radiant in the constellation Perseus (in the northeast part of the sky) overhead and then descend in the western sky.

Perseid meteors of 2013.
Perseid meteors of 2013.

The weather was better in the early morning of 13 August but there were fewer meteors. A reasonable tradeoff. Here are a few individual images zoomed in and cropped from both nights of shooting.

Perseid meteors of 2013.
Perseid meteors of 2013.
Perseid meteors of 2013.
Perseid meteors of 2013.
Perseid meteors of 2013.
Perseid meteors of 2013.

Comet PanSTARRS—VIII

Comet PanSTARRS continues to amaze sky watchers! Even though it has significantly diminished in brightness as it moves away it is still easily photographed. Even more amazing is the incredible “anti-tail” that has developed. Astronomy Photo of the Day (APOD) has a nice image of the anti-tail of Comet PanSTARRS. APOD notes that “…PanSTARRS anti-tail is one of the longest since the appearance of Comet Arend-Roland in 1957.”

 

Comet PanSTARRS: 30 May 2013.
Comet PanSTARRS: 30 May 2013.

This image was taken using a fixed tripod along with a moderate and fast telephoto lens (Nikon AF-S 85mm f/1.8G). Thirty separate images of 15s duration were stacked using the free Deep Sky Stacker software. This relatively-long exposure with a telephoto lens was only possible because the comet is located so close to Polaris (North Star) resulting in minimal star motion. This shows that high-end astronomy equipment (i.e. equatorial tracking mount, telescope, modified cameras, etc.) is not necessary to take photographs of the comet.

 

Triple Planetary Alignment in the Western Sky

During the latter half of the month of May the planets Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury have been drawing closer together. Their closest approach was on 26 May 2013 when the three planets could fit within a 3° circle. For comparison, the disk of the Moon and Sun are about ½ degree.

Triple planetary alignment of Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury in May 2013.
Triple planetary alignment of Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury in May 2013.

For several nights leading up to the closest approach and for a few nights afterward I shot photos of the three planets during the evening hours. I then took the best image from each day (i.e., cloud free!) and made a composite image. Next, I shifted each image up/down, left/right until the planet Jupiter lined up. The result was that the composite contains a single image of Jupiter along with five images of Venus and Mercury. This makes it easy to see how all three planets were shifting relative to each other over the course of five days. During this period, Venus and Mercury were quickly rising higher in the sky while Jupiter was slowly moving towards the horizon.

Comet PanSTARRS — VII

This will probably be the final entry for Comet C/2011 L4 PanSTARRS. The comet is heading farther away from Earth each day and its brightness has diminished substantially. I have still been able to photograph it using long exposures or by stacking* many shorter exposures.

Comet PanSTARRS
Comet PanSTARRS

Here is an image from a few days ago that clearly shows the fan-shaped tail of the comet.

Comet PanSTARRS and M31.
Comet PanSTARRS and M31.

From a month ago — this stacked image shows both the comet and M31 (Andromeda Galaxy).

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* I’ve been experimenting with the free Deep Sky Tracker for image stacking.