Far Ranging Thoughts

Last night was my best night with Jupiter this season. My third and fourth sketches of the planet for this year were completed. Excalibur was used at 218x.

For the first sketch (started at 6:45 UT) I employed a Moon-SkyGlow filter which had perhaps a subtle effect. I feel that my 'Jupiter Observing Eye' has returned now. I was able to sit down and make my most carefully rendered Jupiter sketches of this season. Callisto's shadow showed up as a small, round, pitch black spot below the trailing edge of the Great Red Spot. It looked really nice in such close proximity to Jupiter's most famous feature.

The GRS was very pale. It's leading edge was darker than it's following edge. Nevertheless, even the leading edge was very pale. Some structure within the planet's two primary belts (as well as a little zonal detail) was also recorded.

The second Jupiter sketch of the night was started at 8:50 UT. The GRS had moved to the preceding limb of the planet and was no longer visible, but the disrupted end of the South Equatorial Belt following the GRS remained visible. Callisto's shadow remained on the planet, but it now lagged a little behind the GRS.

In the second sketch the impact scar was visible near the planet's south limb. It hadn't quite reached the planet's central meridian at the time of the sketch. The scar seemed to be a little smaller than Callisto's shadow and clearly elongated in the east-west direction. It was considerably less dark than Callisto's inky, black shadow. The scar was about as dark as the matter making up Jupiter's major belts. In other words, it was far less obvious to the eye than was Callisto's shadow.

I'm hesitant to upload these latest sketches, preferring to keep them for my selfish self. Both would provide good material for future paintings -- if I ever get around to it . . .

I've recently become quite discouraged with an astronomy forum that I've been frequenting lately. Forum content has had little to offer me despite my own attempts to increase its faltering signal to noise ratio. Of course, my own lack of a full night's sleep might be adding to the feeling. Time will tell . . .

Anyway, I've been rethinking my Internet presence in general. Eventually re-working my website is a possibility. Also being considered is a limitation on my blogging -- perhaps making one entry at the beginning of each month describing one night's observing session (with sketches if applicable) from the just ending month.

I find it discouraging that there appears to be so little (relatively speaking) Internet discussion and sharing of observations relating to the recent impact on Jupiter. This is only the second time in recorded history that a Jovian impact event has been positively identified and observable with backyard telescopes.

Then there's imaging. It seems that more and more amateurs are becoming interested in setting their eyes aside and letting their cameras do the looking. With visual observing and sketching I feel that I'm in a minority special interest group within a minority hobby. I get the impression that few care to see sketches when digital cameras can show more detail and more color with less work under worse conditions. Such are a few of my thoughts in the early twenty-first century.