Moon Size Anomaly in Cassini's Photograph of Earth

Officially the circumference of Moon is about 1/4 that of Earth. Assuming Moon has similar albedo/reflectivity as Earth, it should appear no larger than 1/4 the size of Earth when seen from 1.4 billion km away. However since Earth has much higher reflectivity, the Moon really has no business being half the size of Earth as seen from Saturn.


Original (PIA17170)




Contrast and Smoothed




www.jpl.nasa.gov... has some details on image processing performed on the original image by NASA. It says they increased the brightness of the Moon. Okay, but to make it appear bigger than half the size of Earth from 1.5bn km away? I think that makes the Cassini imaging team look less credible than Spaceballs.

I woke up late today. It MUST have been some government op that made me sleep late. I was probably a victim of mind control / hypnotic possession via the good old NSA. Then I went to brush my teeth and cut my gums, they bled, therefore the toothbrush bristle manufacturer is poisoning the bristles and making people have the poison enter the bloodstream. Later I slipped on the kitchen floor convincing me the wood wax manufacturer wants the entire population to slip and die.



Sound crazy? This is what you sound like..

In those pictures it looks to me as if the moon is roughly 1/4 the size of earth.

reply to post by PINGi14


From your link

Both Earth and the moon have been increased in brightness for easy visibility; in addition, brightness of the moon has been increased relative to the Earth, and the brightness of the E ring has been increased as well.

Now, if they say, disappeared the raw images and only released these, I might be more eager to listen to your issues, but they haven't. You can go look at the raw unprocessed ones all you want. I don't get what the problem is?

You wouldn't see that with the human eye, they use composites and filters to achieve pleasant images.

Are you going to complain that some of the galaxies we have pictures of don't look that way to the human eye?

The size will look different depending on it's position in orbit from where one is looking, simple as that. Nothing out of the ordinary here.

reply to post by PINGi14

Look at raw image...

Linky

What were you saying?

reply to post by PINGi14


I removed the sun glare from the picture..







happy now ?

They also had this which looks more accurate in terms of Moon size



In my minds eye, the Moon was always proportionately closer to the Earth.

From 900 million miles away I;d have thought the moon would be indivisible from the Earth?

Although we have some good data on Earth like planets in other solar systems, I dont think anyone knows about Earth like planets with moons.

The Moon is so important to Earth and when pictured at this distance, it makes me wonder even in a universe of billions; how many planets could be so lucky to have such a beneficial nearest object.

reply to post by Jukiodone

The Moon is so important to Earth and when pictured at this distance, it makes me wonder even in a universe of billions; how many planets could be so lucky to have such a beneficial nearest object.

Almost all of the planets in our solar system have them, many planets we've discovered outside of our little 'burb also appear to have them. Not always as big, and usually more than 1.

When you look at that picture, and realize that the moon is responsible for tides, something that basically makes the planet work, you kinda have to feel pretty small.... and lucky.

Although the scale doesn't appear to be correct I would still contribute the discrepency on reflection.

We can verify the actual scale of the moon during solar eclipses correct? Unless we are being lied to about the distance of the moon from us or us from the sun.

That would indeed be a conspiracy eh? Anyone got a really long ruler?

So what are we trying to sayere anyway? That NASA has been lying to us about the size of our moon?

It's the degree of image manipulation that I don't agree with. When they make the Moon half the size of Earth as seen from Saturn by manipulating brightness for no apparent reason other than to look pretty, it makes them look less like an organization rooted in science and more like CGI studios cranking out beautiful space images.

Originally posted by Spacespider
reply to post by PINGi14

 

I removed the sun glare from the picture..

happy now ?

edit on 23-7-2013 by Spacespider because: (no reason given)

I don't see your point. It was already established the Moon was much smaller and darker compared to Earth as shown by the raw image. The issue is that NASA seems to manipulate photos with healthy disregard of scientific accuracy if it means they can show pretty pictures to public. That's what the movie studios are for imo.

On the contrary, the raw picture shows it as you would see it if you where there.
The glare the makes the moon appear larger is the force of nature, or should I say sun

They gave us the real deal, I don't see what you mean..

