In support of the above animation I made a view of the light echoes in relation to each other, rotated to show something of the volume of the surrounding nebula:
On Nov. 22nd, the face of the sun was unblemished by sunspots, and NOAA classified solar activity as "very low." Nevertheless, the skies above Tromso Norway exploded with a remarkable outburst of pink auroras.
This outburst was powered by a stream of solar wind flowing from a hole in the sun's atmosphere. Such holes are common during Solar Minimum, and they require no sunspots to form. That's why auroras continue throughout the 11-year solar cycle.
The pink color of the outburst tells us something interesting about the solar wind on Nov. 22nd: it seems to have been unusually penetrating. Most auroras are green–a verdant glow caused by energetic particles from space hitting oxygen atoms 100 km to 300 km above Earth's surface. Pink appears when the energetic particles descend lower than usual, striking nitrogen molecules at the 100 km level and below.
This is called "the nitrogen fringe."
In recent winters, big displays of pink and white auroras have coincided with spotless suns often enough to make observers wonder if there is a connection. If so, more outbursts are in the offing as the sun continues its plunge toward a deep Solar Minimum. Stay tuned for pink!
CONTEXT:
I live in Switzerland. I had one week vacation left and I needed to book it before the end of the year. So two months in advance, I booked a week in November (a weed with no moon) in order to do some astronomy in the Canaria islands if the weather was not good at home. I would decide at the last minute. So my choice was between these two options.
Then I sow an alert for Aurora, a phenomenon I wanted to see since childhood. I looked at the weather forecast in Tromsø and it looked to be positive. After some hesitation, I eventually took the option to fly to Norway because this is maybe the chance of a lifetime if we consider all the criteria (to be in vacation + nothing planned + Aurora alert + good weather forecast...).
And wow!!!! For my first aurora, that was amazing!!!
The phenomenon appeared so bright on the screen of the camera with my adapted view of the darkness that I reduced the ISO by fear to blow the highlights. It turned to be an error that I tried to correct the best I could in post. So if you see some flickering or an augmented noise, that come from that. Sorry, it was my first attempt. But the event was so spectacular, It absolutly find it worth sharing.
Thank you for watching.
Nicolas
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Sun Dec 03, 2017 1:38 pm
by alfas
Lunar occultation of Jupiter
Jupiter being occulted by the Moon on 25th December 2012, as seen from São Bernardo do Campo, Brazil. This video shows the event 5x faster than real time. Filmed with a Celestron C8 telescope and DBK21AU618.AS camera.
What is this twinkling colored dot of light? If I told you it is extremely far away and can only be seen at night? You guessed it, those are stars, bright ones. These are actually some of the brightest stars in our night sky and you’re about to see them in a very different way…
Have you ever wondered why stars twinkle, some more than others, and some not? Well here is your chance to find out in a very visual way. The light emitted by objects at a very long distance from Earth (at least several light years) travels to us almost without being altered. However as photons are about to end their journey, they face a major obstacle: Earth’s atmosphere. The latter is made of cool gases but is very turbulent with zones of different densities and masses. This differences in pressure, temperature and density make our atmosphere a real hurdle for the light to arrive ‘in one piece’. As photons hit these different layers, they are being diffracted and scattered. This goes for all sources light coming from space. However the light emanating from relatively close, so ‘large’ objects (sun, moon, planets…), overwhelms the hurdle without any problem. It’s a whole different story for the light coming from far-away objects like stars, creating pin-point beams. Since the beam is smaller with fewer photons, we will tend to notice their diffraction and scattering a lot more, causing the light to rapidly and temporarily shift color and brightness. We call it stellar scintillation. It has actually been observed and studied since the dawn of human kind, but recent research has found that stellar scintillation is not only a change in apparent brightness and color of a star, but also position.
