Jupiter - transit of Europa and its shadow animation

Hello everyone,

The day following my Jupiter sketch I revisited Jup’ and saw the last few minutes of the shadow transit of Io.  With this being essentially the time of Jupiter’s opposition, the gap between Io and its shadow on Jupiter’s disk is just about nil.  As a result it is actually very easy to spot Io against the disk of Jupiter when it is very close to the limb.  This really excite me, and I was keen to sketch the event when it repeated itself.

A couple of nights later (poor seeing conditions prevented any possible sketching), Europa was to transit across Jupiter along with its shadow.  The passing of just four nights was already enough to make the gap between the satellite and its shadow larger, but the effect was really just as intense and fantastic.

 As the transit of Europa started, it occurred to me that I could possibly do an animation of the event out of a series of sketches.  So, two and a bit hours later, I had a completed a sketch with the necessary details and time points that would allow me to prepare a series of twelve individual colour pencil sketches.

Below is the complete series of individual sketches from which the animation was made.

Normally for a high magnification sketch I would have used my 8” SCT.  This time however I used my 8” f/4 Kulali push-pull dob.  Its action is so smooth and easy that following an object at high magnification is very easy.

Object:  Jupiter with transit of Europa and its shadow

Scope:  8” f/4 Kulali push-pull dob

Gear:  5mm TMB Planetary Type II, 160X

Date:  9^th May, 2018, 21:10 to 23:20 AET

Location:  Sydney, Australia

Thanks for looking,

Alex.