Monday, August 06, 2018
Animations of the July 28 Lunar eclipse (2018)
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| Entire sequence of the eclipse stacked and aligned in GIMP, starting every 5 minutes until totality and then every 10 minutes until the Moon finally disappeared behind the roof tops (4:06 am.-6:23 am) Sadly the later stages are made rubbish by whatever compression GIMP uses, but you can see the beginning of the glow as maximum eclipse passes (totality ended at 6:44 am; click to embiggen). | Inital sequence of the eclipse up until the start of totality stacked and aligned in ImageJ, starting every 5 minutes until totality. I didn't do the full sequence as aligning moon images in ImageJ is a right pain, and they tend to get out of sequence. but the quality of the fully eclipsed images is much higher. |
Here, as promised, are my animations of the total lunar eclipse of July 28. Because the motor drive on the telescope decided to stop working, I had to manually drive the scope, and the images were not aligned, so I had to align the images by hand. This is a pain in both GIMP and ImageJ (even though there are tools in both to do it they each have their own limitations.
But in the end it work out okay, mostly. not too happy with the way GIMP made the eclipsed images low res, but it does give you a feel for what it was like.
Labels: animation, astrophotography, eclipse, gimp, imageJ, Moon
Thursday, September 18, 2014
Mars Meets Dschubba, September 18, 2014
After last nights beautiful clear sky, when I was attending EldestOne and MiddleOne's school dinner, tonight was cloudy and slightly rainy. There was a short break in the cloud when I captured this photo of Mars and the star Dschubbaclose together, giving Scorpio a rather differnt apperance.
I was trying to put together an animation of the close approach, but my plans was partly ruined by several days of cloud. Below is the not so good version I managed to stitch together. The final image in the stack was taken too close to the horizon and under poor cloud conditions to stack properly, sadly. Still not too bad though.
Labels: animation, Conjunction, Mars
Friday, March 29, 2013
The International Space Station Crosses Orion's Belt (29 March, 2013)
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A series of images taken of the International Space Station pass through Orion on 29 March 2013 at 20:36 ACDST. I took a sequence of 10 images, each 5 seconds exposure at 400 ASA with my Canon IXUS.
The first panel is a single image showing the ISS under Rigel, the next is all 10 images stacked using image J and made into a single froma using the MAX Z-project, in panel 3 I have SUMMED all the frames after registering the images on Rigel, the final panel is a single frame zoomed in to show Rigel and Orion's belt. Click on any image to emiggen (espeically the top two to see them clearly).
Here's an animation.
Saturday, March 23, 2013
Comet PanSTARRS Does Not Dodge a Coronal Mass Ejection
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| Comet C/2011 L4 PanSTARRS on 15 March, 2013 as seen from the STEREO H1B imager showing the comet and a billowing Coronal Mass Ejection. It looks like the CME just misses the comet, but this is an illusion due to the spacecraft's perspective, the comet and CME are nowhere near each other. Click to Embiggen. | Location of the comet in respect to the Earth and the STEREO B spacecraft simulated in Celestia (click to embiggen). My STEREO orbit files are a little old, so it's position is not exact, but it's not very different from the real position. The CME of 15 March was Earth directed and I've indicated it on the chart. You can see it goes nowhere near the comet. |
There is a stunning video from the Sungrazer Comets group that shows comet C/2011 L4 PanSTARRS for the 9th to the 16th as it passes through the field of view of the SETREO B spacecraft's H1 imager. On the 15th, there was a large coronal mass ejection which produced lots of aurora here on Earth on the 17th and 18th. You can see the comet glide past the CME in stunning detail in the video (my less awesome effort is below).
Some commentators on the video around the web are saying the comet "dodged the CME" (in the sense that it just missed the comet). But that,s an illusion of perspective. The spacecraft is is almost behind the Sun from the Spacecrafts perspective looking back at Earth. The CME was Earth directed. fanning out to be sure but faning AWAY from the spacecraft. And the comet, which is above the plane of the Sun (not shown in the Celestia perspective) and over 90 degrees away from the CME Earth axis.
Occasionally someone will claim that comets cause CME's so it's useful to try and think about the geometry and timing of these events. In this case, the CME occurred 5 days after the closest approach to the Sun, and was directed away from the comet.
