Astrophotography anyone?

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by Zythryn

Well, after many days of clouds, we had a partial break in the clouds for a little bit.
I also have some new software which will allow me to work more directly with RAW camera images.
The first one is the RAW (NEF) image converted to JPG with no other editing other than size and crop.

Nice! So the Moon really is green cheese!! The grayscale is a little sharper, like the rays of Tycho look better defined. Why is that RAW image green anyway??

[Turtle]

still no meteors, though we had a spell of cloudy weather and little chance to catch one should it come by. nevertheless, i noticed Jupiter transiting just around dawn on my recordings the last few nights, so i got up this morning @4:30am and zoomed in by hand. no tripod here as i have the camera propped on a bean-bag in the window; the tripod won't get the camera forward enough.

i uploded the raw video without going through the video software, and now looking at that upload i see that i can no longer see Jupiters moon(s) as when viewing the original. so here's that upload and i'll go try and brighten the thing so the moon(s) are clear.

i found this java script utility for the Jovian moons and i think i caught Ganymede & Europa.
SkyandTelescope.com - Planets - Jupiter's Moons Javascript Utility

here's the raw video. manual focus to infinity, standard mode, auto exposure.
>>

YouTube - 20090624043214

[modest]

Originally Posted by Turtle

and now looking at that upload i see that i can no longer see Jupiters moon(s) as when viewing the original.

I see one when playing it full-screen. It's at about 100 degrees from Jupiter at a distance of about 1.5 times Jupiter's diameter.

Very cool. I'm on the edge of my seat for what you guys come up with next

~modest

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by modest

I see one when playing it full-screen. It's at about 100 degrees from Jupiter at a distance of about 1.5 times Jupiter's diameter.

Very cool. I'm on the edge of my seat for what you guys come up with next

~modest

roger full-screen. i tried brightening the video, as well as some still frames from it, but the results looked worse than the original. last night was cloudy, but the Jupiter show will be going on for a while so more chances coming. when i made the vid, i switched out of the infrared mode thinking i might get some hint of the planet's distinct coloring. obviously i sacrificed my exposure.

this concludes another random report.

[Turtle]

since last posting i have made half-a-dozen more attempts to get shots of Jupiter & her moons, all to no avail. no matter if it looks ok on the camera, when i transfer it to the computer it's a virtually blank image. who ya gonna call?

but, i'm dropping in because i think it is delightfull that another amateur photographing Jupiter was the first to record and identify a new impact on the planet.

Impact mark on Jupiter, 19th July 2009

more story & images here: >>SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids

Originally Posted by Spaceweather.com: July 26,2009

JUPITER'S IMPACT CLOUD EXPANDS: Jupiter's impact cloud is expanding. On July 19th, when it was discovered by amateur astronomer Anthony Wesley, the dark mark near Jupiter's south pole was barely visible in backyard telescopes. Five days later Wesley photographed the impact cloud again and found that it had approximately tripled in size.

[Turtle]

the perseids are ramping up and i got the camera running out the south window again last night to do my meteor trapping thing. not the best south sky for me what with the moon & jupiter brightening things, but nothing ventured nothing gained. anyway, i had the camera feeding to the tv to watch live and noticed a 22º moon halo form up on-screen. going to the window, i saw nada. not too surprising i guess as i have the sony camera in its "SuperNightShot" infrared mode.

unfortunately, yet again, when i transfered the video to the computer everything went dark and no halo visible. so back to the grab-a-still-from-the-vid and brighten it. that is the only retouching to the shot below. besides the 22º halo, there is a very faint 46º halo but i couldn't get it to stand out well in the image. just a wisp of it visible on right side of frame. who ya gonna call?

ps that's jupiter inside the halo left of luna.

[UncleAl]

The Perseids are incoming at almost 25 miles/sec! They are projected to go absolutely ape between 0800 and 0900 hrs UT (0100 and 0200 hrs PT).

http://www.spaceweather.com/swpod200..._zhr_strip.jpg

[jab2]

Turtle, I do not want to advertise my ignorance on the subject, but do you measure to know it's a 22deg halo or are the some underlying physics I missed? If measured please provied method. Thanks.

[Turtle]

Originally Posted by jab2

Turtle, I do not want to advertise my ignorance on the subject, but do you measure to know it's a 22deg halo or are the some underlying physics I missed? If measured please provied method. Thanks.

my bad. it is a physical effect, yes. i didn't measure it because it's always the same size. here's some info on halos.

22 Degree Halo: a ring of light 22 degrees from the sun or moon

...Halos form when light from the sun or moon is refracted by ice crystals associated with thin, high-level clouds (like cirrostratus clouds). A 22 degree halo is a ring of light 22 degrees from the sun (or moon) and is the most common type of halo observed and is formed by hexagonal ice crystals with diameters less than 20.5 micrometers....

so too is the 46 degreee halo a physical phenomena.

46° halo - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[jab2]

Thanks Turtle. Very informative.