Photo of the Week for May 27, 2016
Under the right conditions, backyard telescopes can show an astonishing amount of planetary detail. Just compare this fine shot of Mars by Ontario imager Darryl Archer with the one recently recorded by the Hubble Space Telescope (presented here) displaying almost exactly the same face of the planet. That the two images can be compared at all speaks volumes about the level of quality amateur astrophotographers have achieved in recent years.
Darryl captured this view of Mars on May 15 from the Florida Keys with a Celestron Skyris monochrome CCD camera fitted to Celestron C14 Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope and 2.5× Barlow lens. The final image consists of 1,500 frames stacked together (500 frames each captured through red, green, and blue filters).
