Tuesday, February 02, 2016

the mirror moved!

Why would the International Space Station appear in only one frame in my two movies? In the middle of the movie? Not at the very end, when, perhaps, the mount slows or aborts its motion.

These showed that I was very close to the satellite...

An inkling of an idea came to me after I considered the image in the second video. But then it really hit home, crystallised, after viewing the first video. Because in the first video, I was aimed almost straight up.

Mirror shift!

Classic SCT mirror flop.

The huge mirror in the Celestron 14-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope was moving. I have never locked the mirror with the three knobs. For a brief moment, as the mirror moved, it would align with the ISS.

That must be it.

I made a mental note to add this to the checklist of capture plan steps (if I could find it)...

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