Crescent Moon Waxing
Classic "toe-nail" moon 2 days after new moon
Observer Comments
| Image Capture Description | Couldn't resist a spontaneous capture of this "toe-nail moon" using my Seestar, executed nearly a year before I decided to pursue this award. Considering the size and cost of the Seestar telescope, I'm pleased that its lunar captures are good enough to reveal all of the "binocular targets", and all but a handful of the "telescope" targets listed here. The huge advantage of the Seestar is its quick setup. Elapsed time from the decision to perform an observation of the moon, to the first image, is under 10 minutes, even if it's stored-way in my closet. If the Seestar is sitting-out, pre-mounted on its tripod -- which it often is in my household -- then it's under 5 minutes. By contrast, lunar observing with a pre-configured refractor on my home pier takes at least 30 minutes to mount, connect, focus, and polar-align. In cold weather, the EdgeHD needs to temperature normalize as well, which adds another 30-60 minutes depending on the outside temperature. And if the telescope is stored away, not configured for observing, add another 15-30 minutes to mount, attach cameras, and cabling. As a result, you'll see many of the images in this initial Lunar Program were captured with the Seestar. Now that I'm more engaged in lunar observing, I'm replacing them when I can with higher quality captures using SharpCap's live lucky-imaging and wavelet sharpening. Even now, however, cloud forecasts in the Catskills are extremely unreliable, and I can be caught unprepared for a brief window of clarity. In those cases, the Seestar remains as the only practical option. |
| Program Links | Lunar Program Listings | Next> |
Capture Details
| Date and Time Observed | 2024-06-08 21:44:00 |
| Phase Age | 2 days |
| Lunar Phase | Waxing Crescent |
| Illumination | 7% |
| Conditions | Transparency: Good. Seeing: Good. |
| Obs. Lat/Long | 42° 17', 073° 57' |
| Capture Software | Seestar |
| Capture Type | Single-image |
| Instrument | Seestar S50 f5.0-250mm FL |
| Camera | Seestar Built-in SONY IMX462 Sensor |
| Capture Details | Auto capture |
| Post Processing | Levels adjusted and fine bandpass sharpening applied in Affinity Photo |