Comments on: Jupiter and Ganymede in exquisite detail

By: zAmboni

zAmboni — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 16:36:37 +0000

Scott: that Ring like feature is called Oval BA, or also referred to as Red Spot Jr.

A couple of things to note about that image, South is Up in that image. Also Ganymede is also at a different scale.

For a comparison of Jupiter and Ganymede at the same scale, check out the image in this thread:
http://www.cloudynights.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/4846793/

By: Zucchi

Zucchi — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 14:38:58 +0000

Holy cow — that picture was taken with a ground-based 40 cm scope? How is that even possible?

By: Infinite123Lifer

Infinite123Lifer — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 05:36:59 +0000

I Love Ganyemde! Not because I have any clue what it is but because every time I see the word my brain goes GAWN EEE MAAA DEEEE! Thats probably not how its pronounced but I don’t wanna help it. It is a great name.

So Ganymede is a mercury-ish size moon around Jupiter and also its largest satellite. Very cool.

Enjovianate. Ok. I have a 100 year old Webster Dictionary, 1911. Well more on that later perhaps.

Doing a lil research on the Ganymede I just started looking for enunciation. I got:
Ganymede (play /ˈɡænɨmiːd/)[12] is a satellite of Jupiter.

Oh, the woes of being phonetically challenged.

On the other hand I think it would make for a great story to actually have some vastly superior alien race completely hidden to us under all those clouds.

By: Scott Kardel

Scott Kardel — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 23:36:52 +0000

What is the ring-like feature at ~2 o’clock on Jupiter? It doesn’t look like any oval/storm feature that I have ever seen on Jupiter.

By: MadScientist

MadScientist — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 22:45:44 +0000

[OT] Here’s a case of some truly Bad Astronomy (and bad history as well as bad anthropology):

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-15098959

The article is just loaded with bunkum like “NASA Technology” to measure the position of rocks (GPS? – but *why* – GPS is not even necessary to get the information needed to make the claims made). Then some nonsense on how it was only recently demonstrated that Australian Aborigines could count beyond 5 or 6. It looks like this Ray Norris is legit though – he seems to work as a radio astronomer for Australia’s public scientific research organization and self-publishes cuckoo ideas (which he also promotes on his employer’s website).

By: Bigfoot

Bigfoot — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 21:17:15 +0000

The weather here is of no concern. No matter how good the terrestrial seeing conditions are, I swear it’s ALWAYS cloudy on Jupiter!

By: zAmboni

zAmboni — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:58:37 +0000

From another forum, here is a pic of the scope that they used:

http://www.pbase.com/ter_horst/image/130671263

By: DLC

DLC — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:48:56 +0000

There used to be articles in the old Astronomy and Science magazines on how to grind your own telescope. It seems to me that it was fairly straightforward, if a bit detailed.
Some cool pics for a couple of “Amateurs” — in this sense unpaid professionals .

By: Bill

Bill — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:37:44 +0000

So where’s the photo of the homemade telescope!?

By: Kooz

Kooz — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:12:20 +0000

Wow, awesome. Makes me want to build my own 16″ mirror telescope!

By: Pat

Pat — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 20:10:03 +0000

Ganymede is the reason Jupiter is covered with storms. If Jupiter exposes itself to Ganymede one more time, it’s out of the solar system.

By: zAmboni

zAmboni — Fri, 07 Oct 2011 19:47:34 +0000

Funny thing you posted this right as I am processing some images taken last night. Only have an 8″ here though. The seeing was great for a while, BUT there was a REAL heavy fog out. Here is an image with a quick process of three images from last night:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/zamb0ni/6219118497