Two Jupiters

I couldn't think of a better way to celebrate this past new years than to do some imaging in the wee hours of the morning. Besides, in southwestern Michigan you take whatever clear nights you can get!

I have included two images. The one on the left is my second image of Jupiter using a Toucam Pro webcam taken at 4:40am est 1/1/04. The right image was taken on 11/10/03 at 6:24am est. Both images pictured were taken with the same equipment -

8" SCT telescope, Toucam Pro webcam
Televue 3x barlow lens, Baader Infared Filter

and both were taken and processed using K3CCDTools, Registax2 and Photoshop.

The major difference between the two is their altitude (and of course to some degree seeing conditions) at the time the image was taken. The one on the left was taken at an altitude of 52 deg and on the right at 36 deg. At northern latitudes it seems that a few degrees can make quite a difference in image
quality.

Note: Notice the Great Red Spot located at the lower left of the second image.

Quote: "At the time of his death, if he were on Jupiter, Elvis would've weighed six-hundred and forty-eight pounds." 'Mystery Train' (1989)

©2006 Richard Murray

*See the Archives on the left for more astrophotos*