Moon – Page 4 – Astronomy Sketch of the Day

Big Bowl of Pythagoras

Lunar crater Pythagoras - January 3, 2015 — Lunar crater Pythagoras – January 3, 2015

Object Name – Pythagoras
Object Type – Lunar impact crater
Location – Deventer, The Netherands
Date – Januari 3, 2015
Media – White pastel pencil on black paper

So far this winter is terrible for astronomy. Nothing but clouds and rain in the Netherlands… But yesterday evening the skies finally cleared and my 3″ Polarex Unitron was quickly set up in the backyard. Crater Pythagoras on the northeastern limb of the Moon looked particularly nice – like a deep rocky bowl in the lunar surface. Seeing conditions were fair, so I pumped up the magnifcation to a crazy (for a 3″) 200x. It still gave a pleasant and sharp view and sketching was quite comfortable with the crater looking big in the eyepiece.

Pythagoras is a 130km wide impact crater with staggering 5km high terraced walls. The central peaks (I could see two of them) are also pretty huge: 3,5km high! Imagine the panoramic view from the top op one of those mountains….

Sketch made with a pastel pencil on black paper, through a 3″ Polarex Unitron at 200x (Baader 6mm BGO). The image is mirror reversed.

Clear Skies,
Roel Weijenberg
www.roelblog.nl

Smiling Christmas Eve Moon & Mars

The conjunction of the crescent Moon and Planet Mars - December 24, 2014 — The conjunction of the crescent Moon and Planet Mars – December 24, 2014

Aloha,

Every Christmas Eve, my family treks to the top of Haleakala to feel the chill and look for Santa’s Sleigh. This year we went to the 10,000 el to find it a cold 36*, wet, and blowing rain. After a few minutes we jumped back into the car a bit disappointed, to descend the mountain. Right before the park exit the sky had mostly cleared and the winds calmed. There we hiked under the “smiling” Hawaiian crescent. Chilled cheeks and fingers, it was perhaps one of the nicest Christmas Eves ever. This sketch was drawn from my memory of the evening.

In the winter months the path of the Moon is more parallel with the horizon giving the lunar crescent in Hawaii a bowl or smile like appearance when lit from the already set sun. Ancient Hawaiian’s called this the “wet moon” because it looks like a bowl that could be filled up with rain. As the winter moves into Spring & Summer the crescent shifts to “pour” water onto the land, empties and becomes a “dry moon” once more. Wet moons occur routinely in the tropics where the sun and moon rise and set nearly vertically.

3.5 day old Crescent Moon & Mars
12/24/14 1930 HST
Haleakala National Park, Hosmers Grove
Black Canson paper with colored Conte’ Crayon and watercolor pencils

Cindy (Thia) Krach

Webmaster’s note: Wishing all astrosketchers a Very Happy New Year and looking forward to another year hosting all your wonderful observational sketches!

Richard Handy
Jeremy Perez

Lunar crater Maurolycus

Hi,

here we go with a chalk/charcoal sketch of lunar crater Maurolycus.
Object Name: Maurolycus
Object Type: Lunar Crater
Location: Germany, Dusseldorf area
Date: 2014-12-28, 1650-1720 CET
Media: chalk pencil and charcoal pencil on black sketching cardbox
Telescope: Martini 10” f/5 truss tube dobsonian
Eyepiece: TS HR Planetary 7mm

Clear Skies!

Achim

Gassendi, Rimae Mersenius and Rupes Liebig at the terminator

Aloha!

This was one of those nights things just fall together. Excellent seeing and light enough from the Moon that I could see the paper well. After finishing my sketch at the eyepiece I went inside to clean it up and was pleasantly surprised that I liked it pretty much the way it was.

110km wide Gassendi Crater showed some excellent roughened floor details with hummocks casting shadows as well as floor rilles illuminated as bright & dark lines. Rima Mersenius is brilliantly lit on the terminator and the bright scarp of Rupes Liebig can be seen at the base of the wall.

Gassendi Crater, Mersenius Rille, Rupes Liebig, Mare Humorum @11.7 days lunation
.12/2/14 2030-2140 HST
12.5″ Portaball, 227x
Canson Black paper and white and black Conte’ Crayon, white charcoal pencil
Photoscape to adjust contrast

Cindy (Thia) Krach
Haleakala Amateur Astronomers
Maui, Hawaii

Schiller

Hello,

Crater Schiller

Object Type: Moon

Location: Tarragona – Spain

Schiller crater formation is still unknown, but one of the most plausible theory argue that due to an impact of a small asteroid or comet fragmented with a small impact angle.

While I was observing and drawing this beautiful crater, I imagined what it would have been to observe the crash and its immediate aftermath. Actually, the moon never disappoints.

For more details of my observation you can visit my blog:

http://laorilladelcosmos.blogspot.com.es/2014/12/schiller.html

Date and Time: 2014-08-06, 21h 58m UT

Telescope: SC Celestron 235mm (9.25″); CGEM mount.

Eyepiece: 7.5mm (313x)

White paper, HB2 graphite pencil, and scanned with Photoshop

Seeing: 4/5 (5 the best)

Transparency: Clear. Rural skies.

Thank you and best regards.

Taoism on an Anomalous Lunar Phase Night

Lunar mountains as they appear along the limb - December 6, 2014 — Lunar mountains as they appear along the limb – December 6, 2014

Anomalous December 6, 2014 libration illustrated

The night on December 6 , 3;00-4;00 am was great to observe the 15day moon.

