The source picture is the 1.5 gigapixels version (69.536 x 22.230 pixels).
Fun fact: watching the video on certain TV's makes them flicker wildly. Probably because they struggle with many dots in motion. On a monitor it works flawlessly.
I've found the lowest motion-smoothing setting makes watching stuff like this far more enjoyable while avoiding the awful soap-opera effect you get from higher settings.
It felt awful to admit to myself since I hated on motion-smoothing for so long, but I simply cannot not see the 24 frames in pretty much all scenes where the camera is panning and background has to move a lot.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_galaxies#Naked-eye_gal...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_galaxy_groups_and_clus...
So there are actually a few galaxies visible with the naked eye outside of our local group even. However, all are within our local supercluster.
And if we could see it with the naked eye it would appear six times bigger than a full moon.
That'll be 23 Zettameters, please.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42731686
I guess it has to do with the time and day of posting something, on how much it will be upvoted and hopefully rise out of the new posts pit :-)
> We value your privacy
> With your permission we and our partners may use precise geolocation data and identification through device scanning. You may click to consent to our and our 1464 partners’ processing as described above.
No reject all button.
1. Reject all
2. Legitimate Interest
3. Object all
4. Save & Exit
But then I'm in EU
I looked it up: it's 1/4 of a degree. The sun and moon are each 1/2 a degree.
So, Andromeda appears half (diameter) of the sun or moon.
Considering those photons are 2.5 millions old, I'd say it took significantly more than a decade
(I'll see myself out)
Those few unfortunates who died on 8000m peaks by ie getting lost and had the chance to see a starry night must have seen quite a spectacle.
https://archive.stsci.edu/hlsp/phat
https://archive.stsci.edu/hlsp/phast
It took a decade to get that much. Getting the rest, assuming they aren't able to shrink the chunks, would require a project equal in duration and scope. The JWST can probably capture it with similar resolution in a fraction of the time. If the JWST didn't exist, they'd probably go for another project to fill in the gaps, but it doesn't make sense when a much better telescope is available.
https://www.astrobin.com/hqrhe0/
With a few changes I could have easily got somewhere around 100 megapixels if I did a 2x2 mosaic without my reducer on the scope.
There are better cameras and scopes (planewave scopes for example) that getting to 400 megapixel is totally achievable for a high end mature astrophotographer.
My setup gives me around 1.92 arc seconds for a point diameter.
- https://www.ing.iac.es/astronomy/development/hap/dimm.html
- https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Fig-C1-Seeing-distributi...
- https://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/15/9/2225
Around 1-2 arcseconds is 'good' seeing in your backyard. There is a good reason for telescopes to be on some of the tallest mountains on Earth.
It's hard to do dim objects because there's less for the software to inspect in each frame to determine the luckiness and distortion, but you can maybe use fortuitous bright stars in the frame to index off. You also need to collect a huge number of images to get any sort of signal to noise ratio. This video is an example of the technique actually used on a dim object, though the results were fairly modest because of murky British skies.
I always assume that the levels of radiation closer to the galactic core are worse but so would insolation in the wider sense: the star field would be dense enough to illuminate more than the milky way does, for us surely?
I wonder if there were a way to eventually get a stereo image — depth data for each point of light so that we can map Andromeda in three dimensions.
Wouldn't any two points converge at the horizon, considering the distances involved, otherwise?
https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/uk-news/esa-spa...
Imagine you're in the ancient times looking at your cell phone and seeing this distant galaxy in so much detail. Don't think about the technical details and the long time period facts and all that. Just do it as though you're looking through a special magical lens that allows you to see it, because you are!
With my layman's eyes, it is very clear that there is a dense galactic center and dust clouds between the galaxy and us. However, What else can an expert eye tell from the picture?
With better high resolution images recently we've also been able to see confirmation of Gravitational Lensing [0] which reveal superstructures in space-time that affect the images we see. (i.e. with lower resolution we might've assumed we're seeing multiple distinct stars, with better resolution we understand that it's the same)
For example, we just discovered the first "Einstein Zig Zag". [1]
Ultimately, understanding the gravitational structure of space-time is the key to understanding dark matter which is arguably the biggest mystery of the universe today (besides dark energy).
At time 0 it emits a photon toward us. One year later, it's 1.1 light years farther away. The amount of newly-created distance between us is 0.9 light years. Some of that was created behind the photon, but I'll ignore that and just assume that all of the new space got in the photon's way.
Over that one year, the photon has traveled 1 light year towards us, and only 0.9 light years of that distance was new. So it's gotten closer to us by (a little more than) 0.1 light years. This rate will accelerate over time.
The object is still visible at the point where it emitted that photon, even though its velocity exceeds the speed of light.
I think it will ultimately become invisible, though.