first real pics

[xcoupeb]

gday, 1st time poster but have been on the forum gathering lots of info for a while. took my first real shots last night of orion through 80mm refractor with 5d mark 2 on an eq6 i havent got a remote for the camera yet so i could only take 30 sec shots and lots of playing with different iso.
i think i have a satellite in the shots as you may see, but i thought these moved quick?

so what do you all think? i think the focus might be slightly off a bit

cheers

[that_guy]

WOW!!! Only a 30sec exposure but better than my 60 sec exposures :O that 5d must be something...

[steve000]

yea satelites move a lot faster than that.. i have no idea what it is.. what time did you take these.

ALSO legendary pics awesome for 1st time. whats your hardware?

[xcoupeb]

thanks for the compliments, i took these around 10:30 along with others that were a bit too bright with a higher iso. the satellite? moved right through the middle of the nebula and i guess maybe all up 2-3 minutes to come in frame and then out. i was using dslr remote pro for the first time so it all took a long time to work out. i have lots to learn!!!

[h0ughy]

looks like your on your way - enjoy the astrophoto journey

[TerminallyTired]

Nice widefield. :thumbsup:

I'd say it could very well be a satellite in an eliptical orbit, at Apogee some of the more extreme examples move quite slowly.

L8r

TT

[mithrandir]

The current version of Stellarium loads satellites so you could try that to see if it can identify your object. I can't find any sats that passed by M42 on Dec 22 at around 22:30 AEST, but without knowing your location, I can't make allowances for the different parallax.

For my location Heavens Above has 32 sats that were visible between 22:00 and 23:00, so it is quite possible it was a sat.

[xcoupeb]

thanks for taking the time to look into it, im in melbourne and i checked my camera and the shots were taken at 10:16. I guess being new to all of this im wondering is this something unique or just everyday run of the mill? I've seen photos before of satellites passing through shots but they seem to leave a line across the whole image ie moving quite fast, i havent seen anything slow moving before that only leaves a tiny line in a 30sec shot

[TerminallyTired]

Heavens Above and Stellarium only has something like 200 or so of the brightest satellites.

I performed a search for objects passing near M42 from 21:00 on the 22nd through to 00:30 on the 23rd AEST and came up with a list of 6 objects that pass through Orion at something close to the right speed.

GPS BIIR-07 (PRN 18) - operational GPS satellite - NORAD ID: 26690
GPS BIIA-10 (PRN 32) - operational GPS satellite - NORAD ID: 20959
GPS BIIR-04 (PRN 20) - operational GOS satellite - NORAD ID: 26360
COSMOS 2458 (734) - operational Glonass satellite (Russian GPS) - NORAD ID: 36113
AMC-14 - Geostationary US TV Satellite - NORAD ID: 32708
STRV 1A - UK Military Payload, function unkown - NORAD ID: 23125

The last two in the list have the right trajectory through the constellation but arrive much later than 22:16, the time denoted by your camera.

Without more accurate information on your location and the time of the shots its difficult to confirm any of these. Can you confirm that your camera is set to AEST?

My search included 1000 or so satellites, in reality there is something like 30,000 objects 1 inch or larger, that are in orbit around the Earth and tracked by NORAD. You used to be able to get element sets on almost all of them. Unfortunately since 911 paranoia has swept through the US DoD and they no longer publish large element sets.

I guess they do have a point as it makes it too easy to identify an observation as unknown, track it to derive it's orbital characteristics and predict it's location. It used to be quite easy to find classified military payloads as a result (the brighter ones at least). Now there are so many unknowns its much more difficult to track any given one.

Given how close Orion is to the Clarke belt and the speed at which your satellite was moving I would say its most likely to be a largish Geostationary unit that is no longer functional and is drifting though the graveyard. Without more information on the location and time of your shots and comprehensive elsets, its pretty difficult to say exactly which one.

L8r

TT

[kinetic]

As a comparison, here is a shot I took a few nights ago (22Dec)
of a similar field with an 80mm refractor and DSLR.
I have noted the times when the exposures were saved on HD.
These are 3 x 30 sec exposures , separated by 10 sec intervals and show
similar movement rate of a satellite. I'm not saying at all it is the same sat,
only an example of a typical drift rate.
A low orbit polar type sat would move much faster than this so my
guess would be a similar one to Jason's.....a satellite further out
(but not as far out as geostationarys- these move much slower and I have
photographed them) and probably in it's closest phase of an elliptical
orbit....