In this video I wanted to showcase the stellar scintillation of some of brightest stars in the northern hemisphere in a ver different way. There exist some real-time videos of Vega lying around on the internet, but these are usually taken when stars are in focus. In order to increase the apparent area of a star, I needed to manually open up the aperture to its maximum at get an out-of-focus frame. The colors would then be more obvious, but several technical problems arose. The more out-of-focus the star was, the less ‘concentrated’ it light was, so the more I would have to compensate by increasing the ISO and reducing the shutter. However I realized on the spot that increasing my shutter speed would actually worsen the frame, since the scintillations were very often extremely quick and ephemeral. I had to keep a shutter speed between 1/15’’ and 1/30’’ to keep colors and details while still taking advantage of the maximum of light I could gather. I would also need the longest focal length lens I had with the widest aperture, so I after some test I decided to use the Samyang 135mm f/2, at f/2. While trying to get a decent sized bead in the frame, I necessarily had to bump up my ISO to at least 16,000 to get proper light, but that eventually caused some noise issue. After numerous tests and adjustments, these scenes were the best I could get out of cameras, lenses and time-being. Out of these very technical shots, I was amazed at what I was seeing. I had never seen in so much detail the frozen ‘facets’ of twinkling stars, the fleeting evidence of light diffraction by our atmosphere. The successive marble-like dots changed in brightness and colors, although it was very difficult to verify the change in position (maybe too small to see). Very hot stars like Vega or Sirius emit blue light, because their whole emission spectrum is ‘dragged’ towards the shorter wavelengths of visible (blue, violet) and invisible (UV). You can still see other colors and even some occasional ‘rainbows’ that remind you that our atmosphere actually act like a prism. Cooler stars like Betelgeuse or the group of stars Capella emit yellower or redder light, and their scintillation will have an overall red tint. Betelgeuse would be the most luminous star in the night sky if we were able to see all its radiations, but take a close look at its fluctuations: from sometimes invisible to extremely bright red, green or yellow, taken with exactly the same settings as the others, and its area is considerably smaller than the other 3 stars showcased. It’s the one-of-its-kind star that has the biggest fluctuations! Sirius is the brightest star in all our night sky and its fluctuations seemed fewer than the other stars (however low in elevation it was when I took the shot: 25°), maybe because of its ‘close’ distance to Earth. However it was the easiest star to shoot, because it emits so much light!I hope you liked this video that shed some novel light (pun intended) on stellar scintillation, and that it will encourage you to go outside and spend some time stargazing, because the possibilities are endless! I will gladly provide a more detailed list of gear and processing techniques upon request.
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 9:47 am
by Adrien Mauduit
Fall skies of La Palma
Credits: Adrien Mauduit
Four and a half hours a day… That’s how long I have slept each day for ten days. Why would I bother being deprived of vital sleep though? Because my mission and goal was to show the night sky in a different way. The second opus of my sequel ‘Galaxies’ aims at finding new techniques and skills to bring the beauties of the cosmos to the general public, and in this optic, I went to spend a bit more than a week in a privileged place: a dark sky reserve. La Palma is located in the Canary Islands, just a few hundreds kilometers west of northern Africa. Its climate and location enable professional and amateur astronomers to gaze at the stars almost year round in a very little light polluted sky. In fact, the cooperation of more than 19 countries in building a giant observatory site on top of its volcano at 2400m is no surprise, because the skies are drier, purer and darker up there. Having shot on top El Teide in Tenerife, the neighbor island two years before (vimeo.com/163680035), I thought it was the perfect place to go shoot the wonders of the winter night sky. Tenerife also possesses decent skies and opportunities to gaze at the core of the milky way, but when your goal is to observe and capture fainter deep-sky red glows, you need a less polluted and bright atmosphere. That’s why I embarked for an epic and restless astro-adventure on Canary’s darkest island.
