Dawn Slither

Thanks Dave.....i was nearly physically sick waiting for those clouds to part to get those shots due to feeling ill at the time but i was happy with what i got. Im paying for those images today lol....cough cough

After my previous cresent moon image i wanted to capture a more slender crescent this morning when the moon would only be approx 2 days from new near the sun. After a long nights observing i got rewarded at 04.20 when from a country location i could see the pale orange wanning slither of a moon rise above a distant country hill framed by 2 rows of trees and i got my shot. Also caught one of planet Venus which was located 15* west of the moon...

That is an impressively thin sliver!

Bart.

Thanks Bart....you wouldnt think it but there was frost during that image capture...i was freezing!!!!!

Cool picture! You gonna try for the ultra thin crescent on 27 May? Just after sunset it'll only be about 15 hours old. Being a complete astrophotography novice I have no idea what the minimum hardware requirement would be - but there is a good picture on page 51 of the May issue of Sky at Night Magazine of a similar event.

Not gonna get to see it myself (damn cities and their lack of clear horizons) but it would be good if someone on here managed to capture it.

Dwane.

Cool picture! You gonna try for the ultra thin crescent on 27 May? Just after sunset it'll only be about 15 hours old. Being a complete astrophotography novice I have no idea what the minimum hardware requirement would be - but there is a good picture on page 51 of the May issue of Sky at Night Magazine of a similar event.

Not gonna get to see it myself (damn cities and their lack of clear horizons) but it would be good if someone on here managed to capture it.

Dwane.

The new moon on the evening of Saturday 27th will indeed be only 15 hours old, but I imagine will be phenomenally difficult to see, even with binoculars. My personal record for closest to new moon was a new - 38 hours moon seen from Turkey the morning before the TSE on March 29th, and it took me a good 25 minutes to find, and even then I was only able to see it for another 2 or 3 minutes, it was so slim!

However, the Moon's orbit will be at about 45 degress to the horizon on Saturday evening, and it will be only 5 days after perigee, so if the weather conditions are perfect (i.e. no cloud), I'd personally be up to giving it a go from somewhere with a view of an absolutely flat north-western horizon. Also, Mercury will be 4 degrees directly due east of the Moon and will be at magnitude -1.29, so will serve as a good reference point for finding the Moon's location. Anyone else interested in giving this a go, and can anyone suggest an observing location with a good north-westerly aspect? If we see it (and don't get your hopes up to high!), I'm sure we'd be setting some sort of Irish record!