Jupiter and Saturn nearing their December 21, 2020 Great Conjunction, with this image taken in the deep twilight on December 3, 2020 from the Allen Bill flats area on the Elbow River in the Kananaskis Country southwest of Calgary, Alberta. This is a blend of 4 untracked images for the dark ground, stacked to smooth noise, for 2 minutes each at ISO 400, and two tracked images for the sky (and untrailed stars) for 30 seconds each at ISO 400, all with the 35mm Canon lens at f/2.8 and Canon EOS Ra. A dodge and burn layer created by Lumenzia applied. The tracker was the Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer 2i.
Jupiter and Saturn nearing their Dec 21, 2020 Great Conjunction, with this image taken December 3, 2020 from the Elbow Falls area on the Elbow River in the Kananaskis Country southwest of Calgary. This is a blend of 4 untracked images for the dark ground, stacked to smooth noise, for 30 seconds each, and one untracked image for the bright sky for 15 seconds to preserve colours and highlights, all with the 24mm Sigma lens and Canon EOS Ra at ISO 200. A dodge and burn layer created by Lumenzia applied. The location was planned with The Photographer’s Ephemeris and TPE 3D apps, to ensure the planets would be visible between the mountain peaks from this site.
This is the partial penumbral eclipse of the Moon (eclipse magnitude 83% — ie. only 83% of the lunar disk was in the penumbral shadow) of November 30, 2020, taken at maximum eclipse about 2:40 a.m. MST. The Moon was in fast-moving low cloud which added the colourful lunar “corona” around the Moon’s disk, caused by water droplets in the clouds diffracting the moonlight. This effect was obvious to the naked eye and in binoculars, though I have increased the contrast and saturation to bring out the colours here. The contrast increase also brings out the very subtle difference in brightness across the disk of the Full Moon, with the top (north) edge of the Moon embedded most deeply into the penumbra and darkest, and the bottom (southern) edge not in the shadow at all and brightest. But the gradation is subtle and obscured somewhat by the clouds. The Moon was precisely and completely Full here with no terminator or shadows along the limb. This is a single exposure (not HDR) with the Canon 6D MkII at ISO 100 through the Astro-Physics Traveler 105mm refractor at f/6 for 0.4 seconds. The clouds dimmed the Moon enough that a single exposure could take in both the Moon and clouds.
