Hi all
I'd been looking forward to this busy night on Jupiter for over a week and was lucky enough to wake to clear skies and above average seeing. Unfortunately though, I'd only captured 3 runs before blanket cloud put an early end to the session. Very disappointing, as I had a feeling the seeing would've improved as Jupiter increased in altitude. I woke again for work at 5am to clear skies, but I'll tell myself that it only cleared a few minutes earlier. It's less depressing that way.
In this image, the GRS + LRS and new red spot have just rotated into view, Europa is casting a shadow near Ganymede which is in transit, and Io is heading back towards Jupiter soon to be eclipsed by Jupiter's shadow. In the NNTZ, the little red spot has a white oval approaching it that may merge (noted by John Rogers in one of Tomio's recent images).
Regarding my imaging, I've also solved the problem I was having with lack of light - I washed both mirrors of my 12" newt on the weekend which had a dramatic effect and allowed me to capture at 30fps with a full histogram (in green especially). Amazing how much of a haze had built up on the mirrors after months of dewey nights. I also took the opportunity to cut a trap-door in the tube down near the mirror, to help me de-fog the mirror when I start losing transparency in future.
Anyway, attached is the image and also a simulation showing Ganymede from both the NASA Solar System Simulator and Starry Night Pro. It shows very well correlated albedo features with my image of Ganymede in transit.
A short 3-frame animation of the session can be downloaded here:
Jupiter animation (350k gif)
Link to the image:
A busy night on Jupiter
Thanks for looking. Comments welcome.
A busy Jupiter - GRS, Europa + shadow, Ganymede, Io + animation - 26th May
I can see the seeing improve in your animation too...damn the clouds