Labels: animation, celestia, comet, comets, Stereo astronomy, Stereo comet astronomy, Stereo Satellite
Saturday, January 26, 2013
Jupiter and The ISS, 25 January 2013
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| The International Space station passes under Jupiter at 21:41 ACST as seen from Adelaide (click to embiggen, 4 second exposure at 400 ASA with Canon IXUS) | 9 images, each 4 second exposures at 400 ASA, stacked to show the path of the ISS. The stars are trailed because of the rotation of the Earth during the exposures. |
The international Space Station has been doing a series of bright passes in Australia. This is probably the most spectacular of all, with the ISS just below Jupiter.
Here's the amination I made by stacking all 9 frames in ImageJ
Labels: animation, astrophotography, ISS, Jupiter
Wednesday, January 23, 2013
Bright ISS Passes Over Australia January 23-27, 2013
Between 23 and 27 January there will be a series of bright passes of the International Space Station that will be visible from most of Australia at reasonable hours of the night, which are quite family friendly.
Details vary considerably between locations. For Adelaide, the best night is Friday 25 January, when the ISS passes close to Jupiter at 21:41 ACDST, for Sydney it is 24 January, when the ISS goes through the Constellation of Orion at 21:27 AEDST. In Brisbane, the ISS passes through Orion at 19:34 AEST on the 27th and in Melbourne the ISS passes close to Jupiter and Aldebaran on the 23rd.
Visit Heavens Above to find the best viewing days and times for your location.
Animation of the ISS pass seen in the image above.
Labels: animation, ISS, Jupiter
Tuesday, January 08, 2013
Occultation of Spica by the Moon, 6 January 2013, the Follow-Up
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| Widefield image taken at around 5:00 am ACDST, Infinity to infinity focusing, Canon IXUS through a 20 mm eyepiece on a 4" unguided Newtonian (click to embiggen any image) . | Close-upimage taken at around 5:26 am ACDST, Infinity to infinity focusing, Canon IXUS through a 20 mm eyepiece on a 4" unguided Newtonian. As Spica came close to the Moon, I changed the zoom factor on the IXUS to 3x get a close-up view. |
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| Overlay of 10 widefield images using ImageJ, because the scope was unguided, the images don't register very well | Overlay of 9 close-up images using ImageJ, because the scope was unguided, the images don't register very well. Bumped the scope at the last minute, so I missed Spica going behind the Moon. |
Animation made from the 10 wide-field frames, stacked and registered in ImageJ
Animation made from the 9 close-up frames, stacked and registered in ImageJ
Labels: animation, imageJ, Moon, Occultation, star, telescope
Sunday, January 06, 2013
International Space Station Shoots Jupiter, 4 January 2013
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| The International Space Station as it glides above Jupiter on the 4-01-13 at round 21:30 AEDST. Canon IXUS 400 ASA 4 seconds exposure (click to embiggen and see the fainter stars). | Overlay of 10 individual exposures using ImageJ, the camera isn't tracking the stars, so they trail due to Earth's rotation (click to embiggen and see the fainter stars). |
Australia is seeing a series of bright ISS passes in the early evening. On the 4th the ISS passed close to Jupiter, Orion's Belt and the bright star Sirius. Only MiddleOne joined me to view the spectacle, but he was impressed. For conditions and exact timings for your location over the next few days see Heavens Above.
Animation made of the 10 frames above, a bit overexposed so the stars are clearer.
Labels: animation, ISS, Jupiter, Satellite
Thursday, September 13, 2012
The International Space Station Shoots Past Saturn and Mars, 11 September 2012
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My animation of all 10 images is below (images stacked and converted to AVI with ImageJ.
Labels: animation, Astronomy, astrophotography, ISS, Mars, Satellite, Saturn
Wednesday, September 12, 2012
NEO 2012 QG42 12-09-12
They were stacked in ImageJ and a Max intensity Z project made, then despeckeled. The images have variations in brightness which may indicate it is rotating (see my previous image for a better plot). Click to embiggen.
375 metre diameter Near Earth Object 2012 QG42 continues to brighten as it heads for closest approach. It will be 7.4 Earth-Moon distances from us at closest approach on September 14 at 05:08 UT.
For my previous images and animation see here and here.
Here's my video made from my image sequence.
