Lunar sketch 26 September 2023

Hi All,

Prior to yesterday's awful weather Tuesday night was calm and clear until approximately 22:00UT. So, I set-up my f/5 250mm Newtonian Reflector on a Dobsonian base in my front garden to do a spot of observing. 

Luna was nicely positioned between a tree and a house for me to sketch it. It has been a very long time since I illustrated a lunar feature...and it shows. I struggled with the finer details of the image, but it's a record to have.

There weren't many targets to go after because the Moon was 89.2% illuminated. I had considered a couple of objects  in the Southern Highlands, but it was a crater in the Northern hemisphere that caught my attention. This crater was surrounded by what looked like a 'France' shaped wall and there were a few smaller satellite craters lying to the south east ...any guesses?

You'd be hard pressed to identify it from my sketch, so to put you of your misery I attempted to sketch 'Babbage'.

On Tuesday night it hugged the Terminator, so Pythagoras hid in the dark. To compete the sketch I used black and white chalk and kept the magnification at 208X. I spent just under an hour observing it...it's a pretty interesting formation and an area of the Lunar surface I'll revisit again. 

Thanks for taking a look, and clear skies to all,

Darren.
 

 

i thought the image attached to my initial post, but I didn't...sorry guys!

Lovely sketch Darren, a nice 3d effect to it.

Michael.

Thanks a million Michael...much appreciated!