Planet and other Solar System Images 2019 -

2014-2018

On the evening of 15th December 2019 comet C/2017 T2 PANSTARRS was due to pass close to the bright Open Cluster NGC 1528 in Perseus. Unfortunately that evening was clouded out during the short 'window' of darkness before a bright (85%) Moon rose. Fortunately the following evening was clear, the comet was still in the vicinity of the cluster although of course not as close, and I was able to capture several images before the Moon again rose later. So this is the result of 12 x 5 minute images using the modified Canon 700D with TSFLAT2 on the Meade 127 refractor. I'd never imaged NGC 1528 before and think it deserves closer attention - at magnitude 6.4 it's certainly a binocular object. I'm surprised that Messier didn't include it in his catalogue. Larger Image

During the evenings of Spring 2020 Venus (in her Hesperus persona) put on a marvellous show, high in the sky and very bright. I hadn't imaged the planet for several years, but felt I needed at least one shot. Of course without special filters the cloud top is featureless. As usual my sky was rather turbulent, so the final image on April 8th (from a video of 1000 frames) is still a bit fuzzy. Altair GPCAM2 Colour with Televue Powermate 2.5 on RC10.

On the night of 14th May 2020, comet C/2017 T2 PANSTARRS was due to pass very close to NGC 2633 (Arp 80) in Camelopardalis. NGCs 2634 and 2643a also very close. But all these galaxies are faint, around magnitudes 12 to 13 so would need reasonable length exposures. The weather forecast was for clouds, and for once it was correct and it did cloud over. But not before I managed to get on target and snatch 5 subs! 5 minute subs with the Canon 700D on the Meade 127 refractor, at ISO3200 to try to catch the faint galaxies. I knew they would be a bit noisy at that ISO, but had it stayed clear I would have gone for at least 12 subs, probably more. But this will have to do. Stacked in Deep Sky Stacker using the comet and stars setting, finished in Photoshop. At least I managed to capture those faint galaxies as well. 'Mouseover' the medium size image for identifications. Larger size.

On its travels, comet C/2017 T2 PANSTARRS passed close by Messiers 81 and 82 towards the end of May 2020. The few days when it was close were badly affected by a deep low pressure system, so I had to make the most of any chance. The night of 22nd May was marginal for framing, but cleared shortly after midnight and I was able to capture several images before the clouds returned. so this is the result. Canon 700D with Celestron off-axis guider and TSFLAT2 (the back focus worked out beautifully!) on TMB105 refractor. 10 x 5 minute subs at ISO1600. I could of course have framed the comet lower down in the image, but that would then have missed out the little galaxy NGC 3077, poor thing. North is up. Larger image

After my effort above, I hoped to have a second crack at comet C/2017 T2 PANSTARRS in the vicinity of Messiers 81 and 82, with it better placed for the composition of the image. A number of weather forecast sites promsed clear skies on 24th May, and indeed in the early evening things were clearing up nicely. With Astronomical twilight being the best on offer I decided to image between 12.30 and 1.30 to get the darkest sky available. But when I went out around 11.30 to make a leisurely start - disaster! Solid cloud cover. It wasn't until almost 1 am on 25th (midnight UT) that things cleared enough for me to start aligning etc., so 1.15 before I started imaging in earnest, and by 2 am the sky had lightened so much that the background was excessive. So in the end I only had 7 subs to play with, the later ones with a rather light background and the combined image had a very noisy background and generally poor contrast. Much processing later and this is the result, but not what I'd hoped for. Canon 700D with TSFLAT2 on TMB105 refractor (650 mm focal length). 7 subs x 5 minutes at ISO1600. Larger image