Labels: animation, asteroids, astrophotography, iTelescope, NEO
Tuesday, September 11, 2012
NEO 2012 QG42 11-09-12
Near Earth Object 2012 QG42 is a recently discovered relatively bright NEO. It is a 375 metre diameter rock that will be 7.4 Earth-Moon distances from us at closest approach on September 14 at 05:08 UT.
As it comes closer to Earth it appears to be moving faster. For my previous images and animation (using 120 second exposures rather than the 60 seond ones here) see here.
Here's my video made from my image sequence.
Labels: animation, asteroids, iTelescope, NEO
Monday, September 10, 2012
The International Space Station Shoots Past Saturn, 10 September 2012
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My animation of all 10 images is below (images stacked and converted to AVI with ImageJ.
By chance looked up the ISS passes on Heavens Above, not expecting anything, to find that tonight's pass was pretty spectacular. Looked good, and the shots didn't turn out too bad.
Labels: animation, astrophotography, ISS, Mars, Satellite, Saturn
International Space Station 9 September 2102
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Labels: animation, astrophotography, ISS, Satellite
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Comet Machholz has Babies!
Comet Machholz has babies! Well, two fragments really. Leading the main comet by about 5 hours. You can't see them on this image, as my family (looks at eldest son) has used up all our high speed internet this month, I can only download the low resolution images.
But that doesn't matter, there are some high resolution videos from the Sungrazer folks here, LASCO C2: MP4 (1.8M) and C3: MP4 (5.9M).
Comet fragmentation is a lot more common than we might think (remember comets Elenin and Lovejoy), and comet Machholz is a particularly interesting case.
I think it will turn up in the STEREO images, but I really have to wait to get my bandwidth back.
Here's a video I made.
Labels: animation, comet, Soho
Sunday, June 24, 2012
Pluto 23 to 24-06-12
Pluto tends to be ignored a lot by us, after all, even though it is an iconic planet,it's just a dot in most peoples equipment. But it's still fun to do animations of Pluto. My animated GIF of this is here.
Also, between 28 June to 2 April Pluto will be skimming past the open cluster M25, this will be worth some shots.
Labels: animation, iTelescope, Pluto
Sunday, June 17, 2012
Still More NEO 2012 LZ1
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| NEO 2012 LZ1 at 7:53 UT, nearly 9 hours after closest approach. 5x120 second Images taken with iTelescope T5. The images were stretched in FITSliberator, then stacked in ImageJ and a Max intensity Z project made, then despeckeled. | NEO 2012 LZ1 two hours later, zipping through star clouds. Processing as for the earlier image. |
These look to be my final images of the NEO 2012 LZ1, taken with the New Mexico T5 instrument nearly 9 and 11 hours after the asteroids closest approach.This is a much narrower FOV instrument that T14 and T16. A big thank you to Jeff Woods of iTelescope who adjusted the travel of T5 so we could take earlier images.
I'll now do some astrometry on these images to help refine the asteroids orbit.
There is a nice article at Universe Today which features one of my images, and here's a nice animation by Peter Lake using iTelescope T11. My other shots and animations of this asteroid are here, here and here.
My animation here
Labels: animation, asteroids, FITSLiberator, imageJ, iTelescope
Saturday, June 16, 2012
Near Earth Asteroid 2012 LZ1 10:10 UT, 15 June 2012
2012 LZ1 imaged with iTelescope T14 on June 15, 2012 10:10 UT. The image is a stack of 7x120 second exposures, stretched in FITS Liberator and stacked with ImageJ. Click to embiggen (it's not as big as my previous image, but worth it)NEO 2012 LZ1 was imaged here at 10:10 UT, nearly 11 hours after its closest approach of 13-14 lunar-distances (that's the distance between the Earth and the Moon, 0.036 AU) on June 14 23:10 UT. The asteroid is just zipping past the faint globular cluster PAL 11 when this series of images were taken.
I was trying for a longer series of images to make a really cool animation, but the oncoming twilight put paid to that.
Here's my animation.
