Starship Asterisk*

neufer wrote:Looking South at the Pipe Nebula:

Chris Peterson wrote:

ThePiper wrote:
Oh no - something is wrong here. Today there's a picture of the Milkyway over Australia where the Pipe nebula is on top (northern) of the galactic Center, as it should be.
Reunion and Australia - both are located southern of the Equator.

This has nothing to do with which side of the equator you're on. The Pipe Nebula is a bit north of the center of the Milky Way. If you make a Milky Way image when you are facing ~west, you'll see the nebula on top; if you're facing ~east, you'll see it on the bottom. "Top" and "bottom" aren't astronomical directions. Imagine a moonrise with a conjunction of Jupiter rising first. You'd say that Jupiter was "above" the Moon, right? But when you get to moonset, on the opposite horizon, Jupiter will appear "below" the Moon. Or for any Moon, the Man (bunny, grandmother, etc) will be flipped in the opposite direction between moonrise and moonset.

• Looking South at the Pipe Nebula: http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110524.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_Horse_%28astronomy%29 wrote:

[b][color=#0000FF]Looking South at the Great Dark Horse's B-hind[/color][/b]

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<<The Dark Horse Nebula or Great Dark Horse is a large dark nebula, which as seen from Earth, obscures part of the upper central bulge of the Milky Way. The Dark Horse lies in the southern constellation Ophiuchus (the Serpent Bearer), near its borders with the more famous constellations Scorpius and Sagittarius.

This region of dark nebulae is called Dark Horse because it resembles the side silhouette of a horse and appears dark as compared with the background glow of stars and star clouds. It is also known as "Great" because it is one of the largest (in apparent size) groups of dark nebulae in the sky.

The rear of The Great Dark Horse (its rump and hind legs), is also known as the Pipe Nebula, which itself carries the designation B77, B78, and B59. (The 'B' numbers named after the astronomer Edward Emerson Barnard, who catalogued dark nebulae.) The Snake Nebula extends from the Dark Horse to the Rho Ophiuchus nebulosity.>>

ThePiper wrote:Oh no - something is wrong here. Today there's a picture of the Milkyway over Australia where the Pipe nebula is on top (northern) of the galactic Center, as it should be.
Reunion and Australia - both are located southern of the Equator.

ThePiper wrote:

eltodesukane wrote:

ThePiper wrote:
Why is the Pipe nebula BELOW the center of the Milkyway? Normally (in my brain) it shoud be on top!

Image was taken from the Piton de l'Eau on Reunion Island, which is in the southern hemisphere.

Oh no - something is wrong here. Today there's a picture of the Milkyway over Australia where the Pipe nebula is on top (northern) of the galactic Center, as it should be.
Reunion and Australia - both are located southern of the Equator.

So: This picture is a joke - isn't it?

eltodesukane wrote:

ThePiper wrote:Why is the Pipe nebula BELOW the center of the Milkyway? Normally (in my brain) it shoud be on top!

Image was taken from the Piton de l'Eau on Reunion Island, which is in the southern hemisphere.

Guest wrote:Why does the central band of the Milky Way typically appear arching? I would think that from Earth it would appear as a flat line since we are looking at the disc straight on.

Ann wrote:I admire the lovely composition and the wonderful tranquility and also majesty of the scene. And because I am a color nerd, I also admire the lovely colors of the Milky Way. Note the yellow color of the Large Sagittarius Star Cloud, the bright yellow patch at between ten and eleven o'clock. Note the blue color of the Small Sagittarius Star Cloud at about eleven o'clock. Note the pink color of the Lagoon Nebula to the left of the Small Sagittarius Star Cloud and M16 and M17 to the right of it.

Indeed, that's a lovely image!

Ann

Guest wrote:Why does the central band of the Milky Way typically appear arching? I would think that from Earth it would appear as a flat line since we are looking at the disc straight on.

Case wrote:

APOD Robot wrote:Far is the distance, ...

Typo -- should be: “Far in the distance, ...”

Fixed now.

ThePiper wrote:Why is the Pipe nebula BELOW the center of the Milkyway? Normally (in my brain) it shoud be on top!

Chris Peterson wrote:

lup974 wrote:This consideration is right. So, I checked one of the original raw files (there are 12 to compose this panorama). I had a doubt about the quality of my post processing. But I confirm, on the originals, the stars are brightest in the water than in the sky. God knows why...

I can think of a couple of possibilities. In a long exposure, bright stars tend to saturate, so their apparent brightness in the image is less than their actual brightness. But the reflected stars have their light spread around on more pixels (because the water isn't perfectly still), so the total intensity can be higher, even if no individual pixel actually is brighter.

The other possibility is hardware dependent. Some cameras, like Canons, produce raw images that are nearly good enough for photometric purposes. Others, like Nikons, are notorious for the amount of internal processing that occurs, making them poor for many astronomical imaging applications.

lup974 wrote:This consideration is right. So, I checked one of the original raw files (there are 12 to compose this panorama). I had a doubt about the quality of my post processing. But I confirm, on the originals, the stars are brightest in the water than in the sky. God knows why...

briandonohue wrote:
Stars don't do vengeance; that is, so far as we know, an exclusively human phenomenon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Influenza#Etymology wrote:
<<The word Influenza comes from the Italian language meaning "influence" and refers to the cause of the disease; initially, this ascribed illness to unfavorable astrological influences. Archaic terms for influenza include epidemic catarrh, grippe (from the French, first used by Molyneaux in 1694), and sweating sickness. The 1918 flu pandemic (the "Spanish flu") was an unusually severe and deadly pandemic that spread across the world. Most victims were healthy young adults, in contrast to most influenza outbreaks, which predominantly affect juvenile, elderly, or weakened patients. The pandemic lasted from January 1918 to December 1920, spreading even to the Arctic and remote Pacific islands. Between 50 and 130 million died.>>

lup974 wrote:

neufer wrote:

Mactavish wrote:
The astrophotographer reports waiting for nearly two years for the sky and clouds to be just right to get the above shot.

How long did he have to wait for the stars reflected in the lake
to be brighter than the stars in the sky? (Or are those fireflies?)

This consideration is right. So, I checked one of the original raw files (there are 12 to compose this panorama). I had a doubt about the quality of my post processing. But I confirm, on the originals, the stars are brightest in the water than in the sky. God knows why...

Luc Perrot

neufer wrote:

Mactavish wrote:
The astrophotographer reports waiting for nearly two years for the sky and clouds to be just right to get the above shot.

How long did he have to wait for the stars reflected in the lake
to be brighter than the stars in the sky? (Or are those fireflies?)