Astrophotography by Anthony Ayiomamitis

Lunar Image Gallery - Crater Kepler

Named after the German astronomer Johannes Kepler, this 31-km diameter crater lying in Oceanus Procellarum is one of a small number of craters which basically lies in isolation and is relatively young with an estimated age of less than 1.1 billion years. Inspection of the image below reveals several interesting features including an explicit surrounding ray pattern indicative of an impact of some sort; a shadow pattern which is a reflection of the nearly 3-km high surrounding walls; a slight suggestion of a central relief; and various craterlets and domes in all four directions. The impressive twin craters to the north are Herodotus and Aristarchus; crater Euler is at the northeast corner of the image whereas crater Lansberg is the large formation on the southeast corner.

Note: Careful inspection of the image below reveals a beautiful set of radial spokes emanating from the crater, particularly towards the southwest, west, northwest and north.


Image Details
Crater Kepler
Imaging Details
Crater:
Kepler

Quadrant:
NW

Lunar Coordinates:
8.1° N, 38.0° W

Diameter:
31.0 km

Height:
2750 m

Lunation Age:
23d 15h 54m

Phase:
108.3°

Diameter:
31.27'

Magnitude:
-9.4

Rukl:
30
Date:
Oct 20, 2003
05:25:38 UT+3


Location:
Athens, Greece

Equipment:
Celestron 14" SCT
Losmandy G-11 GEM
Nikon Coolpix 995
ScopeTronix STWA14 Adapter


Exposures:
1 x 1/15 sec @ f3.0
ISO 200
JPG RGB Fine image format
2048x1536 image size
Autodark subtraction


Software:
Photoshop V6

Processing:
Despeckle
Unsharp Masking
Resampling (30%)
JPG Compression