Daily Image

07-10-2011
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Jupiter with 16 inch telescope

Submitter: Rik ter Horst
Description: What happens if you have a good 16 inch telescope, two fanatical amateur astronomers, good seeing, a lot of fun and some hot cups of tea? This image was taken last saturday from Ewer (Drenthe, NL), virtually at sea level, but under very good conditions, by Emil Kraaikamp and Rik ter Horst. It shows details near the theoretical diffraction limit (i.e. the best possible resolution) of the home-made 16 inch (40 cm) telescope.

Jupiter was captured with a "lucky imaging" technique that selects only the best of many short (<< 1 sec) exposures, and adds them after correcting for slight position shifts. This greatly reduces the effects of turbulence in the atmosphere, even though we really had very steady conditions to start with.

Ganymede, the largest Jovian moon was imaged as well, and also shows quite some detail. It is compared here with a simulated NASA image for the same orientation. Can you guess which is which?

The images are taken with a monochrome Basler Ace camera and Astronomik RGB filters for the Jupiter image and processing is done by Emil with software he wrote himself (Autostakkert!) and Photoshop. It was fun and we're both very happy with this result! (editor's note: And I am quite impressed as well)
Copyright: emil kraaikamp/rik ter horst
 
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