Epic and restless, because the goal was to spend all night shooting. So have I done. Every evening I would drive one and a half hours from sea level to 2400m of altitude along the dangerously winding coastal roads to arrive at the top El Roque de Los Muchachos, the volcano. The air is very thin and chilly up there, not to mention the constant wind gusts, making any kind of portable time-lapse astrophotography challenging. I would start shooting from dusk till dawn in the dry cold air, and rest in my rental car while my cameras are shooting. At the break of dawn, I would drive down to my holiday condo and sleep for about 4-5 hours. I needed to get back up, because no matter how much I planned the trip before hand using google Earth to find good shooting spots, you need to scout during the day, otherwise you won’t get a chance to see anything. If you don’t know what dark is, I advise you to get up there. It is so dark because of the basaltic rocks, that almost none of my sequences are taken below ISO 6400 and 10 seconds of exposure, no matter what the focal length. You need all the light you can gather! However the real challenge of an astrolapser is the adapt to the local conditions: if the wind picks up, you need to lower your shutter speed to avoid jitter as much as possible, meaning you will have to compensate in any other way. This game of fine manipulation is what makes your astrolapse look good, or horrendous. There is no in between. The slightest slip-up, and you could see the result of a long energy and time investment go to waste (I did have to delete all of my first night’s captures because of misjudgment…). Practice makes perfect, especially within this novel field of astrolapse. I wanted to use narrower angles, astro-modified cameras and contrast filters to reveal the light and colors of nebulae and gas clouds that the winter sky is strewed with. In this short film that also includes day-time sequences of my unforgettable journey around the island, I wanted to feature some of these deep-sky scenes, as a test. The main goal of this short film was showing La Palma under its Fall skies. It was also the occasion for me to use motion control tools for the first time (Yes, it was about time). I used the Vixen Polarie to track the deep sky sequences to get maximum details and sharpness. I also used the Syrp tilt and pan bracket system for wider angle shots. To increase contrasts at angles higher than 14mm, I used the Pure Night filter by Lonely Speck. Camera wise, I used the Canon 6D Baader modified to reveal the H-alpha emission nebulae, the Sony a7s (other night shots), and the Sony a7rII (day shots). From the 1% young crescent moon setting to the blood reds of Barnard’s loop, I tried getting a maximum of interesting and innovative shots. I am sure you can spot countless meteors (Leonids, Taurids and others). Also, some multicolor airglow and dust clouds from the Sahara were rampant and usually add a lot of haze and colors to some frames. On the tracked deep-sky sequences, you can also notice loads of satellites, and these are geo-synchronous ones that stay in synch with the Earth’s orbit! In some wide-angle shots, you can probably spot the famous zodiacal lights too.
These were the main goals for me, and I believe these objects have rarely been photographed in that way before, but unlike what you might think, it is possible with nowadays technology, and is very relevant as this test suggests! I will gladly provide a more detailed list of gear and processing techniques upon request. Enjoy this short!
After spending a full night under the stars in the Swiss Alps at the Emosson Dam on October 26th, I came home with a lot of sequence that will be featured in my next big release 'Galaxies Vol II' coming next spring.
I really wanted to put the emphasis on Orion, as it is a bit detached from our own milky way center per se, but it offers visible features at mid-narrow angles (85 and 135mm) caught extremely well here with my Baader modded Canon 6D and Samyang 135mm, taking advantage of the astro-modification to see Barnard's loop and the Lambda Orionis. Shooting in extremely high light pollution, I used Lonely Speck's Pure night filter to increase contrast in the nebulosity, failing which I would have gotten these results. Look at how sharp and detailed the images look, especially when tracked with the Vixen Polarie.
I really wanted to capture the nebula rising from a mountain and show so much nebulosity and details in just single shots, as it has never been shown before on the internet. On some other scenes, you can also see some Orionid meteors which is still on-going.
The damn is extremely well situated and offers a 180 view on Mont Blanc, Europe's highest peak culminating at 4810m. The white mountains offered a pristine view lit up by the first quarter moon setting, but the milky way and the Scutum part (as well as the Cygnus part) was still visible.
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Mon Dec 04, 2017 9:51 am
by Adrien Mauduit
Rise
Credits: Adrien Mauduit
Following the mornings of October 17, 18 and 19th 2017, the crescent moon rose in a very unique manner. The 3% moon crescent got close (conjunction) to Mars, Venus and Zaniah on Oct. 18th in the Earth shine. I shot the scenes from Gex in the Jura mountains in France, giving me a good vantage point: the ballet of the astrological objects occurred right above the Alps from my perspective. Unfortunately I wasn't able to get the moon and the mountains together, even though I got a still shot. On the other hand, the sun rose right above the 'Dents Blanches' mountains in Switzerland, which name means 'white teeth' because of the jagged-edge shape of its ridges. While the sun is lifting off this sharp horizon, the peaks diffract the emerging sunlight in a very unusual way, offering a dazzling spectacle of sun rays, blue light, and beads, much like at the end of a total eclipse! At 500mm, you notice how much the sun rises further away to the west Each day. The sequences are not in order, but you can certainly see that on the 17th it rose right between the peaks, and on the 19th it was completely west of the mountain ridge! Notice the planes passing by to land in Geneva. They seem to fly in an atmosphere filled with fluff, pollen and dust shining in the sun! Certainly a rare show that could only be recorded from where I am at the period of the year and in these lenient October weather conditions!
