Archimedes, Aristillus, Cassini Mosaic, Apollo 15 landing

iceman (Mike) · #1 27-10-2006, 07:39 AM

Hi guys.

This is a mosaic made from avi's captured a month ago, on the 30th September 2006 in fairly average seeing. Due to the seeing, I could only use a 2x barlow so I captured a wider area and made this mosaic.

It shows the Apollo 15 landing area, too.

The mosaic is the result of 5 avi's, probably using approx 8 alignment points each. Processed in registax, mild wavelets, combined in photoshop and high-pass filter/USM/levels adjustment.

The attached version is saved at 60% quality to get it under 150k, please click the link below for the full version:
Non-compressed version (300k jpeg)

Thanks for looking.

Lester · #2 27-10-2006, 07:45 AM

Excellent Mike.

Dennis · #3 27-10-2006, 07:46 AM

Hi Mike

An excellent mosaic with heaps of interesting objects and terrain to browse. I especially enjoy these images when they also cover and describe lunar missions that have landed and explored there.

Apollo 15 was the 1st Apollo mission that used a motorised vehicle as opposed to the hand cart of Apollo 14!

Cheers

Dennis

[1ponders] (Paul) · #4 27-10-2006, 07:48 AM

Cracker Mike

Great detail.

iceman (Mike) · #5 28-10-2006, 06:24 AM

Thanks guys

At the time I didn't realise it was the Apollo 15 landing area

It wasn't until I was id'ing the features in VMA that I saw it

davidpretorius · #6 28-10-2006, 08:19 AM

Awesome.
Your lunar compositions are fantastic!

RB (Andrew) · #7 28-10-2006, 11:30 AM

Fantastic Mike, as always.
And I love how you've included the landing area.

ving (David) · #8 28-10-2006, 06:07 PM

great pic. i wonder if they intended to land so close to that mountain range?

Astroman (Andrew Wall) · #9 28-10-2006, 09:34 PM

Amazing how the landing sites come up in red and pink, must be the angle of the sun at the time or something..

Nice image Mike.

andrew · #10 29-10-2006, 12:49 PM

Lovely image mate

seeker372011 (Narayan) · #11 29-10-2006, 06:45 PM

as always Mike your lunar images never fail to inspire awe

Lee · #12 29-10-2006, 07:20 PM

Awesome stuff Mike..... won't be long and you'll be showing us Neil's footprints!

rmcpb (Rob) · #13 29-10-2006, 08:16 PM

Great photo Mike.

Cheers

iceman (Mike) · #14 30-10-2006, 06:44 AM

Thanks guys, appreciate the kind words.

noelo · #15 30-10-2006, 04:05 PM

great image, I wonder how big a scope it would require to actually resolve the
actual hardware on the moon....

Any idea what the scale is on the image ?

Noel

Lee · #16 30-10-2006, 05:20 PM

I don't know, your average spotting scope on a hill in New Mexico would do it wouldn't it..... conspiracy theorists of the world unite!

Really - you'd need some sort of spy satellite orbiting the moon I think - I doubt any size scope on earth would do it..... and I think if Hubble could do it we'd have seen those images by now.....

iceman (Mike) · #17 31-10-2006, 06:37 AM

Thanks for the comments.

Noel, this image isn't particularly hi-res, especially when you compare it with a hi-res version I took the next night

See here

I haven't worked out the effective resolution of my hi-res imaging train, but a few people have asked so I guess I should sit down and do it.

No earth-bound telescope, or even hubble, can resolve the hardware on the moon. We'd need a resolution of 10 metres to see it, maybe a little less at a low sun angle if the shadow is cast a long way.

Apparently the new 50metre binocular telescope being built will be able to resolve it!

netwolf · #18 31-10-2006, 09:09 AM

Great photo Mike. Is that red dot the American Flag?

BTW could the site not be resolved into more detail using the satellite (Dont recall the name) around the Moon which they are using to map the Moon.

Regards