Comet C/2020 F3 NEOWISE graced the Northern Skies during the Summer of 2020 and for many days was a faint naked eye object, beautiful in binoculars. Unfortunately during twilight hours at my latitude, and low in the sky, almost due North. But the brightest and best comet for many years, just visible naked eye even with my old eyes, so I couldn't miss opportunities to photograph it, particularly as I wasn't doing any main imaging at the time. These were on the night of 13th July. Plagued by cloud at the darkest time (1 am Summer Time), so the ion tail to the upper left was lost in the background. Increasing the blue level just shows it, but the overall colour is wrong. I hope to try again of course. Canon 700D with 200 mm telephoto lens at f5, several 15 second sub frames combined in Deep Sky Stacker. Larger main image
For a number of days the midnight sky was disappointing, either cloudy or hazy. But the night of 19th cleared nicely with this result now showing a hint of the ion tail. I couldn't expect any better from my location - not only astronomical twilight, but low in the Northern sky - the brightest part at this time of the year. Again Canon 700D with 200 mm telephoto lens at f5, ten 30 second sub frames combined in Deep Sky Stacker. Note the 9th magnitude galaxy NGC 2841, indicated in the medium sized image (click on the thumbnail). A 2010 image of this beautiful spiral galaxy is here. Larger Size
A few more cloudy nights, then 24th was nicely clear, although as before background twilit sky, but with the comet fading as it moved away from the Sun, no longer visible to the naked eye (mine anyway!) So this was the final attempt. 8 frames at 30 seconds, camera as above. Larger Size

In the Autumn of 2020 Mars approached the Earth at its best in a number of years for my latitude (see 2016 report). For some reason, I suspect because of my location in rolling country in the lee of the Pennines I hardly ever get skies stable enough for imaging planets which require considerable magnification. But I had to go for it! So this image was obtained in the early hours of 18th September. At the time of imaging (0335 UT) the diameter was 21.32 arc secs. Imaged with an Altair GPCAM2 colour camera on my 10" RC telescope (2000 mm focal length). I used a 3x Televue Barlow to magnify the image. For this and the following images, multiple frames were selected and stacked using Registack 6. Click on the thumbnails for the full size images. There is an excellent free stand alone program, 'Mars Previewer 2' which shows features on Mars at any date and time. Click here for this particular view, but for information of the various features, I strongly recommend you download and install it - hovering the mouse over the live image will name numerous features. Information and download can be found on the internet here Unfortunately the installer doesn't want to work on Windows7 or above. Yet it's on my W7 computer - I wish I could remember how I installed it! IMPORTANT I've now (2022) managed to install Mars Previewer on my W7 laptop. Just needed a missing Windows DLL file to be added when copying the existing installation. So if anyone wants to use this very nice program, email me. My email on the 'Latest' page.
Cloudy weather intervened but the night of 1st-2nd October was clear and crisp. So I took several sets of images over a few hours. Nevertheless because of turbulence only one set was worth keeping and that is this one from 0001 UT on 2nd. Again GPCAM2 colour on RC10 but this time with a Televue 2.5x Powermate. Because of the lower magnification the original image was smaller than that above, so I have increased its size to compensate for the difference. At this time the diameter was 22.47 arc-secs. The very prominent feature is of course Syrtis Major. Mars Prevewer image here.
There is another venerable free program giving a graphical image of Mars (and other planets) - Meridian. It does install on later versions of Windows, but doesn't name features. Nevertheless useful. I've put the 'meri487.exe' installer on my web site here. This is the installer I used, and my anti virus program has never objected! Sample image (Syrtis Major)     BUT, lest we forget. The readily available free 'Stellarium' does an excellent job, also naming features, the only slight drawback being the extra time the program takes to load and set time etc. Here is a sample crop from a screenshot. click on it for a larger image.
Again some cloudy weather but the night of 9th-10th October was clear for a short while and I was able to capture several sets of images. Again only the best is presented. Quite turbulent sky with a weather front approaching, so difficult to pull up detail. The maximum altitude for me during this apparition was approximately 40 degrees, so decently high, which of course helped to improve the seeing despite the poor sky conditions. Mars Prevewer image here.
Because Mars' rotational period is 24.6 hours, a very similar view is presented from night to night, only changing slowly. I still didn't have a full view of the distinctive Sinus Sabaeus. In order to capture that particular 'face' of Mars when still a reasonable size following conjunction on 8th October I had to image it early in the evening when still quite low in the sky, or wait until it appeared when high in the sky, by which time it would be getting smaller as it moved away from Earth. Weather conditions were consistently bad, and although a brief clear sky opportunity arose on 22nd October, the seeing was very poor, made worse by the low (20 degree) altitude. So even extensive processing only produced a verydisappointing image, with Sinus Sabaeus right of centre. But maybe another opportunity in a week or so.... Mars previewer image here.
A more propitious night on 30th :October - clear for a while and Mars much higher than on 22nd. Still disappointing seeing - dancing around and 'morphing'. But with processing a better view of Sinus Sabeus. Mars previewer image here. In 2022 Mars will be much smaller, 17.19 arc seconds diameter at closest approach on 1st December. But for me nicely high, reaching 60 degrees altitude, which should allow for decently detailed images. But there is an additional bonus. On 8th December, when still 17 degrees diameter it will be occulted by a Full Moon around 4.54 am. Lowering into the West by then, but still at 29 degrees altitude. Emergence is at 5.54 am. altitude 20 degrees. Quite low so peering through thickening and possibly turbulent air, but if the weather is kind, the air is usually most stable in the hours before dawn. So fingers crossed!

