Pastel Pencil – Astronomy Sketch of the Day

Posidonius Area

Hi all,

Friday evening just before the altocumulus clouds of the approaching depression covered the sky, I could do another sketch of the moon: This time it was crater Posidonius and its surroundings.

Ah, by the way, this time I tried a new pen: For the bright areas (e. g. the western rims of Posidonius A and J), I took a whitecoal pen instead of chalk pen. That provided much brighter contrast.

Another novelty for me: I didn’t use a diagonal but an Amici prism, so that the view in the eyepiece wasn’t mirrored at all. The view was a bit less bright, but for the moon it’s still bright enough.

Object Name: Posidonius
Object Type: Lunar Crater
Location: Germany, Dusseldorf area
Date: 2015-04-24, 2130-2205 CEST
Media: chalk pastel pencil, whitecoal pencil and charcoal pencil on black sketching cardbox
Telescope: Celestron Nexstar 127 SLT
Eyepiece: TS HR Planetary 7mm

Clear skies

Achim

Posidonius Crater

Hi all,

yesterday evening just before the altocumulus clouds of the approaching depression covered the sky, I could do another sketch of the moon: This time it was crater Posidonius and its surroundings.

Ah, by the way, this time I tried a new pen: For the bright areas (e. g. the western rims of Posidonius A and J), I took a whitecoal pen instead of chalk pen. That provided much brighter contrast.

Clear skies

Achim

Crinkled Solar Surface – 21 March 2015

H-Alpha Solar - 21 March2015 — H-Alpha Solar – 21 March2015

Aloha,

Todays solar surface showed some interesting features that I tried to capture. There were a lot of long detailed filaments as well as a region to the east that looked like a piece of silk that had been crinkled and then flattened. To the west of this area was a brightening plage, at the moment the brightest region in the observation besides a bright spike on the limb. The prominences to the north were more subtle and dim.

White sketch paper
Grey charcoal, Tombow pencils 2H, 6B
White acrylic paint (plage)
Blending pencil
Photoscape to adjust contrast

60mm Lunt h-alpha 36x
3/21/2015 2010-2035 UT
Seeing Wilson 4/5 Transparency 2/4
Cindy (Thia) L. Krach
Maui, Hawaii

Sunrise at Mare Crisium

Hi,

find attached a charcoal and pastel sketch of the sunrise at Mare Crisium. I hope you like it.

Object Name: Mare Crisium, eastern part
Object Type: Lunar Maria
Location: Germany, Dusseldorf area
Date: 2015-03-22, 2020-2100 CET
Media: chalk pastel pencil and charcoal pencil on black sketching cardbox
Telescope: Celestron Nexstar 127 SLT
Eyepiece: TS HR Planetary 7mm

Clear skies

Achim

Young Winter December Moon

During the early part of the current lunation I was observing and sketching in Mesa, Arizona and caught the thin crescent Moon in the southwestern sky just after sunset. Venus was also visible much closer to the horizon but not close enough to the Moon to be included. Earthshine improved and brightened as the hour passed.

Sketching:
For this sketch I used dark blue sketching paper (8.5” x 11”), white, yellow and brown pastel pencils, blending stumps, white Pearl eraser.

Telescope 6”f/7.2 Dobsonian telescope, 28mm eyepiece 39x
Date and Time: 12-23-2014; 18:15 – 19:10 local time
Seeing: Antoniadi III
Transparency: clear 4/5
Temperature: 18 °C (65°F)
Colongitude: 295.3°
Lunation: 1.74 days
Illumination: 4.1%

Frank McCabe

Vallis Schröteri

Hi,

find attached a charcoal and pastel sketch of Aristarchus, Herodotus and the famous Vallis Schröteri. I hope you like it.

Object Name: Vallis Schröteri, Aristarchus, Herodotus
Object Type: Lunar Valley and Crater
Location: Germany, Dusseldorf area
Date: 2015-01-02, 1800-1845 CET
Media: chalk pastel pencil and charcoal pencil on black sketching cardbox
Telescope: Martini 10” f/5 Dobsonian
Eyepiece: Skywatcher HR Planetary 5mm
Clear skies!

Achim

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

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

Rabbit on the Moon

Rabbit On The Moon
Lunar Observing Pattern
Pilanesberg Game Reserve South Africa
5th November
Jet Black Canford Paper with White Pastel Pencil. Used a smartphone to take a picture and crop.
Sketched on holiday in South Africa – The ‘Rabbit on the Moon’ pattern really jumps out at you from Southern Skies and creates a whole new observing experience if you are used to the Northern hemisphere.

Biggest sunspot group in 20 years

Active Region 2192, an unusually large sunspot group - October 27, 2014 — Active Region 2192, an unusually large sunspot group – October 27, 2014

Clouds made it not easy to observe the enormous sunspot group AR 2192 in the Low Countries. I had only one good day to observe and sketch this marvel at ease. Thanks to good seeing conditions I could see – despite my small telescope – an impressive amount of detail. I hope the group will survive his voyage on the far side of the sun and give us another beautiful display.

Clear skies
Jef De Wit

Object: Sun
Location: Biggekerke, Netherlands (51°29’ N 3°31’ E)
Date and time: 27 October 2014, around 9.30 UT
Equipment: 8 cm refractor, Baader Herschel wedge, Solar Continuum filter
Eyepiece: 13mm Nagler T6 (79x)
Medium: white, gray and black pastel pencils, a Pierre Noire pencil and a light gray soft pastel on white printing paper, scanned, mirror reversed, contrast adjustments with Paint Shop Pro