Starship Asterisk*

Starswarm Magellan wrote:How long did it take the French to get this shot, another 2 years? Americans are preserving and studying light photons in a cage of mirrors and finding remnants of water on Mars, yet NASA APOD prefers to spend our tax money paying the same folks for purdy pictures taken with a Nikon from the ground. I saw pictures of the sedimentary rocks of Mars in the Washington Post while APOD doesn't deem that info important enough to show to the world. Perhaps a fifth or two of Stolichnaya Wodka (with American cranberries juice) will make me care less if American institutions strive for excellence. It seems to work well for the Russians and the EU

Chris Peterson wrote:

grady.stroud wrote:I have seen so many pictures of star trails. (This is a nice one.) I, who have no real equipment, would like to do something a little different. That would be to take an extended time lapse photo of the NCP, but have the camera fixed (adjusted by tracking motor) to reduce the stars to just mere points and show the geostationary satellites with trails. This would allow me some idea, with all the clear skies and low light pollution to have some idea where these reside and try to catch a glimpse of them when they catch the sun and reflect brightly. Just a thought.

Geostationary satellites are over the equator, so if you aim your camera at the NCP it will need to be very wide angle. Geostationary and geosynchronous satellites show up (as streaks) all the time when making astronomical images at low declinations.

grady.stroud wrote:I have seen so many pictures of star trails. (This is a nice one.) I, who have no real equipment, would like to do something a little different. That would be to take an extended time lapse photo of the NCP, but have the camera fixed (adjusted by tracking motor) to reduce the stars to just mere points and show the geostationary satellites with trails. This would allow me some idea, with all the clear skies and low light pollution to have some idea where these reside and try to catch a glimpse of them when they catch the sun and reflect brightly. Just a thought.

drollere wrote:what is the longest period that APOD has gone without publishing a photograph of "star trails plus picturesque landscape elements"?