The  Great Conjunction  Every 20 years Jupiter and Saturn line up in our sky, forming a 'Great Conjunction', albeit being millions of miles apart in their orbits. Most times they are reasonably close, but on 21st December 2020 they approached within almost 6 arc-minutes of each other in line of sight. Very close indeed, in May 2000 they were approximately 70 arc-minutes apart, and in November 2040 they will again be separated by approximately 70 arc-minutes although a dawn event. The next really close conjunction is in March 2080 when the separation will be around 6 arc-minutes, but that will be essentially a daytime event in the UK It is 400 years since they were so close, and 800 years since such a close approach was visible in a dark sky. Indeed for me, the best time was to be at the onset of Astronomical twilight, around 4.30 pm GMT.  BUT As is unfortunately so often the case, the weather here in NE England which had been very poor for several weeks, did not look as though it would be clear. And indeed much of 20th was cloudy. Nevertheless, it relented for an hour or so from 4 pm and I was able to locate the planets and take photographs before the clouds moved back over. Not the closest approach, but still very close at 9 arc-minutes. So here are a wide angle shot (including the Moon, unfortunately slightly out of focus) and 4x zoom with my Panasonic TZ70, and a close up with my Altair GPCAM2 on my 10" RC telescope with an Astrophysics CCDT67 reducer enabling both planets to be on the sensor together. Larger wide angle Larger 4x zoom  Very low in the sky as you can see (8 degrees above the horizon) and with a lot of turbulence - very poor 'seeing', so lacking in any fine detail. The close up of the Moon was taken with the same optics as Jupiter and Saturn and they are superimposed to give some idea of scale.  This (GIF) video clip shows the effect on Jupiter of the poor seeing conditions and low altitude. The forecast for 21st was dire as for 22nd, and both proved to be correct, so no more images. But it's rather ironic - 400 years since the last time they were so close, and my sky on 21st cleared completely just after midnight. Only 8 hours out after 400 years - Sod's law in spades! However it would seem that most got a glimpse at some time over the three day period. I doubt if I'll be around for the next one (I'd be 97!) and anyway 70 minutes will be hardly worthy of attention after witnessing 9 minutes!

Comet C/2021 A1 LEONARD brightened nicely towards the end of November 2021, and was due to pass near the interesting galaxies NGC 4631, the 'Whale' and NGC 4656, the 'Hockey Stick' on the night of 24th. Rising late and not at a decent height until after 2 am, but the forecast was for clear sky, so I set up my Canon 700D camera on my Meade 127 refractor with TS FLAT2 field flattener. The sky did clear beautifully, but unfortunately there was a bright 73% mag -11 waning gibbous Moon. Because of the bright moonlight (the Moon was a little over 50 degrees from the target) difficult to reduce noise. 9 x 5 minute ISO 1600 subs. Processed with Darks and Flats in Deep Sky Stacker, but using the clever system to align on both the comet and stars. It doesn't always work, but this time was successful. There is a good image of the galaxies from 2009 here. Larger image. Because of the 'noise', not full size - no point!

Following the successful launch, deployment and insertion into its L2 orbit of the James Webb Space Telescope, I was looking for coordinates for the telescope's position,and came across this page. So I decided to have a go at imaging this wonderful telescope in the hope that there is enough sunlight reflecting from the heat shield to show up as a star in an image. I was set up to image a deep sky target with my QSI683 camera on my 4" TMB 105 refractor. But while the Moon was up (6th Feb 2022) I had an hour to play (I'd been out earlier). Got 6 x 5 minute images unbinned with 5 minute intervals between each image, and this monochrome gif is the result. Much cropped from the original frame of course. Look for the faint moving dot a little below centre. The upper of the two bright stars is TYC 763-29-1 in Canis Minor, so you will be able to find the location in a planetarium program. As usual click on the thumbnails for (slightly!) larger images.  This image shows the trail with all the frames overlaid. Very faint, but undoubtedly James Webb - the coordinates match those given on The Sky Live site.

