Starship Asterisk*

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<- Previous submissions

Elephant Trunk Nebula in Narrowband
Copyright: Malcolm Park The left image is Hydrogen Alpha (Ha) and Oxygen III (OIII) and the right image is Ha, OIII and SII processed as the Hubble palette (S,Ha,O=R,G,B). The right image is a sum of more than 11 hours exposure time, imaged from the skies above London, UK over the period of the summer solstice. ~ Malcolm Park The Milky Way on the Horizon
http://www.astromodelismo.es
Copyright: Máximo Ruiz NGC 6369: Little Ghost Nebula
http://www.kellysky.net
Credit and copyright: HLA (image); Al Kelly (processing) Lightning over the Mediterranean
http://picasaweb.google.com/blacksir/2009
Copyright: Alexander Vasenin Between Sagittarius, Ophiuchus and Scorpius
http://blog.deepskycolors.com/archive/2 ... -Scor.html
Copyright: Rogelio Bernal Andreo Circumhorizontal Arc, Take 2
Copyright: Brad Viets I did an enhanced version that is a lot closer to what the eye actually saw. (It was much prettier in person than what the camera originally took.)

Known in the weather world as a circumhorizontal arc, this rare sight was caught on film on June 23 as it hung over Boise, Idaho. It lasted about 1/2 hour.

The arc isn't a rainbow — it is caused by light passing through wispy, high-altitude cirrus clouds. The sight occurs only when the sun is very high in the sky (more than 58° above the horizon). What's more, the hexagonal ice crystals that make up cirrus clouds must be shaped like thick plates with their faces parallel to the ground.

When light enters through a vertical side face of such an ice crystal and leaves from the bottom face, it refracts, or bends, in the same way that light passes through a prism. If a cirrus's crystals are aligned just right, the whole cloud lights up in a spectrum of colors. ~ Brad Viets Lagoon Nebula and NGC6559
Copyright: Scott Tucker and Dail Terry Reaching to the Stars
http://www.greeksky.gr/files/photos/lan ... yChris.htm
Copyright: Chris Kotsiopoulos Antennae Galaxies
http://www.skyfactory.org/antennae/antennae.htm
Credit: NASA, ESA, and B. Whitmore (STScI). Image processing: Davide De Martin This Image Needs a Good Name; Can You Help?
http://gaf.gokyuzu.org/img/2010-04-24.jpg
Copyright: M. Raşid Tuğral Please post your suggestions for a name for this image; thank you! ~ Owlice <- Previous submissions

There were several good images here. I'm a sucker for pictures showing the Milky Way over the Earth, so I particularly enjoyed the image called "The Milky Way on the Horizon". It is a large picture which looks really beautiful at full magnification! But it is a bit disconcerting that the Milky Way seems to be "upside down". Is tht what the Cygnus region looks like from the southern hemisphere?

The thunder and lightning picture was totally awesome, although it's just barely an astronomical image. Oh well.

I don't think you did Rogelio Bernal Andreo's picture full justice. On his own homepage, you can enlarge that image so that it becomes much bigger than here. And do you realize just how big that image is, how well-resolved it is, and what a large swath of the Milky Way and the Scorpius and Ophiuchus regions that it actually covers?

The Antennae image is nice, too. I think I particularly like how the picture brings out the streams of blue clusters being thrown out of the the main "body" of the galaxy and forming the beginning of one "antenna".

And the dandelion and "arc" image is of course lovely, although it reinforces the unfortunate misconception that the Sun is yellow - even dandelion yellow!

Ann

Ann wrote:
And the dandelion and "arc" image is of course lovely, although it reinforces the unfortunate misconception that the Sun is yellow - even dandelion yellow!

Ann

I didn't know (or knew as another flower's name) the name of that flower
Thanks for your comment Ann!

nuclearcat wrote: I didn't know (or knew as another flower's name) the name of that flower

I have a billion of these flowers in my yard, nuclearcat, and would love to have another name by which to refer to them; what is the other name you know them by? I hope it's something exotic and desirable-sounding so that I can drop that name into conversations with my turf-building neighbors so they (maybe) won't mind my exceedingly natural landscape!

The dandelions in my yard are unlike any in the yards of other houses in which I've lived. Here, they are like the ones in your picture, on a tall stem; I had never seen dandelions like this until I bought this house. (I also had never seen a camel cricket before I bought this house, and I certainly could have done without ever knowing what they are; I like the dandelions ever so much more than these bizarre spidery-looking crickets! Field crickets, I don't mind at all, unless they make it to the second floor of the house in the fall, wedge themselves behind a baseboard, and then sing all night. But I digress.) The dandelions of my childhood and previous houses grow low to the ground, on short, fat stems which are hollow and exude a lot of milky liquid when plucked. Those dandelions also wilt immediately, and though they are often a mother's first flower from her offspring, it is impossible to keep them even an hour, even in water. (So mothers keep these flowers in their hearts instead.)