I shot everything with the Sony a7rII + Sigma 150-500mm APO f/4-6.3
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Thu Dec 07, 2017 9:45 am
by Adrien Mauduit
Orion: the Hunter
Credits: Adrien Mauduit
A strange rectangle formed by bright stars in the winter sky, with three aligned central stars, that’s no ordinary shape for a constellation! You’ve probably seen it on a winter night sortie. If you are in the northern Hemisphere, these stars tend to rise in the south east in the Fall and set in the south west in the Spring, and linger during cold and long hours throughout the winter darkness. It’s undoubtably Orion, one of the oldest and most recognizable constellations in the night sky. According to the Greek mythology, the constellation was given the name Orion because it resembles a hunter holding a bow, as a reference to the son of Poseidon (the sea God) and Euryale.
Orion is next to some very famous constellations and deep-sky objects like the Pleiades, the Hyades (Taurus), Monoceros (and the Rosette Nebula), the milky way, Lepus (to the south) and Gemini. Sirius- the brightest star in our night sky, can often been sighted along side Orion. Orion also contains some very bright stars delimiting the outer shape of the hour-glass: Rigel, Saiph, Betelgeuse and Bellatrix. In the center, its belt harbors Alnitak, Alnilam and Mintaka. The Orion area also holds a great deal of colors. Even though our eyes cannot pick them up, our cameras can. As the biggest stars end their lives in a gigantic cosmic burp spewing out tremendous amounts of hot gases containing several elements they have formed by nuclear fusion, the explosion (called a supernova) propels these gases outwards. Their color is a testament of their nature (ex: blue/green is oxygen, red/brown tends to be hydrogen). They slowly cool off and in some places they agglutinate again by gravity. When the pressure and temperature get high enough in these accretion zones, a nuclear fusion starts and gives birth to a new star: nebulae are in fact a star graveyard and a nursery at the same time! In the Orion region, a lot of these nebulae can be captured with a camera: The large Lambda Orionis cloud, the famous and extremely bright shell-like Orion nebula, the running-man nebula, the flame and horse head nebulae located near Orion’s belt, but also the Rosette nebula not too far from all that! Look at how bright and varied these hues are. The point of this educative and pedagogical video was also to push the limits of what single picture astrophotography can do. While most cameras cannot pick the H-alpha emissions (red glowing gasses), I used a camera capable of doing so because its CMOS sensor has been replaced by a filter that can allow a wider range of wavelengths in the reds. I also used a light pollution filter (Pure Night from Lonely Speck) to increase contrasts, as well as a tracker (Vixen Polarie) for the deep-sky scenes to increase sharpness and details. With this film (as well as some of my previous productions), I was eager to show that today’s technology allows us to show so much details and colors in the night sky. Of course it contains a lot more noise than a stacked deep-sky or wide-angle astrophograph, but the time-lapse technique can also use medium format and deep-sky to reveal the beauty of this part of the cosmos, and this novel time-lapse proves it! I used the Canon 6D Baader modded and Sony a7s, as well as range of lenses from 14mm to 300mm. I will be glad to give more precisions and details about the technique, post-processing and workflow upon request. In the mean time, the video also contains a myriad of hidden gems that only attentive viewers will see. You can definitely see birds, shooting stars, airglow, iridium flares, low-orbit satellites, but most impressive of all, geosynchronous satellites. The latter is a type of higher orbit satellites that hover approximately over the same point of the Earth. They are usually fixed against the night sky, but as some scenes are tracked, meaning the night sky is fixed this time, these satellites move with the Earth’s rotation. Watch closely how many they are and how they tend to ‘follow’ each other! That’s also why this type of time-lapse is relevant and a real marvel for star gazers!
