Awesome pictures

Hi everyone,

As I was surfing the Web, I stumbled upon these pictures and
I tough some of you could be interested.

Here's the link:

Universe pictures

Have a nice day,

Fred

[edit on 1-6-2007 by fmoriss]

Nothing beats this:



Sagittarius A visible without the aid of a telescope or binoculars FTW!

[edit on 1-6-2007 by ZikhaN]

Oh wow ZikhaN that picture is gorgeous!

Originally posted by ZikhaN
Nothing beats this:

Wow how was this picture taken? I wish I could see a sky like that when i look up at night! Any idea how this is done?

Originally posted by AcesInTheHole
Wow how was this picture taken? I wish I could see a sky like that when i look up at night! Any idea how this is done?

Yep. First of all, you have to be in a place with very little lights to no lights at all. Second, it has to be somewhere between the middle of July and the beginning of August. Maybe a little before that even, I'm not 100% sure. And thirdly, you need to have a bit of luck.

I think you'll have to find a good spot in the middle of nowhere, somewhere in the middle of July, and you'll have to check back every night for as long as you can stand it. And if you're lucky, you'll see the whole middle of our galaxy. Either you'll be able to see it with the naked eye, if not, just use a pair of binoculars.

I'm definitely going to try it during my trip to the north of Sweden in July.

These are some good tips from a website:

In mid of July Sagittarius culminates at about 23:00 LT (11:00 pm). The declination of the constellation borders ranges from -45 to -12 degrees. Brightest star is Kaus Australis, epsilon Sgr, seen at the lower right of the tea pot (m(v)=1.8 mag).

The galactic center lies in the lower half at the right image border. Therefore a lot of galactic deep sky objects join the field of Sagittarius. Most of them are listed in the famous Messier catalogue and can be found well with a pair of binoculars or even by naked eye (under very good sky conditions).

Here is another photo of how it looks:



[edit on 1-6-2007 by ZikhaN]

Is it any wonder ancient humanity gazed up in wonderment at the sky?

Wow ZikhaN.....I mean wow....unbelievable pictures...talking about something that take your breath!

Those are some really nice photos!

It also looks as if the photographer was using a clock drive of some sort.
Something to track the sky as it moves. you can see it in the second photo especially. All of the ground based objects have some motion blur.
Probably in the range of the few minutes exposure.

This is the kind of thing ancient people saw every night. Sometimes I think we aren't even human compared to them.

Originally posted by spacedoubt
Those are some really nice photos!

It also looks as if the photographer was using a clock drive of some sort.
Something to track the sky as it moves. you can see it in the second photo especially. All of the ground based objects have some motion blur.
Probably in the range of the few minutes exposure.

Yeah exactly. They probably moved the camera according to Earth's rotation. Because if not the ground based objects would be clear. I wonder what it would have looked like if they didn't use that method though.

I'm hoping you're able to view it just like in the photo with the naked eye.

yes, the second picture was definitely taken using a longer exposure than you would normally need to take a photo of the family round the table at Christmas.

If you look carefully at the right edge of the picture about half way up, then trace a line up to about three quarters of the way up on the left side you will notice a series of tiny pink dots in a near perfect straight line; this indicates a 'near-Earth' object crossing the field of view (such as a satellite, the ISS or an aeroplane) during the course of the exposure. This, along with the blurred objects on the ground, is solid proof of an exposure of about 5 - 10 minutes (a 'best estimate' based upon my own experience, you'd need to ask the photographer exactly how long he set it at!). The first picture of the Sagittarius cluster is a shorter exposure (probably about 2 - 3 minutes) but still utterly spectacular.

I will try to find some links to where you can learn more about this, but you are a resourceful bunch so no doubt I'll be beaten to it

Oh, and no matter how dark the night is, and how little artificial light is around, you will never see it like this with the naked eye. It will still be fairly spectacular, but not as jaw-dropping as that second picture. That is a great piece of photography.

Yeah exactly. They probably moved the camera according to Earth's rotation. Because if not the ground based objects would be clear. I wonder what it would have looked like if they didn't use that method though.

you need to move the camera at 15 degrees per hour to keep the stars from rotating around a center point. if you point a camera at the north star and do a long exposure all the other stars will rotate around it. my friend from college used to take some of the most amazing sky long exposures ive ever seen. ill dig up the files on my home computer tonight and scan them im tomorrow.

hannibal is of course right, you would never see anything in the sky with suck colours no matter how dark it is, your eyes just arnt sensitive enough, of course if your lucky some people with the aid of binoculars or a telescope can pick out colour in things like nebula etc. usually green or blue. I can pick up a hint of green in the Orion nebula which looks great btw.

Here's one of my favorites. The link will have to do cause its a panoramic photo.

antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov...

Originally posted by hannibal the cannibal
Oh, and no matter how dark the night is, and how little artificial light is around, you will never see it like this with the naked eye. It will still be fairly spectacular, but not as jaw-dropping as that second picture. That is a great piece of photography.

But what about this though?

In mid of July Sagittarius culminates at about 23:00 LT (11:00 pm). The declination of the constellation borders ranges from -45 to -12 degrees. Brightest star is Kaus Australis, epsilon Sgr, seen at the lower right of the tea pot (m(v)=1.8 mag).

The galactic center lies in the lower half at the right image border. Therefore a lot of galactic deep sky objects join the field of Sagittarius. Most of them are listed in the famous Messier catalogue and can be found well with a pair of binoculars or even by naked eye (under very good sky conditions).

I know that it doesn't say anything about you being able to view Sagittarius A just like in the photo, but still. It should be something close to it.

[edit on 7-6-2007 by ZikhaN]

This is what it would look like if you didn't have some kind of rotating device:



You can see that the tree is in focus, but the deep sky isn't.

Here's another proof/hint that you should be able to view our galaxy with the naked eye:


Click here

The Milky Way has its brightest parts of the northern hemisphere in this field of the sky. A number of uncountable stars of our own galaxy builds up this fuzzy appearance to the naked eye. If you watch carefully you will recognize structures and dark bands in the Milky Way. From Cygnus southwards lies the so called "Great Rift", a dark band of interstellar dust that is absorbing light of the stars behind.

It should look just about the same. It'll just appear a little more fuzzy since our eyes aren't sensetive enough.

[edit on 24-6-2007 by ZikhaN]

Originally posted by ZikhaN
Here's another proof/hint that you should be able to view our galaxy with the naked eye:

Of course you can see our galaxy, even in bad conditions (light pollution) you can make out our galaxy, but there is no way you will see the galaxy in such colour, shads of blank and white possibly (if you have good eye sight) greens and blues with the right optics but not any other colours.

I can tell you the clearest skies I seen were in the desert outside Tonopah Nevada away from any light source. It is absolutely breathtaking to say the least. Their is no color like the pictures seem to suggest but you can see the stars and the galaxy very clear.

Originally posted by Edn

Originally posted by ZikhaN
Here's another proof/hint that you should be able to view our galaxy with the naked eye:

Of course you can see our galaxy, even in bad conditions (light pollution) you can make out our galaxy, but there is no way you will see the galaxy in such colour, shads of blank and white possibly (if you have good eye sight) greens and blues with the right optics but not any other colours.

I guess you're right. Cameras can obviously absorb a lot more light, especially if you hold down the button for a long time to let it absorb for a long time.

I guess our eyes aren't sensetive enough to light. But like the other guy said, it should still look really cool as long as you're away from the light, during good sky conditions, and at the right time. Like say around July.

[edit on 27-6-2007 by ZikhaN]