The late evening of Thursday 12 May 2005 was fantastic for viewing and imaging Jupiter. Within the relatively short time period of 4 hours you could see the Great Red Spot, Europa's shadow transiting the surface, Io and its shadow transiting the surface.

I used my 8" SCT, Nikon Coolpix 5700 afocally attached to a 15mm Plossl. Multiple images were stacked using Registax2 and fine-tuned with Adobe Photoshop CS.

For all the images, South is Up, West is Left

2105h UT (2205h BST) - Great Red Spot mid-transit, Io commencing transit (eastern edge, NEB), Europa to north-west, faint Europa shadow near western edge of NTeZ

2120h UT (2220h BST) - Great Red Spot mid-transit, Io? (small smudge? eastern side, NEB), Europa to north-west

2220h UT (2320h BST) - Great Red Spot mid-transit, Io shadow mid-transit (eastern side, NEB), Europa to north-west

 

2315h UT (0015h BST) - Great Red Spot disappearing over western (preceding) edge, Io emerging from transit (western edge, NEB), Io shadow mid-transit (NEB), Europa to north-west

enlargement of 2315 UT image

 

Jupiter taken from Conon Bridge on 10 May 2005 at 2230h to 2245h BST (2130h to 2145h UT) . Just 25 minutes beforehand, through the eyepiece, the shadow of Ganymede which had transited the planet was clearly and sharply visible at the edge of Jupiter.

The Great Red Spot (GRS) is just visible (2nd belt/red stripe from the top, extreme left side of image) as it disappears from view due to the rapid rotation of the planet. The GRS, in this image, is located on the West (preceding) side of the plant in the South Temperate Zone (STeZ). This image was taken looking through a reflector telescope therefore everything is reversed - South is Up, West is left. A good map of Jupiter can be found here.

Multiple images were taken afocally using a 15mm Plossl eyepiece on "only" a 114mm reflector using a Nikon Coolpix 5700 digital camera. Compare this to the first attempts in December 2003 using the smaller scope, shown below.

Exposures were 0.25sec at ISO 200, f/4.2. Fifty separate images were stacked using Registax3 and processed using Adobe Photoshop CS.

Jupiter taken from Conon Bridge on 23 April 2005 at 2115h to 2130h BST (2015h to 2030h UT) and 2215h to 2230h BST (2115h to 2130h UT).

Multiple images were taken afocally using a 9mm Plossl eyepiece on an 8" SCT using a Nikon Coolpix 5700 digital camera.

Exposures were 0.125sec and 0.25sec at ISO 800, f/3.9. The 27 and 137 separate images respectively were stacked using Registax3 and processed using Adobe Photoshop CS.

The famous Great Red Spot, a great storm that has been raging for centuries, can be seen very close to the meridian in the first image and has moved considerably in the second image, due to the very rapid rotation of the planet, only one hour later.

Jupiter taken from Conon Bridge on 20 April 2005 at 2230h BST (2130h UT).

Multiple images were taken afocally using a 15mm Plossl eyepiece on an 8" SCT using a Nikon Coolpix 5700 digital camera.

Exposures varied from 0.125sec to 0.5 sec at ISO 200 and 400, f/4.7 to f/7.4. The lower image is a combination of 67 separate images.

The multiple images were stacked using Registax3 and processed using Adobe Photoshop CS.

The faint "smudge" to the top right of the first image is one of Jupiter's Galilean moons, Io, which had emerged from occultation (eclipsed) behind Jupiter only half an hour earlier.

Jupiter taken from Conon Bridge on 10 March 2005 at 0100h.

Multiple images were taken afocally using a 15mm Plossl + 2x Barlow eyepiece combination on an 8" SCT using a Nikon Coolpix 5700 digital camera.

Exposures varied from 0.25sec to 1.0 sec at ISO 200, 400, and 800, f/4.2.

The multiple images were stacked using Registax3 and processed using Adobe Photoshop CS.

Several images taken in the early hours (0630h UT) of 30 December 2003 using a modified QuickPro webcam CCD imager at prime focus through a 114mm reflector telescope. The images were optimised using Paint Shop Pro 8.