Monroe's Astronomy Pictures / Saturn

6/22/2001

Saturn 31 Jan 01

This is the planet Saturn, taken on 31 January 2001. I used my Nikon Coolpix 950 digital camera and my Celestron 8" telescope. The rings are normally horizontal when viewed at normal angles, but the camera mounting scheme I used forced this angle. You can barely see the hints of cloud bands in the planet's atmosphere. If you can see a thin black gap in the middle of the rings, that's the Cassini Division.