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| Lunar Eclipse 08-Nov-2003 |
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| Actually, it was neither:The images were from single shots that captured the moon as it slowly slipped backward relative to the background stars. To help explain the phenomenon, I created the "Moontrail" image seen below. The bright star near the left edge, was used as a focal point to "register" seven images taken over a 43 minute span, while the moon seems to be sliding backwards. |
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| The animation on the left was formed using 13 thumbnail images from the set, and depicts the full eclipse sequence. A slight nutation (tilting wobble) occurs during the moon's 4 1/2 hour celestial journey, and can be more readily noted in the two image sequence on the right, comprised of the first and final frames (17:53 vs 22:17 EST). An even more dramatic display is that of parallax... a change in libration caused by a wide change in observational position, thus providing a different line of sight. This is well illustrate in the animation below, consisting of images taken simulataneously (01:18UT) in Connecticut, USA by myself and in Styria, Austria by accomplished imager Johannes Schedler. |
| Taken just prior to totality (20:03 EST), the above image shows reveals a background starfield no longer hidden in the moon's glow. The progession seen below has been annotated from ingress to egress, with local EST times listed (add 5 hours for UT). The brighter penumbral phase used exposure levels optimized for the illuminated portion, while the umbral progression was set to capture the dark. The event begins at the upper left, with an image taken at 17:52 local time (EST, 22:52UT) and terminates with the lower right image, taken at 22:17 EST. The umbra series begins at 19:57 EST and winds completes at 20:41 EST. Approximately 100 images were taken during the evening (all keepers!) , but that number needed to be reduced sufficiently to allow a managable display, hence only 21 of them are presented above. The raw images each measure 3072 x 2048 pixels and were converted to 16/48 bit 36Mb images, so they too were substantially reduced in size for web display (the "working copy" of this poster is 38 X 56 inches). |
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| The concept was the brainchild of Peter Lawrence, who co-ordinated the collection of timed images from those areas within the eclipse path, preparing an extensive lunar parallax demonstration! An astute friend noticed that in two of the preview shots from this series, the moon basked in a different position among the background stars. Thinking I had merely plonked a copy of the moon disks on top of a starfield shot for ambiance, he asked if I had "slipped up" with the placement, or had perhaps mis-calculated where the disk should be. |
| New and hot!!! Using a shifted starfield as a backdrop, an interesting psuedo-3D image can be fabricated (click here)! |