Saturn 2003/12/29
Saturn Image Information
- Date: 2003.12.29 23:33 PST
- South pole is at the top
- This image was taken when Saturn was two days from opposition on 2003.12.31. As a result the planet shadow on the rings is in directly behind the planet as seen from our view point on Earth.
See Saturn 2003-2004 Opposition on how the shadow has moved since September.
- This is my first image to see four cloud bands on Saturn.
- The planet is showing through the Cassini division at the bottom the image.
- Above average seeing
- Images taken from driveway
Photo Information
- CAMERA: Philips PCVC740K ToUcam PRO web camera
- SHUTTER: 1/25sec
- GAIN: 25/53
- FPS: 10
- IMAGES: 1400 taken, 512 stacked
- COLOR BALANCE: Outdoor, blue +1 click
- AVI File: 031229Saturn25g30r0b1n16.avi
- FILTER: Sirius Optics Near Infrared blocking filter
Equipment
- Telescope: Orion Atlas 10 reflector (254 mm aperture,
f/4.7 focal ratio, 1200 mm focal length)
- Barlow: Tele Vue 5x Powermate (effective f/23.5 focal ratio, 6000 mm focal length)
- Finder: Mounted on top of a Atlas 10 is an Orion ShortTube 80 mm aperture rich-field refractor
(f/5 focal ratio, 400 mm focal length) which is used as a finder.
- Focuser: JMI NGF-S Motofocus with DRO (Digital Read Out)
- Telescope Mount: Losmandy G-11 mount
Imaging Processing
- Cor Berrevoets Registax Version 2.1.14.0 beta, align, select, stack and process multiple images
- Adobe Potoshop Version CS, unsharp mask, curves, resize, crop and convert to JPG
Use Test patterns to calibrate monitor brightness, contrast, height and width
© 1998-2003 David Haworth