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Sun Dec 10, 2017 6:01 pm
by Goudig
100 billions of suns and Comet 252/P Linear, a 360° Milky Way panoramic project http://www.bastienfoucher.com
Copyright: Sabine Gloaguen - Bastien Foucher
Galaxies Vol. II: Wonders of the winter night skies
Credits: Adrien Mauduit
As the days shorten and the darkness progressively eats away the light, an amazing transformation happens in the northern hemisphere skies. A lot of astronomers and stargazers prefer summertime to look up at the stars, probably because conditions are better and the brightest part of our own galaxy, the milky way is more visible, even with the naked eye. Although fainter, the ‘winter’ part of the milky way and the rest of the winter sky harbor countless unsuspected gems, if one knows how to find and capture them!
In the late Fall, you can still get a glimpse at the bright core of our galaxy sink down under the horizon just after sunset, along with its dark hydrogen gas lanes, Lagoon and trifid nebulae, and Saturn. Later, you can catch Scutum (shield constellation) and its dark nebulosity set in the south west/west. In the movie, this part is visible in many scenes but my favorite one is by far as it sets on La Palma shores behind a thunderstorm accompanied by red sprites, airglow and zodiacal lights.Then, take a peek at one of my favorite areas of the winter sky: the Swan constellation. I presented it to you (also on the cover), so that you can see it from different perspectives, but the best is probably at a narrower angle to show the beautiful magenta colors of the H-alpha emission nebulae (North-American, Pelican, Sadr region or IC 1396). I also included a scene where the ‘Summer Triangle’ of Cygnus (formed by Deneb, Sadr, Delta Cygni, and Gienah) is photobombed by an overhead aurora borealis. Continuing along the winter milky way, I included a shot of the Heart and Soul nebula. Rising on the other side of the hemisphere, we are now looking at the outer edge of our galaxy, where very little light comes from fewer stars, nebulae and dark clouds (in comparison to the core!). I wanted to show you a very novel scene combining the hot Pleiades stars reflecting their blue light onto passing gasses and the California nebula glowing blood red! The next area I want to emphasize is winter’s most emblematic: Orion. I wanted to maximize the different colors and brightness this constellation has to offer while shooting it in a series of single shots: the orange of Betelgeuse and the blue of Rigel, the gigantic red-glowing Barnard’s loop, the inevitable shell-like Orion nebula along with the running man nebula, the horse-head nebula, the flame nebula, Lambda Orionis nebula… Further away from the winter milky way doesn’t mean dull at all, au contraire! Look at the magnificent Andromeda galaxy (M31), the size of 6 full moons- rise above the tree line! What about the iconic Big Dipper being photobombed by some pillars of Icelandic and Canadian aurora borealis? What about these iridescent marbles at the very start of the video? Those are twinkling Sirius, Capella (bottom left) and Vega (upper right) emphasized by the real-time out-of-focus setting to reveal the hypnotic shift in light and colors of these twinkling stars created by our own atmosphere! You will probably miss a lot of night sky events if you only watch the video once! Don’t blink, you might miss a lot of meteors (Perseids, Orionids, Draconids, Leonids…), iridium flares, low-orbit satellites, red sprites. What about those satellites that seem to ‘follow’ each other in some deep-sky scenes? Those are geosynchronous satellites normally hovering over a fixed point of the Earth, but the motion of the star tracker allows them to move whereas the sky is now immobile. I am sure professionals and amateurs will spot many more features, all you have to do is sit back and gaze! The goal of this series of astro-lapses ‘Galaxies’ and especially this second opus was a way for me to push the limits of single astrophotography. However beautiful and numerous they are, wide-angle shots of the milky way moving against a foreground became less interesting to me as I got to shoot more and more astro-timelapses. I became more interested in exploring the possibilities that modern lenses, sensors and techniques could give, so I started using medium-format and astromodfication to take advantage of a wider light spectrum and show the red colors of H-alpha emission nebulae that are so ubiquitous in the winter part of the sky. I also wanted to improve the quality of the shots, so I used a square light pollution filter for shots at more than 50mm (Lonely Speck’s Pure Night LP filter), and a star tracker for some of the scenes to increase sharpness and details (Vixen Polarie). It was very important for me to prove that deep-sky time-lapses can be very interesting and successful, whether they hold a foreground or not, because so many things can be happening the sky (airglow, meteors, satellites, haze giving a temporary glow to the stars…). All shots have been recorded over the past year and in different countries (France, Switzerland, Spain, Iceland, Denmark and Canada).
