PRIME OPPORTUNITY! Mercury and Jupiter close to within 1/2 degree at sunset this Friday, July 25th!<br><br>Astrophotographers and astro-imagers have a GOLDEN opportunity to capture both Mercury and Jupiter in the same low to medium power field of view this Friday night. Try your luck and find your best shots right here at AOAS.ORG next week for everyone to enjoy!

UPDATE!

In case you miss this opportunity, another good photo-op will occur on Wednesday, July 30, as Mercury (near Regulus) and Jupiter will be joined by the thin crescent moon at sunset. This won't require a telescope, but a good telephoto lens will capture all three in a nice shot.

Photos © 2003 Jeff Treshnell

The upcoming Mars opposition inspired me to attempt digital photography using my Orion 127mm Mak with an Orion variable zoom eyepiece set at 7 mm. I used a 2 megapixel Canon A-40 on the morning of July 7. Hand-holding a camera in front of the eyepiece, I snapped about 50 pictures and chose the best out of the bunch.

It is interesting that the Canon A-40 in fully automatic mode had no problems taking images, but my Olympus C4000Z refuses to take even one decent image. I have fiddled with the manual settings for hours with no success. I received an Orion SteadyPix Universal Camera Mount today, and am eager to try "hands-off" imaging. I will post more photos in the near future.

Photo © 2003 Kenny Dickerson

Climbed out of bed 4:00 am Friday morning to get a glimpse of Mars and to try out my camera with my new camera mount. Mars is still a little hazy and its brightness makes it difficult to obtain much detail. I will have to make a mask to cut back on the light. I am still very much in the experimental stage with my camera so I take lots of pictures and try to keep it in an order so I can keep up with what works and what doesn't. After taking numerous pictures across a wide range of zoom levels and exposure times, I was only able to obtain any detail on the minimal zoom and exposure settings. I had a few pictures turn out with some detail, but they were faint and very small. I could barely make out the polar cap and what appeared to be a bluish streak. Like I said, I am new to this but I enjoy the challenge and the occasional result of an accomplishment.