iPhone Astrophotography Asteroid Irene
Posted: 20 April 2025
The sky became cloudy Friday afternoon, 11 April 2025.
Wednesday night, 16 April, I attended a presentation at the San Manuel Community Center given by Sam Miller of the DarkSky Southern Arizona Chapter to provide info to local citizens about International Dark Sky 2025.
Cloudy skies continued until 16 April. When I returned home from the above event, strong winds were still blowing, as they had been nearly all day. Clouds returned on Thursday, 17 April, with more wind. After midnight Saturday, 19 April, received 0.13" rain. The sky cleared mid-day on Saturday.
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Open: Saturday, 19 April 2025, 1834 MST Temperature: 74°F |
Session: 2089 Conditions: Clear |
Equipment:
12" f/8 LX600 w/StarLock
2" 24mm UWA eyepiece
2" 30mm eyepiece
Camera:
iPhone 15 Pro Max
SYNCed observatory clock to WWV time signals.
1845 MST: LX600 ON, StarLock OFF, High Precision OFF.
Viewed Jupiter, 102X. No moons were visible in the bright sky.
1855 MST: The Jovian moons Ganymede and Io were faintly visible in the bright sky near the planet's disk, 102X.
1858 MST: Sunset.
1901 MST: The Jovian moon Callisto was now faintly visible in the bright twilight sky, 102X. Viewed Jupiter and three Galilean Moons, 81X.
Viewed Castor (double star), 81X.
1923 MST: Wi-Fi ON.
Used SkySafari 7 Pro on the iPhone to GOTO Asteroid 14 Irene, Mag. +11.3.
1927 MST: Wi-Fi OFF.
Waited for the sky to get darker in order to identify Asteroid Irene.
1943 MST: IDed Asteroid Irene, 81X.
Attached the LiDAR Cover on the iPhone 15 Pro Max and mounted the iPhone on the 30mm eyepiece using the 3-axis adapter.
1957 MST: StarLock ON.
Did some image framing tests.
2008 MST and 2108 MST: Took StarLock autoguided afocal 81X images of Asteroid 14 Irene using the iPhone Camera app (Night Mode, 30 seconds, 1X lens).

2042 MST: In-between imaging Asteroid Irene, I noticed that the Zodiacal Light was easily seen.
2109 MST: StarLock OFF.
2114 MST: LX600 OFF.
2122 MST: Took a Sky Quality reading and reported the result to Globe at Night.
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Close: Saturday, 19 April 2025, 2126 MST Temperature: 49°F |
Session Length: 2h 52m Conditions: Clear, SQM 20.84 |
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