Flamsteed member John Williams has kindly sent me two images of Saturn, one of which he took yesterday evening:
I think it's plain to see how inclined the rings are at the moment, which is contributing to the increase in brightness of the planet. It's a great time to view Saturn, even though it's low in the sky.
As good an image as this is, the following image is just superb. It's a montage of Saturn images that John has taken over the last nine years! It demonstrates beautifully how the inclination of the rings changes year-on-year. A wonderful image, John. Thanks for sending it in.
Awesome imaging record of Saturn. So lovely, John.
I dont get time to do much astronomy during this summer but I did manage to squeeze in some visual astronomy on Saturn this week in the small 20 minute midnight window I have to peek at Saturn between a tree and the wall of my house! And what a gorgeous 20 minutes it is. I never cease to be awed at sight of it in the 2 years I started this hobby. And yes, I love the inclination of its rings right now that you have wonderfully captured.
Great photos, Andy will surely be lapping all of that up for his members gallery presentation!
For planetary work I use a second hand 1994 Celestron Classic 8" SCT on a mains powered tracking mount (fitted with a safety cutout) !!!! The mount is a fork and wedge. There is no polar scope for accurate polar alignment so I use a combination of bearings taken from Google Earth and a long piece of string and two pieces of wood at a fixed angle!!!