Starship Asterisk*

Seeking Venus under the Spitzkoppe Arch

Explanation: What's that in the sky? Although there was much to see in this spectacular panorama taken during the early morning hours of a day in late September, the brightest object in the sky was clearly the planet Venus. In the featured image, Venus was captured actually through a natural rock bridge, itself picturesque, in Spitzkoppe, Namibia. The planet, on the left of the opening, was complemented by a silhouette of the astrophotographer on the right. Above and beyond the rock bridge were many famous icons of a dark night sky, including, from left to right, the Pleiades star cluster, the Orion Nebula, the bright star Sirius, and the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. This week, Venus remains visible to the east in the pre-dawn sky, being complemented by Mars, which is angularly quite close.

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That's a gorgeous image! Wonderful composition and color!

Can't resist mentioning that the name "Spitzkoppe Arch" gives me some strange associations. It makes me thing of the Swedish word "spottkopp", a receptor of some sort where you, well, spit!

Ann

It is a lovely image (oh for the pleasure of stargazing under a Namibian sky). Some errata in the rollover annotations though:

• Musca should be Mensa
• Hydra should be Hydrus
• Horogolium should be Horologium

Not marked are the Barnard's Loop and lambda Orionis nebulae in Orion, and the Gum Nebula in Puppis/Vela.

Hate to be a pain, but the constellation labelled Musca is actually Mensa.

Nice catches. The picture I used with the labels was super distorted and all I rushed through it. I sent in a corrected image.

Is anyone else tired of seeing photos of the Milky Way as an arch? 95% of your Milky Way photos have it in an arch. Its not in an arch. In fact, if you have ever seen it stretched across the sky, its magnificent.
1- Believe it or not, some people go here to learn and you are doing them an injustice.
2- If the people who run this site are so bored with it that they do stuff like this, then let someone else run it.

Guest wrote:
Is anyone else tired of seeing photos of the Milky Way as an arch? 95% of your Milky Way photos have it in an arch. Its not in an arch. In fact, if you have ever seen it stretched across the sky, its magnificent.

Guest wrote:Is anyone else tired of seeing photos of the Milky Way as an arch? 95% of your Milky Way photos have it in an arch. Its not in an arch. In fact, if you have ever seen it stretched across the sky, its magnificent.
1- Believe it or not, some people go here to learn and you are doing them an injustice.
2- If the people who run this site are so bored with it that they do stuff like this, then let someone else run it.

How long will we be waiting for your magnificent submission of a flat Milky Way?

Guest wrote:Is anyone else tired of seeing photos of the Milky Way as an arch? 95% of your Milky Way photos have it in an arch. Its not in an arch. In fact, if you have ever seen it stretched across the sky, its magnificent.
1- Believe it or not, some people go here to learn and you are doing them an injustice.
2- If the people who run this site are so bored with it that they do stuff like this, then let someone else run it.

Well, when we see it stretched out across the sky, it certainly appears as an arch. What else would you call something that rises from one place on the horizon, crosses the dome of the sky, and sinks behind a different place? Linear structures easily appear as arches, or appear to show curvature.

Short of taking a fisheye image with the Milky Way crossing the zenith, just how do you imagine capturing it such that it doesn't appear curved?

Guest wrote:Is anyone else tired of seeing photos of the Milky Way as an arch? 95% of your Milky Way photos have it in an arch. Its not in an arch. In fact, if you have ever seen it stretched across the sky, its magnificent.
1- Believe it or not, some people go here to learn and you are doing them an injustice.
2- If the people who run this site are so bored with it that they do stuff like this, then let someone else run it.

Dear Guest, feel free to click on any of these soothing images while you count to 10 and relax.

1. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150904.html
2. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150902.html
3. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150825.html
4. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150814.html
5. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150813.html
6. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150812.html
7. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150803.html
8. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150727.html
9. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150608.html
10. http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap150525.html

All of these recent APODs show the Milky Way looking pretty much straight, so I think you'll enjoy them.
Also, since you're here to learn, the correct punctuation is "it's magnificent". Otherwise, I quite agree with you that it is indeed.

But Mark, that one with the Earth on top and bottom does an injustice to our magnificent planet. We all know that the Earth simply is not in whatever shape that shows.

geckzilla wrote:But Mark, that one with the Earth on top and bottom does an injustice to our magnificent planet. We all know that the Earth simply is not in whatever shape that shows.

Maybe the concave hollow Earth hypothesis has finally been confirmed?

Ann

geckzilla wrote:
But Mark, that one with the Earth on top and bottom does an injustice to our magnificent planet.
We all know that the Earth simply is not in whatever shape that shows.

You need to ponder that looking up at the sky from a hillside with Stephen Colbert.