After study some pdf Taurus-Littrow Valley ,NASA, in web, l looked through the eyepieces and soon l found the position of the 15day lunar shade terminator was wrong and strangely for, l remember the lunar phases on 15day moon were always [East-West]ward apparent, this time it was anomalously [North-South] ward.

l think it was not because by libration definitely but by some unknown force pushed the moon downward against the flat normal orbital plane of moon-earth system. l was so tired that night that l had only one hour observation not enough time to check how the limb shade was changing even l could’nt sketch reasonably well the old China or Korean Taoism like landscape and this magnificent similarly scenery was stretched along the limb almost 350km long and of course my limitation was only 70km span , yes-, l have also experienced the Grand Canyon like scenery once with the 8′ og in Dec 2013, twice was recently with the 13″ og 1.5months ago. Now is a Taoism scene.

—————-

320mm homemade refractor x420

2014, 12. 6th

Transparecy,seeing together superb ,8/10;.8/10

White paper, graphite pencils, black acrilic

Shot with a Olympus d-camera

K.S.Min S. Korea

Mooncrater – Thebit

The Lunar crater Thebit - November 1, 2014 — The Lunar crater Thebit – November 1, 2014

Hello,

in this night I used my TMB 115/805 to observe the moon.

After half an hour (I have started around 19:00 clock) I decided to hold the crater “Thebit” for my log. Partly it has not occurred to me somehow and I took more than an hour before I could go on for fine work. The proportions did not want to go out of hand and the many subtleties difficult to carry auf’s paper today. Everything was pretty numb, pins “dashed” strange and haze-winding soaked the paper so that it rippled.

All in all I am very happy to have seen it. It was a great Show.

CS Uwe

Date: 01.November 2014
Object: Moon
Object Name: Crater Thebit
Telescope: 115/805 TMB
Eyepiece: 3,5 mm Nagler
Magnification: about 230x
Location: Near Tauberbischofsheim Germany

Surprise Libration

The lunar crater Gauss and environs seen in different librations on January 16, 2014 and December 8, 2014

Last night I made a sketch of Lunar crater Gauss and its surroundings. While archiving the sketch this morning I realised I already sketched this part of the Moon almost a year ago, so I got the idea of a side by side comparison to show the effect of lunation. To my surprise I found out these sketches were made at the exact same lunation: 15.5 days. The difference in lighting therefore had to be caused mainly by the Moon’s libration; the slow wobbling of the Moon in its orbit. A pleasant suprise to find out I sketched this phenomenon totally unintentionally!

Both sketches were made using a 3″ Polarex Unitron refractor at 171x, with a white pastel pencil on black paper. Orientation and size were matched using Photoshop.

Object Name: Gauss
Object Type: Lunar crater, libration
Location: Deventer, The Netherlands
Date: December 8, 2014
Media: white pastel pencil, black paper

Clear skies!
Roel Weijenberg
www.roelblog.nl

Craters Billy and Hansteen

Billy, Hansteen and Mons Hansteen labeled

Craters Billy and Hansteen

It has been cold in Chicagoland and although it was sunny most of the day, high cirrus clouds moved in after sunset to block out all stars fainter than 3rd magnitude. Ice crystals at high altitude generated a colorless halo around the Moon. Not the best conditions for sketching but the first chance in 4 weeks for me. My target for this sketch was the pair of craters at the southern edge of Oceanus Procellarum. Crater Billy (46 km.) with its dark smooth lava covered floor and crater Hansteen (45 km.) with its hilly, irregular floor and terraced walls present contrasting looking craters of similar size and age. Between these craters is a large arrowhead shaped volcanic extrusion feature called Mons Hansteen. This object always looks very bright at or near full Moon.

Sketching:

Black Canson paper, white and black Conte’ pastel pencils, white Pearl eraser, blending stumps
Telescope 13.1” f/6 Dobsonian telescope on an equatorial drive platform at 222x with 9mm eyepiece

Date: 12-04-2014, 02:00 – 03:00 UT

 Temperature: -7°C (20° F)  mostly cloudy, calm
 Seeing: Antoniadi IV (poor)
 Colongitude: 54.2 °
 Lunation: 11.4 days
 Illumination: 92.5 %

  Frank McCabe

Capuanus Crater and Lacus Timoris

Lunar crater Capuanus on the shores of the Lake of Fear - December 1, 2014 — Lunar crater Capuanus on the shores of the Lake of Fear – December 1, 2014

Aloha!

I have been lucky enough to have clear skies the past 3 nights and took advantage of sketching some feature of the Moon every night. On 12/1/14 my eye rested upon the partly eroded walls of Capuanus Crater and the surrounding region north of Palus Epidemiarum. At the time of the observation the 60 km wide crater cast a deep shadow to the west and over a rim of rock placing it partially in shadow. Smaller Elger Crater is visible just to the west of the rim of Capuanus just beyond the shadows. A multitude of smaller more complex appearing craters border the southern edge of Capuanus. The small mare of Lacus Timoris (Lake of Fear) can be seen to the south near the terminator.

Cindy (Thia) Krach

Capuanus Crater 10 day lunation
12/1/14
2130-2245 HST
12.5” Portaball, 6.7mm 227x
Maui, Hawaii
Black Fabriano Paper 6”x 6”
white & black Conte’ Crayons