Here's my animation from last night of the James Webb Space Telescope continuing its journey to the L2 Lagrangian:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IeXQUH_ZslO7P7Alqvut4vAiPunMYjcn/view
[Quality is better if you download the 512x512 video first]
The animation covers 4 hours elapsed time last night - 2 hours either side of midnight 5/6 January Greenwich Mean Time. North Celestial Pole is upwards in the video.
Celestial coordinates (R.A. and Dec) specific to my location were calculated by the JPL site: https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/horizons/app.html#/
Currently the JWST is somewhere between the Rosette Nebula and the constellation of Orion, heading in the direction of Orion. It seems to be fainter than the previous night but if you look carefully there are interesting variations in brightness
Acquisition details:
* Canon EOS R on Takahashi Epsilon 180ED scope ( 500mm focal length at f/2.8 )
* 113 exposures of 2min at ISO 1600
Processing details:
* Each frame is calibrated with darks, flats, bias then background subtracted and gamma of 2.2 applied
* The video is then cropped to 512x512
Mark
Well done Mark.
I have been imaging in that area over last couple of nights and got a dirty great tramline through a couple oif images, I wonder whether it could have been JWST.
Carole
Quote from: Carole
I have been imaging in that area over last couple of nights and got a dirty great tramline through a couple oif images, I wonder whether it could have been JWST.
More likely they were geostationary satellites. When imaging near Orion they are very common.
Really interesting Mark thank you.
You can clearly see some variation in brightness as you indicate. I think it was rotating at one point, perhaps that?
Hugh
Very good Mark. The telescope is very far now although its brightness may have increased somewhat as it extends its mirrors and solar shield compensating somehow for the increasing distance.
Roberto
Cool! Presumably once it's in position, it will have its big reflector facing the Earth. I wonder how bright reflections from that will be.
At a million miles probably not much.Its only half way.
Roger
Bizarrely it wouldn't play on mine but offered me a download,
Here's the funny bit, the telescope followed the time marker across the screen exactly.
Nice capture.
Presumably then the Hubble can be imaged because its much closer than the JWST?
Roger
Quote from: Rick
Cool! Presumably once it's in position, it will have its big reflector facing the Earth. I wonder how bright reflections from that will be.
It's easy to calculate an upper limit. The solar shield is 21m x 14m at a distance of 1.5 million kilometres. Given the sun is mag -26.7 then if the shield is 100% reflective it would be around magnitude 3, which is surprisingly bright. It would act like an Iridium flare. On the other hand, if the solar shield is angled in the wrong direction then it might be next to impossible to image.
Mark
Quote from: MarkS on Jan 08, 2022, 08:33:16On the other hand, if the solar shield is angled in the wrong direction then it might be next to impossible to image.
I've not looked closely at the geometry of the shield, but as it's sheets of reflective material stretched between the ends of some arms I'd guess it's not flat. That'd reduce the maximum magnitude considerably. I expect it will still vary in magnitude considerably depending upon where exactly it's facing, though.
i think most people are waiting for images that the actual telescope has taken rather than images of it, after all its only a white dot or a white line.
Roger
Quote from: Apophis
i think most people are waiting for images that the actual telescope has taken rather than images of it, after all its only a white dot or a white line.
:)
Quote from: Apophis on Jan 08, 2022, 12:00:43images that the actual telescope has taken
Of course, but they'll be a while, and seeing actual images of the spacecraft on its way is interesting too, even with all the mission status pages. Besides, doing things like imaging spacecraft (with known size, reflectivity, etc.) could provide interesting comparisons with, say, the next near-Earth asteroid or piece of wandering space junk when it too gets imaged.
But they are not going to be Hubble like images, as it's an Infra-red camera I believe.
I expect the JWST views to be at least as fascinating as the ones Hubble's given us. It should be able to look even deeper into the past than Hubble's been able to manage, too.
QuoteBut they are not going to be Hubble like images, as it's an Infra-red camera I believe.
IR Photos are just the same as light photos but normally in black and white or false colour.
Nearly every CCD chip is sensitive to IR light which is why All cameras have a hot filter, this reduces IR & UV light hitting the sensor.
Just think of it as a night vision camera. Old posts call it Xray as it could see through items.
My old compact camera took IR photos, you just needed to get a true IR pass filter which is normally black.
I used it to take photos of the top of my old cooker which it could see straight through and i could see all the electronics and stuff below the black glass.
My old sony camera takes IR video, (not in daylight post mod).
http://www.kaya-optics.com/ (http://www.kaya-optics.com/)
(https://www.irishtimes.com/polopoly_fs/1.4473007.1612185073!/image/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/ratio_16x9_w1200/image.jpg)
Roger