Mercury passed near and South of M45 at the end of April 2022. Generally cloudy weather in NE England at that time, but the evening of 29th April was clear although with a lot of moisture in the air, and as luck would have it, Mercury was at its closest to M45. I had a clear view of a low Western horizon, and was able to capture the attached. Canon 700D with Canon 400L lens (400mm fl) at f 6.3. Stack of 15 x 4 second subs at ISO 800. North is up, so the horizon is tilted by 30 degrees. As you can see when it was dark enough (22:19 BST) to show the brighter stars of the Pleiades, Mercury (4 degrees altitude) was fast sinking into horizon murk! Sod's law kicked in on 2nd May, so the even more interesting view that evening of both objects with a thin crescent Moon in a straight line parallel to the horizon was clouded out. Larger image

In early December 2022 Mars made its close approach of this apparition to Earth. Not as large as 2020 (around 17 arc-secs) but higher, approaching 60 degrees altitude for me. Closest approach was on 1st December, unfortunately that coincided with a continuous spell of cloudy weather. But 6th December was a clear night. Seeing was poor, and this image was taken with my GPCAM2 colour camera and 2.5x Powermate on my Sharpstar 140 telescope. Enlarged to twice size. Click on the thumbnail for full size (not much bigger!) The excellent Mars Previewer program image is here for comparison.
But although lower in the sky, in the early hours of 8th December (starting at 0454) Mars was occulted by a Full Moon. Cloudy earlier, but cleared by 0230, so I was able to get set up. Still poor seeing, so I settled for using the Sharpstar again. A 7.9 Mb mp4 file with music is here.	Click here for a small file size (392 Kb) video
Because I took the video as a series of 1 second sequences and linked them together to produce the final video, each sequence contained approximately 25 individual frames. The relative movement between the Moon and Mars in each sequence was very small, so I was able to process individual sequences to produce clearer defined stills. Here are 'before' and 'after'. Mars enhanced in Photoshop. Click on the thumbnail for full size. If you look closely at Mars you can see the change in surface markings due to the rotation of the planet - approximately an hour elapsed between the two images. This image appeared in the February 2023 Astronomy Now Gallery

Comet C 2022 E3 ZTF is a very long period comet, with an approximately 50,000 year period. So last seen a very long time ago! Nicely placed high in the sky, except that in mid January although a nice clear night it was hanging in the East where I have light pollution from the Tyne Valley. 9 x 2 minute subs at ISO 3200, darks and flats with modded Canon 700D on TS65 quad on early 17th January . Processed in Deep Sky Stacker and Photoshop. Clearly the light pollution created a lot of noise when stretched. More subs might help a bit. And I didn't get the angle right to capture more of the tail even though it is very faint. Must do better! In 10 days or so it will culminate due North at 66 deg altitude for me around 4 am, and is forecast to be brighter. So another late night if the weather gods are kind. Larger image.

My previous attempt on Comet C 2022 E3 ZTF on 16/17th January (above) was plagued by light pollution. But I had high hopes for later in the month when it would be higher and further North away from my polluted Eastern Sky. Sure enough around 2 am on 28th Jan. it was brighter, the head easily visible in binoculars and 'almost' visual, nicely situated just North of Kochab! So I took 30 subs of 90 seconds with my Canon 700D at ISO 1600 on TS65 quad refractor. But despite messing around for ages with various settings in DSS, MaximDL and Photoshop a clean version of the very faint long tail has eluded me. So this is a combination of various attempts, and there is still a hint of diagonal streaks from stars. But I've spent enough time on it. North is up. I think the answer as some appear to have found is a fairly short exposure with a very fast large aperture instrument. Larger size

On 2nd November 2023 Jupiter was at its closest to Earth and nicely high in the sky. But due partly to poor weather and mainly to my inability to image due to the recent Achilles tendon rupture I missed that date when typically we had a couple of beautifully clear nights. But on the night of 25th November the Red spot was visible in a reasonably clear sky. Although Jupiter was nicely high at around 47 degrees altitude, the image is not as sharp as I would have hoped, maybe some fine turbulence, or maybe my telescope needs collimation! I will endeavour to do that before the next opportunities in early December.