Recommended: 1080p, full screen, audio on.
We imaged the eclipse using a variety of optics and cameras, from wide all-sky to narrow field of view with an apo refractor. We put all the frames together into this timelapse movie, which shows the whole phenomenon in fast motion, compressing a 2+ hour timespan into a 3 minute movie.
Imaged from Glendo, WY, USA on 21 Aug 2017.
HDR corona 500 mm at 0:43 HDR corona 150 mm at 1:35 Gopro view at 2:00 Allsky view at 2:23 Allsky rectilinear view at 2:44 Tech details at 03:00
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Sun Apr 29, 2018 4:14 pm
by Bi2L
American Nightscapes, Timelapse 4K - The Great American Eclipse
Music: Dwayne Ford - Dragon Fire
Night landscapes above the National Parks of United States of America !
Admire beautiful landscapes from Dead horse point of Moab, Utah to Monument Valley State Park of Navajo Nation.... and from Yosemite National Park to Death Valley and to Yellowstone National Park.
One of my favourite captures is The Great American Eclipse, captured at Boysen State Park, Wyoming.
Also check out the captures from Arches National Park, Utah.
Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
Devils Tower National Monument, Wyoming
Don't forget the must see Horseshoe-Bend near the town of Page, Arizona and Grand Canyon National Park, Arizona.
This short’s timeline is built around one fictional day on the beautiful island of Tenerife in the Canary Islands. It starts with the beautiful sunrises above the sea of clouds. Then embark on a journey around the island, visiting the Cacti of the south or the humid forests of the north. As the day unfolds we progressively climb the volcano to witness the magic of sunsets from the crater. There you can experience many twilight phenomena. For one the sun hanging right above the ‘Calima’- this cloud of dust and sand from the Sahara, giving beautiful colors. You can also appreciate the extremely fast twilight with Venus and the thin-crescent moon in the Earthshine setting on the western shore in the zodiacal lights, this strange pyramidal column of light coming from the sunlight being refracted into tiny interplanetary dust particles! From this moment when colors and light are fading away, you are in for quite a show… The second part of this film is the one I wanted to put the emphasis mostly because I’m an astrophotographer.
As I am following my journey into finding innovative sequences and techniques, this trip was the perfect occasion to test out these new skills on a part of the sky I was eager to capture: the center of our home galaxy and its many astronomical treasures. After twilight in April, you can witness the ‘winter part’ of the milky way setting on the south-western shore along with the famous Sirius, Orion constellations and its nebulae (Orion, Running Man, Flame, Horse Head, Rosette). It’s also a good time to peek at Vela, the Gum nebula and the Carina nebula (barely visible here because it is too close to the horizon to get a clean shot). I went to El Roque de Garcia to get a sequence of Orion setting behind the famous rocky pinnacles there to combine the red of the H-alpha emissions and the hues of the lava. Around midnight, you can watch Jupiter rise in the east followed by the head of Scorpius (Pi Sco, Dschubba and Acrab), announcing the rise of the milky way. About 15 minutes later, a very interesting region would lift up: The Antares region. For the first time in timelapse you will be able to gaze at the beautiful colors and shapes of the nebulae of Rho Ophiuchi along with Messier 4, and especially a signature shot of this area photobombed by some red and green airglow, making the yellow, pink and blue gas clouds literally change color! I also really wanted to get the best details of the core, which is rising almost horizontally 30 minutes later. I traveled and hiked to several locations for that and my favorite shot was for sure the core rising behind the telescope hill of Tenerife’s observatory. I used both motionless timelapse to get the red laser pointing at the stars, but also a tracked sequence to increase details and lights. Around 3:15 I switched to my 135mm lens to give you the best detailed view of the galaxy bulge seen on timelapse: the dark dust lanes blocking the light coming from a billion stars of the downtown region, the pinks of the Lagoon nebula and the pink and blue Trifid nebula. You can also watch many other wide angle shots of our home galaxy rising and hanging above the crater at various locations, whether it is above the Caldera, or the white dunes of Minas de San Jose, or even the many basaltic pinnacles of the craters. On top of that I also featured a 50mm shot of the Cygnus region and its nebulae, the Eagle and Shield region, The tail of Scorpius up to Norma with the Cat’s Paw nebula, the War and Peace nebulae, and the Prawn nebula all bathed in airglow. I am really proud and excited to share these unique and novel scenes with you in timelapse, and it sure took a tremendous amount of time, energy, ressources, preparation, work and learning to get to this point. I gathered 1 To of data, around 20 000 pictures, working from 4 pm till 8 am every day for 9 days with a 3 hour drive each day. It also took me an entire week of relentless work to post-process and edit the sequences and the film. All was recorded with the Canon 6D Baader modified, the Sony a7s, the Sony a7rII and a variety of bright lenses ranging from 14mm to 300mm. I used the Lonely Speck Pure Night and Matt Aust Light pollution filters to reduce light pollution and increase details, and also the Vixen Polarie to track the stars and get cleaner shots. Syrp Genie 3 axis system was used for motion control. All post production was made in Lr with the special timelapse plus plugin, Sequence for mac, TLDF, and final production was made in FCPX.
