I opened the roof on the observatory at sunset, and by the time I got out to shoot this at 1:00 a.m., the scope was covered in frost. I had to hit the corrector on the LX200 with the hair dryer a couple of times to keep the dew under control. What was interesting was how much the heat from the hair dryer would degrade the image. It took several minutes after clearing it for the image to settle back down. Of course by then the dew wasn't far behind, so I had to work quickly.
ClearSkyClock had forecast 4/5 seeing, and that seemed about right. You can see the difference between tonight's and last night's shot.
Mars is still just 13 arc-seconds across in this shot.
Heritage Park Observatory, Cedar Park, TX
Camera: DMK21AF04.US
Scope: Meade 10" LX200, TeleVue 2.5x Powermate
Mount: Meade LX200
Filter: Orion LRGB
Software: AstroIIDC, RegiStax, Photoshop
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