APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

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APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by APOD Robot » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:06 am

Image Draconid Meteors Over Spain

Explanation: What are those streaks in the sky? They're meteors from the Draconids meteor shower that peaked earlier this month. The above composite image captured numerous meteor streaks over 90 minutes above the Celtic ruins of Capote in Badajoz province, Spain. The particles that caused these meteors were typically the size of a pebble and were expelled long ago from the nucleus of comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner. Most of the above meteors can be traced back to a single radiant emanating from the constellation of the Dragon (Draco). Reports from this year meteor shower indicate that the Draconids were unusually good this year with activity was concentrated around 8 pm UT on October 8. The most intense Draconid meteor showers in recent history occurred in 1933 and 1946 when thousands of meteors per hour were recorded as the Earth plowed through particularly dense streams of comet debris. Although the Draconids occur every October, it is usually difficult to know just how active each year's meteor shower will be.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by geckzilla » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:13 am

I counted 40, using the highly sophisticated method of occluding the image with a piece of cardboard from right to left until I had counted all the streaks. :)
Just call me "geck" because "zilla" is like a last name.

Watsisname

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by Watsisname » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:30 am

Good question. My first thought was perhaps it's a composite (90 minutes for meteors, short duration for stars), but then how'd you remove the star trails from the 90 minute frame?

As for the meteor count, I'mma go with 44.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by neufer » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:36 am

As for the URL count, I'mma go with 2: comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner
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keerthi2kiran

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by keerthi2kiran » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:40 am

I counted 42 (which is also the ultimate answer to life universe and everything)

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by Beyond » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:40 am

neufer wrote:As for the URL count, I'mma go with 2: comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner
As for the link in your post, I'mma go with -webpage cannot be found-. At least until you fix the link.
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keerthi2kiran

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by keerthi2kiran » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:46 am

keerthi2kiran wrote:I counted 42 (which is also the ultimate answer to life universe and everything)
Oops... There are 40 meteors... I think I counted some meteors twice.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by geckzilla » Wed Oct 19, 2011 4:54 am

Beyond wrote:
neufer wrote:As for the URL count, I'mma go with 2: comet 21P/Giacobini-Zinner
As for the link in your post, I'mma go with -webpage cannot be found-. At least until you fix the link.
Fixed the robot's postand sent a msg to RJN in case you guys actually thought he has the time to read all the posts we make.

Turns out the robot just fails sometimes.
Just call me "geck" because "zilla" is like a last name.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by Beyond » Wed Oct 19, 2011 5:04 am

Robots fail :?: :?: What's this world coming to :?: However, neufer's link is still -webpage not found-, at the time of this posting.
To find the Truth, you must go Beyond.

islader2

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by islader2 » Wed Oct 19, 2011 5:04 am

Chauvinism lives! Fifty {50}, one for each State. :lol: :lol:

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by geckzilla » Wed Oct 19, 2011 5:07 am

Beyond wrote:Robots fail :?: :?: What's this world coming to :?: However, neufer's link is still -webpage not found-, at the time of this posting.
Yeah, well, it wouldn't make sense anymore if I fixed it, would it? It is hard enough as it is to make sense of some of his posts.
Just call me "geck" because "zilla" is like a last name.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by Ann » Wed Oct 19, 2011 6:04 am

keerthi2kiran wrote:I counted 42 (which is also the ultimate answer to life universe and everything)
I'm far too lazy to count, but if you, keerthi2kiran, found 42 of them, then that's obviously the correct answer (for exactly the reason you stated). So now we have found two of the questions to the ultimate answer, which is of course 42. One of the questions is how many Draconids there are in the APOD of October 19, 2011, and the other question is (obviously) "How many roads must a man walk down?"! :wink:
Click to play embedded YouTube video.
As for today's APOD, it is very beautiful. The ruin in the background is picturesque. As for myself, I appreciate the blue moonlit sky, as there was an almost full Moon on the night of the Draconids. As David Malin has pointed out, the moonlit sky is also blue, just like the daytime sky! It was a beautiful night, as I said, but really light-polluted. I saw five Draconids, and I kept watching for about half an hour. The Draconids in this picture look relatively faint, undoubtedly because the background sky is so bright.

That's a nice APOD!