Animation extrapolating the movement of the clouds from JunoCam imagery
taken on 1st April 2018. (Credit: NASA / JPL / SwRI / MSSS / Gerald Eichstädt)
Members of NASA’s Juno mission team, some of the world’s leading observers of Jupiter, and citizen scientists from across the globe will attend a workshop ‘New Views of Jupiter: Pro-Am Collaborations during and beyond the NASA Juno Mission’ at the Royal Astronomical Society in London on 10-11 May.
JunoCam images presented at the meeting by citizen scientists Gerald Eichstädt and Seán Doran include an animation showing the evolution of swirling features in the giant planet’s atmosphere and a composite image of Jupiter’s cloud tops.
Gerald Eichstädt, a mathematician working as a software professional, has taken two images from JunoCam and reprojected them to the same vantage point to enable a direct comparison between the images and show the subtle motions within the atmosphere. By modelling the movement of individual pixels in the images, he has created an animation that extrapolates the swirling evolution of the vortices in the atmosphere. ...
Pic du Midi in 4K
Posted: Tue May 15, 2018 1:58 pm
by jldauvergne
Hello
recently I've done a set of time lapses with a Nikon D850 that allowed me to make some 4K time lapses of the Pic du Midi in France.
You can see the clouds playing with the mountains. It's fantastic as usal on top of this mountain.
Crédit : Jean-Luc Dauvergne / Ciel et Espace
Fast Imaging Solar Spectrograph (FISS) is an instrument installed at the 1.6 meter Goode Solar Telescope in the Big Bear Solar Observatory, California. The telescope is currently the biggest solar telescope in the world. The FISS is an Echelle spectrograph that produces spatial and spectral information of the Hα and Ca II 8542 Å lines simultaneously, using a fast scan of the slit across the field of view (Chae et al., 2012). The image is reconstructed using the spectrum of the multiple slit positions.
The movie describes the reconstructed image at each wavelength in Hα and Ca II 8542Å bands. The movie at the wings of the spectrum (far from the spectral line center) show the photospheric structures, such as granules and small white specs called filigree. The filigree is a signature of the magnetic concentrations in the photosphere. As the wavelength changes to the line center, the movie displays the chromospheric structures, such as fine threaded spicules. Interesting point is that the spicules are connected with the filigree!
Credit : Heesu Yang (Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute)
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Fri Aug 10, 2018 1:44 pm
by Sebastian Voltmer
Star occultation of Omicron Capricorni A / B during the Total Lunar Eclipse 2018
Time Lapse (interval 4 sec)
Captured with a NexStar 4SE and a Sony a7s.
Original footage in full length of video station #3.
Observed with a Baader Scopos 66ED between Grünau and Keetmanshoop, Namibia.
GPS of this location:
S 27°16'43.45"
E 18°58'48.88"
ALT. 1395 m
The footage of the other 3 stations will be processed in the next weeks.
Team: Bernd Gährken and Sebastian Voltmer
That's a well-scoped image of Mars. Thanks for sharing!
Re: Video Submissions
Posted: Wed Oct 10, 2018 12:00 pm
by IO_12
Proper motion of the Comet 21P / Giacobini-Zinner on October 10th 2018over IC 2177 (Seagull Nebula)
Copyright: Velimir Popov, Emil Ivanov Irida Observatory