At last, an Aurora! With the Sun now more active, aurora are likely, but unfortunately I missed a superb one in early November2023 due to my tendon damage which at that time had me firmly in crutches with only one useable leg. But a recent solar image prompted me to keep an eye on activity and I was rewarded by a showing around 6.30 pm on 25th November. Unfortunately there was a fair bit of cloud around and also bright moonlight which diminished the effect which was barely visible to the naked eye. But good to finally get one! Times were 6:25 pm for the upper image and 6:32 pm for the lower. Canon 700d at 17 mm focal length, f2.8, ISO1600, each single 2second exposures. Larger images 6:25, 6:32

The night of 2nd December fortunately was clear albeit slightly hazy. Perhaps that helped stability, because this is a much better image than the 25th November effort above. Also I attempted to improve collimation, although with my rather unsteady skies it is difficult to find the 'sweet spot'. But with my generally mediocre seeing this is almost as good as it gets. The Great Red Spot nicely centred, with an interesting strongly coloured area beside it - I wonder what is happening there. GPCAM2 on RC10 with 2.5X Powermate. 308 subs stacked from a total of 2049 (1 minute AVI). Incidentally my original take on this was much more blue rather like the above image, but I eventually modified the colours - I feel this is probably more representative. We are now moving away from Jupiter. I had another look several days later but in very poor seeing, so no good. So that is it for this apparition unless something really unusual happens. But I'm looking forward to December 2024 when Jupiter will be much higher, reaching a maximum altitude for me at opposition of 57 degrees. 10 degrees higher than for this image!

In early May 2024 NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) Space Weather Prediction Center (SWPC) issued a Geomagnetic Severe Storm Warning for Friday, May 10th. Additional Solar eruptions were expected to cause geomagnetic storm conditions to persist through the weekend. This was the most powerful storm for many years, and was likely to produce extensive aurorae covering the whole of the British Isles, even visible further South. For once the skies were decently clear on the evening of the 10th so I had hopes for seeing something. And I wasn't disappointed! I live on a reasonably dark road above Hexham Northumberland. Northerly views are somewhat obscured by trees and hedges, but there is a farm gate around 100 yards along with an open view North. So I set up my Canon 700D there and waited. Nothing seemed to be happening around 10:43 pm, just the usual twilight and sunset glow.
But then what appeared to be a band of thin cloud overhead started to show a bit of colour, and soon brightened to the point that it was showing colour on my camera live view screen. At that stage it was just a narrow band. Of course I hadn't expected the display to be so high, and as you can see overhead telephone and power lines got in the way. I've left them in on these first two aurora images. Larger images: upper image, lower image.
The third one was also from that location, but I Photoshopped the lines out. Then I moved to my back garden where the last one was taken - again I had to Photoshop power lines out. In these two images they were low down anyway. You can just see Corona Borealis in the top left corner of the last one - more visible on the larger version. Although the aurora alert continued very strong, clouds arrived before midnight, so that was that. But it was a magnificent spectacle. Larger images: upper image, lower image. All the aurora photos were 8 seconds at ISO400 with 17 mm lens at f3.5, and have of course been Photoshopped to bring out the colours.
The next day Aurorawatch showed that the emissions got even stronger later. I hoped there would be another opportunity that night, although the forecast was not promising, and indeed there was nothing of any consequence.

Well, how lucky can you get! Only 3 days after the previous Aurora there was another strong outburst. This time, there was only a diffuse show in the North. Larger image.
But when I returned from the North facing road view and went into my back South facing garden it was all happening! This view to the East. Larger image.       This to the West. Larger image.       This to the South. Larger image.         This also to the South but more overhead - the Summer triangle immersed in the aurora. 'Mouseover' the medium size for some identification. Larger image.
These photos, the best of the many I took, and of course which have been processed in Photoshop to make the colours really shine, were all taken around 10 pm. But as can be seen from this chart, the aurora became even stronger later. I did have another look before going to bed around midnight, and the intensity had reduced, but I missed the later peak. Nevertheless I was very happy with what I did see - the red colour, particularly in the East facing image was clearly visible to the naked eye.