Labels: animation, asteroids, FITSLiberator, imageJ, iTelescope, NEO
Sunday, June 10, 2012
Images from My Transit of Venus, June 6 2012
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| My first image of Venus at 10:26 am ACST when the clouds had broken. | Near mid transit at 11:04 am. The varying colours are due to the cameras auto exposure function, and its lag when clouds come over. |
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| After a cloud interlude, Venus approaches the Sun's limb | Just before 3rd contact at 1:52 pm ACST |
I had great plans for the Transit of Venus on June 6 2012, the last until 2117. I had made a binocular projection system, I had my 4" Newtonian telescope with a glass aperture solar filter, a home-made Baader filter for my 8" Newtonian telescope and a mini Baader filter for my Olympus camera.Wednesday dawned cloudy. Actually, when I first woke up the sky was mostly clear, but huge slabs of cloud moved over where the Sun would be shortly before Sunrise, ending any hope I had of seeing first and second contact.
This was the pattern for the day, large parts of the sky would be sparkly blue, except where the Sun was. Due to the weather I made a decision to only use the binocular projection system and my 4" Newtonian scope, as these systems could be moved around a lot more quickly than the homogeneously heavy 8". Also, although I have a time drive on the 8", it drifts slowly. With brief patches of blue coming over the Sun at short, widely spaced intervals, the time to realign the scope would be too long to catch the breaks. So I stuck with the simpler systems.
An added complication was that SmallestOne was sick and had to stay home too. He wasn't THAT sick, well enough to watch TV and play computer games, but I still had to keep an eye on him and give him his medications at the prescribed times. So I divided my time between moaning at the clouds, looking after SmallestOne, watching the live webcasts and rushing out when gaps in the cloud came up.
I had a great Transit. I took heaps of shots through the 4" scope. Most were useless, with cloud coming over just as I was imaging, or the scope shaking with the wind. Getting the focus right was a pain too. But I could watch the progress of the transit with the binocular projection system easily while I fiddled with the camera.Some people came over and I showed them the transit with the projection system (I had to move quickly to stop one person trying to look through the eyepiece rather than at the card the image was projected on. Even SmallestOne came out and had a look (he wasn't impressed). Compare this transit with my Transit experience in 2004.
Even though I thought I had carefully placed my scope, just as third contact was coming up, the Sun went behind a tree. So I rapidly moved the scope and binoculars, and hurriedly realigned and refocused in time to see Venus approach the Sun's limb.
And the clouds came over again.
Nonetheless, I was able to get sufficient shots to see third contact and just before fouth contact (I though I had 4th contact but I was fooled by the low magnification image). I have made the final series of images into the animation below. It's a bit jerky as at lot of frames were unusable due to cloud. The weird tiny black speckles are due to the GIF to AVI translation. Images taken using infinity to infinity imaging a Canon IXUS and a 4" reflector with aperture filter and 25 mm eye piece, the camera was held in place by a commercial adapter (see image of the scope above).
Animation of third and fourth contact. Images were imported into GIMP as layers, aligned using the difference function and manual alignment, the cropped, exported as an animated GIF, then converted to AVI with ImageJ.
Reflecting after it was all over, what was really good was the degree to which the astronomical community, both amateur and professional, put a lot of time into making sure the general public got to experience the transit, either by making their won projection systems, public outreach events or webcast. As well as thoroughly enjoying my own experience, I'm glad I could help in some small way to let others experience it.
Labels: animation, astrophotography, gimp, imageJ, transit, Venus
Thursday, May 10, 2012
More Flares from the Sun
In the past 24 hours we have had an M5 and M4 class solar flare, as well as several smaller ones. It is possibly that Tasmania and Southern New Zealand will see aurora in the next 24-48 hours
Labels: animation, aurora, Solar flare
Thursday, December 15, 2011
Comet C/2011 W3 Lovejoy Brightens!
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Karl has more information and animations (including the son of lovejoy), here. For previous images, animations and orbit descriptions see this post. Rob McNaught suspects it may not get above magnitude -6 (brighter than Venus but hard to see in daylight). It looks like it may survive to at least perihelion (but then, it will probably spectacularly disintegrate now).
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Comet C/2011 W3 Lovejoy as seen in STEREO H1 Behind 13 December 2011, tail disconnection seen . Raw data courtesy Karl Battams
Comet C/2011 W3 Lovejoy as seen in STEREO H1 Ahead spacecraft 12-13 December 2011, tail movement in solar wind seen. False colour image. Raw data courtesy Karl Battams
Comet C/2011 W3 Lovejoy as seen in SOHO spacecraft C3 imager 14-15 December 2011. Raw data courtesy NASA/SOHO
Labels: animation, comet, comet lovejoy, comets, Stereo Satellite
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