Posted in Astronomy at 20:04 on 29 December 2011
This was Astronomy Picture of the Day on Monday (26/12/11.)
The storm apparently has 18 times the surface area of the Earth. It’s one of the longest lasting storms ever recorded. (It can’t match Jupiter’s Great Red Spot, though.)
I like the way Saturn’s rings show up here as a thin blue line right across the middle of the photo. Their shadows are impressive too. There also seems to be the shadow of a moon on the lower left.
Posted in Astronomy at 14:20 on 19 March 2011
Another goody from Astronomy Picture of the Day, posted last Tuesday.
This is a movie of Saturn, its rings and moons, constructed from real photos taken by the Cassini probe. The first images are black and white, the colour kicks in later.
5.6k Saturn Cassini Photographic Animation from stephen v2 on Vimeo.
Posted in Astronomy at 15:27 on 12 March 2011
Astronomy Picture of the Day strikes again. This was Tuesday’s (8/3/11.)
It shows the largest moon in the solar system, Titan, almost like a bowling ball against the background of Saturn’s rings. Apparently the rings are much smaller in thickness in relative terms than a razor blade is! The rings’ shadows on the planet’s cloud surface show the sun is angled above them. Just across to the right, just below the rings, you can see the much smaller moon Enceladus making one of its frequent transits of Saturn.