I on the other hand made some tweaks to remove the natural glare to show you the moon is the right size

reply to post by Spacespider


They didn't give us the real deal. The glare you speak of, I am assuming you are talking about reflectivity. While Moon does reflect light from the sun, it really shouldn't make it bigger in relation to Earth. That's because Earth can reflect sunlight too, and at much higher level. That means, at distances like 1.5bn kilometers, moon should appear even smaller(darker) than actual, which is 1/4 of Earth.

Originally posted by PINGi14
It's the degree of image manipulation that I don't agree with. When they make the Moon half the size of Earth as seen from Saturn by manipulating brightness for no apparent reason other than to look pretty, it makes them look less like an organization rooted in science and more like CGI studios cranking out beautiful space images.

Or it shows that people look at picture and don't read whats attached.

So you have an issue with the image processing for public releases. That's all there is to it. It's not about NASA trying to hide something, or giving a false representation of something, as the raw files are available to the public and you're welcome to examine them, as well as other technical data in the PDS archives.

You're not happy because they made the Moon brighter (and hence slightly bigger), which as you say is un-scientific. In a way, you're right, but I don't think any scientists will be basing their views and their theories on prettied-up NASA images in public releases. They will look at the raw data, and I suggest you do too.

Think of NASA's public releases as ads for McDonalds. The real burger will never look as good as in pictures or videos.

Here is a raw Cassini's photograph of Earth: saturn.jpl.nasa.gov...

You can find some more here saturn.jpl.nasa.gov... if you select target EARTH and search for newest images.

I don't see why there are complaints about some sort of scientific inaccuracy over a picture that was neither a scientific experiment nor collecting any scientific data.

The point of the photograph was to produce a picrture of Earth from Saturn when the two were in a good position for that to happen. This they did. They also made it a better picture of Earth from Saturn. Weirdly, considering we have a moon that orbits us, you could see the moon as well. Who'd have thought it.

There is a massive difference between enhancing an image and faking something.

Originally posted by PINGi14
It's the degree of image manipulation that I don't agree with. When they make the Moon half the size of Earth as seen from Saturn by manipulating brightness for no apparent reason other than to look pretty, it makes them look less like an organization rooted in science and more like CGI studios cranking out beautiful space images.

No all it means is YOU don't understand digital imaging and like many on here YOU automatically think the worst of NASA because YOU want to see a conspiracy in it.

Originally posted by wmd_2008

Originally posted by PINGi14
It's the degree of image manipulation that I don't agree with. When they make the Moon half the size of Earth as seen from Saturn by manipulating brightness for no apparent reason other than to look pretty, it makes them look less like an organization rooted in science and more like CGI studios cranking out beautiful space images.

No all it means is YOU don't understand digital imaging and like many on here YOU automatically think the worst of NASA because YOU want to see a conspiracy in it.

Speak for yourself my friend. At no point did I bring up any conspiracy related explanation for NASA enlarging the size of the Moon in the referenced image. I simply pointed out that the size of the Moon in relation to Earth was scientificaly inccurate using actual factual data for size of Earth vs Moon and their known difference in reflectivity.

I also included in the OP how the Moon came to be larger than it should be in the picture by applying some unmentioned degree of brightness increase as explained by NASA. I guess it's possible to figure out exactly how much of MoonKs brightness they cranked up using math but the fact Moon has become half the size of Earth as seen from 1.4 billion km away remains in defiance of known physical principles.

I stated pretty clearly my reason for dissatisfaction with this scientific inaccuracy stemming from excessive photo manipulation by the Cassini imaging team more than once in this thread. However since you brought up conspiracy, I'd be happy to hear what kind of conspiracy have you got in mind, please elaborate.

reply to post by PINGi14


Here are some quotes for YOU

The Earth will appear to be just a pixel

Both Earth and the moon have been increased in brightness for easy visibility

The illuminated areas of neither Earth nor the moon are resolved here. Consequently, the size of each "dot" is the same size that a point of light of comparable brightness would have in the narrow angle camera

The Earth at that distance and due to the resolution of the camera system is a pixel across the Moon would be a fraction that's why brightness etc has to be increased you are trying to make the proverbial mountain out of a mole hill.

What exactly were you expecting, maybe learning a bit more about digital imaging and the problems trying to do what they did above would be advised.