I think a dandelion is a dandy substitute for the sun here, as when I am able to actually view the sun with mine own eyes, it is either yellow, orange, or red. If I am looking at it and see it as white, I am in trouble, indeed!

owlice wrote:I have a billion of these flowers in my yard, nuclearcat, and would love to have another name by which to refer to them; what is the other name you know them by? I hope it's something exotic and desirable-sounding so that I can drop that name into conversations with my turf-building neighbors so they (maybe) won't mind my exceedingly natural landscape!

Wow, a billion! I'd like to see that. <g> Here in the mountains, these are true wildflowers, and nobody would consider them a weed. But nobody has lawns here, either. If you like, you can call them taraxacum, which sounds a bit exotic.

The dandelions in my yard are unlike any in the yards of other houses in which I've lived. Here, they are like the ones in your picture, on a tall stem; I had never seen dandelions like this until I bought this house.

We have both tall and short dandelions. They are exactly the same species; how tall they grow depends partly on subtle genetics, but mainly on their growing conditions.

They were Emily Dickinson's favorite flower; she grew them in her garden and wrote a lovely poem about them:

The Dandelion's pallid tube
Astonishes the Grass,
And Winter instantly becomes
An infinite Alas—

The tube uplifts a signal Bud
And then a shouting Flower,—
The Proclamation of the Suns
That sepulture is o'er.

Both the leaves and flowers are quite nice in salads, too.

I also had never seen a camel cricket before I bought this house, and I certainly could have done without ever knowing what they are...

I guess you don't have cats? These little crickets provide them endless entertainment (not so entertaining for the crickets, though!)

I think a dandelion is a dandy substitute for the sun here, as when I am able to actually view the sun with mine own eyes, it is either yellow, orange, or red. If I am looking at it and see it as white, I am in trouble, indeed!

Indeed! And it isn't inaccurate; in a view like this, the Sun is yellow, although nowhere near as saturated as a dandelion.

Chris Peterson wrote: Wow, a billion! I'd like to see that. <g>

Yes, a billion! Maybe not all at the same time, however! <g>

Chris Peterson wrote:We have both tall and short dandelions. They are exactly the same species; how tall they grow depends partly on subtle genetics, but mainly on their growing conditions.

I grew up in this area, just a few miles from where I currently live. The short ones have a much fuller flower and a much fatter (hollow) stem; the tall ones aren't nearly so full, nor the flower so big, and the stems are spindly in comparison. The leaves are different, too, with those on the tall ones flat on the ground (trying to avoid the lawnmower, and doing a dandy job of it!) and a very dark green; I would not eat these. The leaves of the short dandelions stand up much like leaf lettuce, are a lighter green, and yes, are fine for salads or for cooking, though a bit bitter.

Chris Peterson wrote:I guess you don't have cats? These little crickets provide them endless entertainment (not so entertaining for the crickets, though!)

Oh, yes, I do indeed! Two of them now (plus three freeloading feral fluffies). My big cat, a three-legged, half-tailed Himalayan, is great about catching camel crickets and is praised lavishly when he does so. He makes sure to leave them where I will step on the crushed bodies, so I will know he caught and killed them. (He does this with hairballs, too: leaves them where I am sure to step on them, which I seem to do most often when I am barefoot and on my way to or from the bathroom in the middle of the night.) Except for the treating-people-as-prey thing he does, he's an exceedingly polite cat. Handsome, too, I think. A little too fond of holiday garland, though.

But this isn't naming the last picture, is it? Does anyone have any suggestions?

Chris Peterson wrote:Both the leaves and flowers are quite nice in salads, too.

Lots of vitamins and anti-oxidants. The leaves can be cooked like other "greens". And, of course, the flowers are used in dandelion wine. The dried roots can be used like chicory in coffee. (Yuk)

Indeed! And it isn't inaccurate; in a view like this, the Sun is yellow, although nowhere near as saturated as a dandelion.

I think you just like needling Ann.