BTW, great shot! Look forward to seeing some more!:thumbsup:

Steve

[xcoupeb]

had another go last night think i got a lot more detail this time

[rcheshire]

It's a nice image - a great start - tracking is enviable, although the core of M42 is getting to bright and detail is being lost. It's difficult to control without applying the correct processing techniques.

Here's a short tutorial that may be of help. Your image has more potential than the one in the tutorial.

http://www.astropix.com/HTML/BEGINNER/M42HDR.HTM

[TerminallyTired]

With a elsets for over 14,500 objects and your precise location I have ID'd your bird.

COSMOS 1675 - Russian Military Payload (See Below) - NORAD ID: 15952

NORAD ID: 15952
Int'l Code: 1985-071A
Perigee: 1,353.5 km
Apogee: 26,355.8 km
Inclination: 65.9°
Period: 477.1 min
Semi major axis: 20,225.7 km
Launch date: August 12, 1985
Source: Commonwealth of Independent States (former USSR) (CIS)

Cosmos 1675 was a Soviet missile early warning satellite launched from the Plesetsk cosmodrome aboard a Molniya rocket. It replaced Cosmos 1581 as part of the Oko constellation of satellites and covered the plane 8 - 195 degree longitude of ascending node.

When it passed through the middle of the M42 Nebula, shortly after your photos were taken, it was approximately 25151.4km from you. I have attached an image of the satellite real up close and personal. :)

Oko satellites make up a constellation known in Russia as SPRN (a Russian abbreviation of "Satellite for Warning on Rocket Attack"). The network, which also includes dedicated ground control, is designed to detect and track launches of ballistic missiles around the world. Spacecraft in the system use sensitive telescopes to detect infrared radiation emitted by the exhaust of rocket engines. By tracking the hot plume of the rocket, the satellite can determine the trajectory of the missile.

L8r

TT

[xcoupeb]

Jason you are an absolute legend! Thankyou very much for taking the time to look into this mystery for me. Now i can tell people when i show them the photo exactly which satellite it is! As well as having to explain what the big bright coloured thing is in the middle!!:rofl:

[TerminallyTired]

No problem Xcoupeb, you are most welcome.

Steve your sat is:

CZ-3C R/B - Chinese Long March Rocket Body - Norad ID: 36288

NORAD ID: 36288
Int'l Code: 2010-001B
Perigee: 247.8 km
Apogee: 35,319.0 km
Inclination: 19.7°
Period: 622.7 min
Semi major axis: 24,154.4 km
Launch date: January 16, 2010
Source: People's Republic of China (PRC)

This is a long march rocket body left over from the launch of Beidou G3.

BEIDOU G3 is the third member of the second-generation Beidou constellation. Two spacecraft were launched to medium Earth orbit and geosynchronous orbit in 2007 and 2009, respectively. BEIDOU G3 has been placed on a geosynchronous orbit.

Beidou 3 is also known as Compass G1. A Chinese navigation satellite intended to form part of an eventual system, also known as Compass, composed of 35 satellites in geostationary and medium altitude orbits. Beidou 3 was launched by a Long March 3C rocket from Xichang at 16:12 UT on 16 January 2010.

The Compass system is expected to be operational for Asian-Pacific users by 2012 and to global users by 2020. The positional accuracy for civilian users is expected to be about 10 m.

The Rocket Body itself is in a highly elliptical orbit. When you took your photos your range to the satellite was approximately 27108km.

I have attached a picture of the entire rocket assembly. Your sat will be the 3rd stage, 3m in diameter and 12m long. It is the stage just below the bulbous payload fairing in the photo. The entire rocket assembly pictured is 54m in length.

L8r

TT

[kinetic]

27,000k...wow...
Thanks Jason for the detective work.

My computer time might have been out by +/-5 sec at most.
I try to make sure that the dome capture PC has the most accurate
clock of all the PCs in this house. I try to sync it often.

Steve

[TerminallyTired]

No trouble at all for a fellow Saganist (secular humanist). :thumbsup:

L8r

TT