Comments on: Shuttle and ISS transit the Sun http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/ I am an astronomer, writer, and skeptic. I likes reality the way it is, and I aims to keep it that way. My real name is Phil Plait, and I run the Bad Astronomy blog. Tue, 06 Jan 2009 09:00:29 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.3.1 By: david http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-107164 david Wed, 30 Jul 2008 20:21:31 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-107164 jeez his nebula shots are amazing also jeez his nebula shots are amazing also

]]> By: marko http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-106940 marko Wed, 30 Jul 2008 07:44:26 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-106940 APOD has another image: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap080730.html -- viewing the shot with the Shuttle from September 2006 and the new picture with just the ISS side by side shows the progress in adding solar panels and modules. Just what are they doing with all that solar power and additional space? Far too little research is going on. APOD has another image: http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap080730.html — viewing the shot with the Shuttle from September 2006 and the new picture with just the ISS side by side shows the progress in adding solar panels and modules. Just what are they doing with all that solar power and additional space? Far too little research is going on.

]]> By: ABDUL QUDDUS http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20853 ABDUL QUDDUS Mon, 26 Nov 2007 11:20:47 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20853 Beuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutifull shot Beuuuuuuuuuuuuuuutifull shot

]]> By: Full-Frontal Skepticism » ISS and Atlantis visible in the sky tonight - check it out http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20852 Full-Frontal Skepticism » ISS and Atlantis visible in the sky tonight - check it out Tue, 19 Jun 2007 22:21:24 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20852 [...] The above picture was taken by astrophotographer Thierry Legault on September 17th, 2006 and was written about on Bad Astronomy. [...] […] The above picture was taken by astrophotographer Thierry Legault on September 17th, 2006 and was written about on Bad Astronomy. […]

]]> By: Elizabeth http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20841 Elizabeth Mon, 02 Oct 2006 15:27:29 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20841 Awesome! like you said it was a one (in the universe) time shot. You have a remarkable sence of timing, a fantastic amalgum of photography equipment and a very decerning eye. Was the camera "analog" or "digital" (old verses new school). Your "the Bad Astronomer" moniker fits that was a totally BAD**** picture. Good luck in any future endevors. Awesome! like you said it was a one (in the universe) time shot.
You have a remarkable sence of timing, a fantastic amalgum of photography equipment and a very decerning eye. Was the camera “analog” or “digital” (old verses new school). Your “the Bad Astronomer” moniker fits that was a totally BAD**** picture. Good luck in any future endevors.

]]> By: Allen Thomson http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20842 Allen Thomson Fri, 22 Sep 2006 13:56:07 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20842 ioresult Says: > Tim G: have you seen the exposure time? 1/8000 of a second! > Aren’t adaptive optics used to stabilize images for long exposures? So I’d guess adaptive optics in this case should be useless. Well, "not absolutely needed" is probably more like it than "useless." What we're dealing with here goes under the name of "short-exposure" imaging. The atmospheric turbulence that causes blurring (aka "seeing") is a statistical beast, and every once in a while, for a few milliseconds, the atmosphere in front of a telescope flattens out enough to allow images near the diffraction limit to be taken. So the basic trick (there are elaborations) is to take a lot of short-exposure images and choose the occasional sharp one. Depending on local turbulence conditions and the brightness of the target, the technique has been shown to work with telescopes having apertures up to a meter or a bit more. Ron Dantowitz pioneered the technique for satellite imaging in the unclassified world. See, e.g., http://www.hobbyspace.com/SatWatching/#SatPhotos about halfway down the page. Solar silhouettes are a variant that allow for *really* short exposures because the sun is, as we know, bright. (Fifteen years or so ago, I in a briefing where an official from a certain three-letter organization that's now housed in Chantilly, Va. became very unhappy when one of my colleagues discussed the possible applications of short-exposure solar and lunar silhouette imaging of satellites.) ioresult
Says:

> Tim G: have you seen the exposure time? 1/8000 of a second!

> Aren’t adaptive optics used to stabilize images for long exposures? So I’d guess adaptive optics in this case should be useless.

Well, “not absolutely needed” is probably more like it than “useless.” What we’re dealing with here goes under the name of “short-exposure” imaging. The atmospheric turbulence that causes blurring (aka “seeing”) is a statistical beast, and every once in a while, for a few milliseconds, the atmosphere in front of a telescope flattens out enough to allow images near the diffraction limit to be taken. So the basic trick (there are elaborations) is to take a lot of short-exposure images and choose the occasional sharp one. Depending on local turbulence conditions and the brightness of the target, the technique has been shown to work with telescopes having apertures up to a meter or a bit more.

Ron Dantowitz pioneered the technique for satellite imaging in the unclassified world. See, e.g., http://www.hobbyspace.com/SatWatching/#SatPhotos about halfway down the page. Solar silhouettes are a variant that allow for *really* short exposures because the sun is, as we know, bright.

(Fifteen years or so ago, I in a briefing where an official from a certain three-letter organization that’s now housed in Chantilly, Va. became very unhappy when one of my colleagues discussed the possible applications of short-exposure solar and lunar silhouette imaging of satellites.)

]]> By: mandarine http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20837 mandarine Fri, 22 Sep 2006 03:06:35 +0000 http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2006/09/20/shuttle-and-iss-transit-the-sun/#comment-20837 Jack H: maybe they meant 'for the first time in official history of space observation'. Or maybe they meant 'for the first time in the history of european space observation'. Or maybe they were so glad they got that shot that they forgot to do their homework beforehand. Thanks for the info. Jack H: maybe they meant ‘for the first time in official history of space observation’. Or maybe they meant ‘for the first time in the history of european space observation’. Or maybe they were so glad they got that shot that they forgot to do their homework beforehand.
Thanks for the info.

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