Ann
Last edited by Ann on Wed Oct 19, 2011 12:04 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by agulesin » Wed Oct 19, 2011 7:22 am

Beyond wrote:Robots fail :?: :?: What's this world coming to :?: However, neufer's link is still -webpage not found-, at the time of this posting.
Not that difficult to remove the (mis)leading "http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ " from the start of that link, is it? :roll:

counting meteors? no, until I find a program capable of counting them I'm not going to guess! :-) call me lazy if you really want to!

Maureen

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by Maureen » Wed Oct 19, 2011 9:41 am

I pasted the image into PhotoShop and placed a dot over the streaks. I counted 45, although I prefer '42'! ;) ~~Maureen

Erika

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by Erika » Wed Oct 19, 2011 10:52 am

ich zählte 39! E.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by neufer » Wed Oct 19, 2011 11:10 am

keerthi2kiran wrote:
keerthi2kiran wrote:
I counted 42 (which is also the ultimate answer to life universe and everything)
Oops... There are 40 meteors... I think I counted some meteors twice.
Perhaps geckzilla could direct you to some astronomy supply outfits that sell cardboard. :wink:
Art Neuendorffer

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by geckzilla » Wed Oct 19, 2011 12:48 pm

Ok, the cardboard method definitely had its shortcomings, especially with me being drowsy and about to go to sleep. I have now updated my count to 43. And that, I would put money on. Here's a pic of my count. No, I did not get tricked by Andromeda...
PS - Maureen, there is a count tool in Photoshop. At least, there is in CS4, which is my version. It's in the same button stack as the eyedropper tool.
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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by orin stepanek » Wed Oct 19, 2011 1:15 pm

I didn't count them; but I liked the picture! 8-) :wink:
Orin

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by neptunium » Wed Oct 19, 2011 2:26 pm

Count me in with 43.
It's hard to count meteors with my phone; luckily, I can download high-res images to see them better!
:)

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by donendusted » Wed Oct 19, 2011 2:36 pm

My hightech excel overlay tells me there were 44

RickM

Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by RickM » Wed Oct 19, 2011 2:42 pm

Watsisname wrote:Good question. My first thought was perhaps it's a composite (90 minutes for meteors, short duration for stars), but then how'd you remove the star trails from the 90 minute frame?
I didn't see the question you refer to, but the question in my mind when I came to the discussion page was how you get a 90-minute exposure without star trails.

This has to be a composite image using an equatorial mount for the stars and meteors, and a fixed camera for the landscape. Otherwise you get either star trails or motion-blurred ruins. Right? And to keep the stars from overpowering the meteors, maybe instead of a single 90-minute exposure, you take a series of shorter exposures and combine only those that include meteors.

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by donendusted » Wed Oct 19, 2011 2:44 pm

In spite of the constant dust over Abu Dhabi my wife and I caught a brief glimpse from our balcony of one coming in over the Abu Dhabi airport then it broke into two bright red/orange pieces as it passed overhead and into the desert dust filled sky. And no camera!

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by donendusted » Wed Oct 19, 2011 2:49 pm

oops! 44 streaks minus one andromeda equals 43 meteors

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Re: APOD: Draconid Meteors Over Spain (2011 Oct 19)

Post by StarCuriousAero » Wed Oct 19, 2011 3:02 pm

Why hello there Andromeda!

I counted 43 streaks, but I'm thinking that the extra long streak at the top of the image is in fact two meteor streaks overlaid, which puts my final answer/guess at 44 meteors. Although I wish the answer was 42 to give us another question to that ultimate answer. :-/

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How'd they do that?

Post by geoffrey.landis » Wed Oct 19, 2011 3:22 pm

RickM wrote:This has to be a composite image using an equatorial mount for the stars and meteors, and a fixed camera for the landscape.
Ah, that's a good solution. I was wondering how this was done-- my guess was one exposure for the stars, multiple frames for the meteors, and then the meteor frames each had the dark level adjusted so that stars were adjusted from "faint" to "completely black" before adding.

But an equatorial mount for the sky, and then composite in the foreground later, is simpler.

There's a very noticible shadow in the foreground landscape-- if the moon is bright enough to cast that shadow, I'm amazed you could see Draconids at all. But then, the foreground image could very well have been a daytime image, if it's a composite.