UPDATED Animation of Pallas passing M42

[StephenM]

Hi all,

Here is a little 2-frame animation of minor planet 2 Pallas passing near M42. It's made up of images taken over the last 2 nights using a tripod-mounted K100d and 70-300mm lens using 20 sec exposures at 5/5.6 and 800iso. Pallas can be seen to the left of the dates. I find it interesting to see how far these asteroids move in 24hrs. Hope you like it.

Cheers,
Stephen

[matt]

Nice work Stephen:thumbsup:

That's quite a fair bit of trailing for 20 secs. Quite surprising, but I'm not a long exp photographer so I wouldn't know what to expect.

[StephenM]

Thanks Matt!

I forgot to mention that the images are cropped substantially - hence the long trails.

Cheers,
Stephen

[[1ponders]]

Nicely done Steven. Good pickup for 20 sec.

Hi Matt, divide 700 by the focal length of the lens/scope. That will give you the number of second you can go for without trailing near 0° Dec. Nearer the pole divide 1000 by the focal length. There's some complicated formula that will work it out for each degree dec but the 700 and 1000 rule and estimated in between works pretty well. :thumbsup:

[jjjnettie]

:thumbsup:
Nice one Steven.

[Screwdriverone]

Nice work Stephen!

That paid off well, although, there seems to be a smudge in the bottom right corner?.....................

:lol:

Jeez I am funny, seriously! :rofl:

Cheers

Chris

[h0ughy]

well done mate

[StephenM]

Thanks Paul, Jeanette, Chris and David. This is only the second asteroid I've tracked down, and it was quite a fun little project!

Cheers,
Stephen

[StephenM]

Hi all,

Here is a link to a larger animation showing the movement of Pallas over 4 nights this week. Not in the same league as the animations done by Ash and Dennis, but I'm happy with the result. Note: 1.1 mg file.

http://i307.photobucket.com/albums/nn311/stephenmudge/IMGP0057_4-frames-cropped.gif

Thanks for looking.

Cheers,
Stephen

[Ric]

Well done Stephen, they are great animations.

Cheers

[Inmykombi]

Well done there Stephen.

I guess lots of patience is needed to track these down and image them.

Keep up the good work and nice animations.

Geoffro.

[StephenM]

Thanks very much Ric and Geoff!

Cheers,
Stephen