"Pete Lawrence" wrote in message
...
On Wed, 09 Jun 2004 19:03:45 GMT, nobody wrote:

For my money, the black drop appears to be substantially caused by the
eye's own optical illusion, and is dependant upon the image scale of the
eyepiece (the effect was more pronounced at what experience tells me is
medium magnification and wasn't noticable when the Venus image was very
small (zooming out the Photoshop image greatly) or very large (highly
zoomed in.)

Thus, in addition to the eye playing tricks, the magnification, quality
of the optics and the seeing most likely contribute to the effect,
positively or negatively.

The problem is that for all theories at the moment, I'm hearing
examples of images taken with equipment/conditions that counter each
theory.

Despite the massive number of images taken of the event, I've had very
few equipment/conditions/black-drop (y/n) reports sent in yet [HINT
HINT!].

Ellicott City, MD (just south of Baltimore, MD)
8'' Hardin Optical Newt on a Dob mount
Eyepiece was the lower power of the two that came with the scope, not sure
of mag. off the top of my head
Image projected on to Staples Printer Paper
Images taken with Olympus C-320 digital cam

I believe this image hints at the effect,
http://www.darofamily.com/jeff/files...s/p1010065.jpg. I can make
full-res versions available if requested.

Disclaimer: I am a newbie hack, so I am not sure if this data is even
helpful. Flame not.


BV.