Long period comet C2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS became visible in the Northern hemisphere during mid October 2024 and caused quite a stir. The first opportunity i had to image it was on 14th October when a clear night was forecast. The day indeed was beautifully cloudless, but cloud was building to the West as the Sun set. I moved (over our back fence into a field!) to where I had a clear Western horizon, and started looking. Arcturus was very useful to focus my camera, and from Skymap I had an idea of where to look. At no time was the comet visible to the naked eye - a bright Moon and thin cloud killed that, but eventually I found it with 8x42 binos. It was a different story getting it on my camera chip. Canon 700D tracking on a Star Adventurer with 70-200 L lens set at 100mm. Had I realised the tail was so long I would have focused the lens at the 70mm zoom setting, but having eventually located the comet, no way was I going to go back to Arcturus to refocus - this particular lens focus changes slightly with different zoom settings. By this time (7:50 pm BST) the comet was getting very low in the West - around 6 degrees altitude, so in very murky sky lit up by the bright 90% waxing Moon in the East. Anyway after all the photos taken just to find the comet, this is the heavily processed result of 8 subs, each 20 seconds at ISO400 taken around 7.50 pm (Summer Time). Colour obviously badly affected by moonlight, thin cloud and very low altitude. The tail is about 9 degrees, and I calculate its length at around 7 million miles. Wow! When I tried to match the star field with Skymap I was foxed by the bright fuzzy star inside the tail. Until I realised it was Messier 5. Quite a coincidence! Larger image

After I had posted the above on Stargazers Lounge, Paul Clark mentioned that I'd captured the anti-tail. As it happened i had a further 5 subs taken after the above with the comet head higher in relation to the image border. so I processed them, and sure enough a very faint anti-tail is just visible Larger image

On 19th October there was a decently clear evening and I was able to capture several shots of C2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS. Still a fair bit of sky glow due to a bright Moon in the East, and the comet lowering in the West with thin cloud rapidly approaching. It was starting to fade and not naked eye visible in my sky. I had my Canon 700D mounted on my Star Adventurer tracking mount, taking 20 second subs at f4 and 50mm focal length with a Tamron 17-50 mm zoom lens. Because the mount was tracking, the stars are nicely round, but when stacked the foreground is blurred. So I have produced this animation instead, aligned on the foreground so that you see the sky and comet moving correctly. As always, click on the thumbnail for the medium size version. Larger animation (4.8MB)

Jupiter was very high during December 2024, but as might be expected the weather did not play ball - December suffered badly from constant cloud cover. So the first decent opportunity I had (I like to get the GRS when possible) was on 1st January 2025! And here is the result. I thought I was using a 3x Barlow on my RC10, but as I later realised it was a 2x. Anyway, I'm quite pleased with the result, nice to have some moons in the image.

Another opporunity for Jupiter on the evening of 2nd January 2025. No GRS this time, but a nice positioning of a couple of moons. Quite good seeing produced this image, this time with my 2.5 x Televue Powermate. Decent detail and Ganymede actually shows as a tiny disc! Jupiter now receding, but Mars is brightening, although quite small this time round is high in the sky. Watch this space!

Another decently clear night on 10th January 2025. Bright Moon, but planets not affected, so I went for Mars and Jupiter. Seeing not good, but the magic of digital processing.... Well distant from each other in the sky, but both nicely high, reaching above 50 degrees altitude. Unfortunately Mars is very small this time round, and this can be seen in this montage, both planets taken with the same optics. GPCAM2 on RC10 with 2.5 x Powermate, stacks of numerous subframes from the avi videos. Worth remembering of course that even though the Great Red Spot has been shrinking, it is still large enough for Mars to physically fit inside with loads of room to spare!

 

We were promised a very close encounter between the Moon and Mars late on the night of 13th January 2025. But as usual the sky gods were unkind! Cloud thickened here as the evening progressed, to the point where I had to wait with my camera at the ready for thinner areas (tracking on Star Adventurer). Never completely clear, and by midnight or so things were getting worse so I packed in. I'd have had to wait another 4 hours for the closest approach which would have been only 12 arc-minutes from the Moon, and obviously the cloud was definitely not going to play ball. So this is what I ended up with. Mars is about 3 Lunar diameters to the East of the Moon - just visible as a tiny round dot. Canon 700D with 400 L lens. f5.6, ISO200, 1/1000 sec single frame, sharpened and contrast improved in Photoshop. Better than nothing I suppose! The larger image around 1/2 full size better to show Mars which is only 14.6 arc-seconds in diameter - 1/130th the diameter of the Moon! The event was actually more impressive naked eye where the dynamic range of the eye made Mars appear relatively brighter than in the photograph. Larger image