Hi Owlice,

The "full size image" link to "Between Sagittarius, Ophiuchus and Scorpius" should be
http://deepskycolors.com/pics/astro/201 ... 52MRot.jpg (5000x2713 pixels)
not
http://deepskycolors.com/pics/astro/201 ... 52MRot.jpg (just 800x434 pixels)

Thanks,
Rogelio

Rogelio, the text "Click to view full size image" comes with the tag that constrains the linked image, and "full size" means the image the constrained display came from, not necessarily the largest file available. Even though the image display is constrained, the browser has to grab the (unconstrained) original image. Given a choice between having the browser grab an 800x434-pixel image and a 5000x2713-pixel image for thread display, I will choose the smaller image (the image size that is displayed on your webpage) and provide a link that can get people to the largest image.

I hope I've explained this well enough, but if I've just confused matters, please let me know; thanks!

Owlice - AAWWW, what a nice lookin Puddy Tat! And look at the firery orange eyes!! Perhaps a reflection of the one taking the picture

beyond wrote:Owlice - AAWWW, what a nice lookin Puddy Tat! And look at the firery orange eyes!! Perhaps a reflection of the one taking the picture

Thanks, beyond! The kid took the picture on Christmas morning; three guesses what the Santa Owlice had left under the tree for him!

Westerlund 2
http://www.robgendlerastropics.com/West ... T-ESO.html
Copyright and processing: Robert Gendler; image data from HLA and ESO

owlice wrote: I have a billion of these flowers in my yard, nuclearcat, and would love to have another name by which to refer to them; what is the other name you know them by? I hope it's something exotic and desirable-sounding so that I can drop that name into conversations with my turf-building neighbors so they (maybe) won't mind my exceedingly natural landscape!

No I mean I knew them wrongly as a kind of mums (Chrysanthemum)
Any way they are both member of same family (Asteraceae)

The Milky Way
http://www.altamiraobs.org.es/
Copyright: José Francisco Hernández

nuclearcat wrote: No I mean I knew them wrongly as a kind of mums (Chrysanthemum)
Any way they are both member of same family (Asteraceae)

Thanks, and oh, poo! I don't think I can get away with referring to them as mums, nor even asters, though they are of that family!!

owlice wrote:

beyond wrote:Owlice - AAWWW, what a nice lookin Puddy Tat! And look at the firery orange eyes!! Perhaps a reflection of the one taking the picture

Thanks, beyond! The kid took the picture on Christmas morning; three guesses what the Santa Owlice had left under the tree for him!

Alas!! It will take a lot more than three guesses. I can be so dumb about some things that seem so obvious to so many. But it still is a very nice looking Puddy Tat! Too bad it can't keep the orange pupils.

beyond wrote:Alas!! It will take a lot more than three guesses.

beyond, the camera!

Dandelion Halo
http://gaf.gokyuzu.org/img/2010-04-24.jpg
Copyright: M. Raşid Tuğral

Indeed! And it isn't inaccurate; in a view like this, the Sun is yellow, although nowhere near as saturated as a dandelion.

I think you just like needling Ann.

I think he does, too, but in this case he is right. In a picture like this the Sun would look yellow-white instead of white, precisely because much of the blue light it emits has been scattered by the atmosphere, making the sky blue and the Sun reddened, i.e. yellow-white.

I didn't know (or knew as another flower's name) the name of that flower
Thanks for your comment Ann!

You're welcome, Nuclearcat! In Swedish "dandelion" is "maskros". It is possible to think of this name as consisting of two words, "mask", which means "worm", and "ros" which means, obviously, "rose". So a dandelion is a "worm-rose". Yeeech.



Disgusting, eh? Although it is clearly the wrong flower!

Oh well, but in English this yellow weed is a dandy lion...



Ann

Ann, that sure is a "Dandy" lion and he's not yellow either! But he does kinda remind me of Teddy R. needing a Trim

owlice wrote:

beyond wrote:Alas!! It will take a lot more than three guesses.

beyond, the camera!

Ok owlice, whats beyond the camera besides "the kid?"

beyond wrote:Ok owlice, whats beyond the camera besides "the kid?"

If she had left the EXIF header for the image intact, you could have told her the make and model of her kid's present.

owlice wrote: [...] I hope I've explained this well enough, but if I've just confused matters, please let me know; thanks!

Understood Owlice. Thanks for the explanation!
I just felt bad having to shrink the original image from 18,000 pixels wide to 5,000 so as to keep it within a reasonable download time, so the "full size" link pointing to a 800x400 image felt a bit misleading but I understand what you mean. Thanks again!

Chris Peterson wrote:

beyond wrote:Ok owlice, whats beyond the camera besides "the kid?"

If she had left the EXIF header for the image intact, you could have told her the make and model of her kid's present.

Ok Chris, what's an EXIF header??