Spot the Space Station

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I use heavens above all the time looking for Hubble which just had a great flyover last night and the ISS. I live out in the country, so the other night I saw a couple of dozen satellites flying overhead. With ISS there is definite elongation in one direction verses the other when it is flying overhead.
 
"Where mankind goes, alcohol is sure to follow"


Sapporo in Japan brewed beer from barley grown in the ISS...


So, we'll be drinking beer in space! Oops, not so quick. There's the "wet burp" syndrome in space. Due to the lack of gravity, it's difficult to burp without barfing. But good news! Our great brewing friends down under found a solution to that problem:

 
Time: Thu Jul 18 5:07 AM, Visible: 4 min, Max Height: 49 degrees, Appears: SSW, Disappears: ENE

Buggar! I'll be at work!! Can I put a request in to NASA to adjust their schedule?
 
VERY last minute, but for the SW suburbs of Chicago:

Time: Sun Aug 04 9:37 PM
Visible: 6 min
Max Height: 62 degrees
Appears: SW
Disappears: ENE
 
"That brilliant ball of blue"



Chris Hadfield surprisingly sounds a lot like Ed Robertson.

The astronauts apparently see 16 sun rises & sets per day (24 hours)!! I don't know if that would be amazing over the entire trip or if I'd just become numb to it.
 
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I have been trying to contact NA1SS since I got my ham radio license, am working on a better 2 meter antenna right now, because all I have is a 5 watt handheld. People do it quite often and I want to be one of the lucky ones!!


Here is a video of someone doing it I found.

[ame]http://youtu.be/rmcV6xKSaSI[/ame]

Oh and I use www.isstracker.com, but I'm sure the alerts are a lot more handy.

KF5WHN
 
I woke up this morning at 430 for a nature call and remembered that I had heard on the radio that this weekend was the Perseid meteor shower. I stepped out on the back deck and watched for 30 minutes. I counted 16 meteor strikes and much to my surprise I spotted 4 satellites. It probably would have been better if I didn't live in the city limits and didn't have so many trees. I'm going to look again tonight sometime during the 2-5 window. Next year is supposed to be unfavorable conditions due to a full moon or something.
 
shelly_belly said:
I woke up this morning at 430 for a nature call and remembered that I had heard on the radio that this weekend was the Perseid meteor shower. I stepped out on the back deck and watched for 30 minutes. I counted 16 meteor strikes and much to my surprise I spotted 4 satellites. It probably would have been better if I didn't live in the city limits and didn't have so many trees. I'm going to look again tonight sometime during the 2-5 window. Next year is supposed to be unfavorable conditions due to a full moon or something.
Click to expand...

My family vacationed on a small island on the gulf last week. Here on the gulf of Mexico, we don't keep any lights on the beach because it confuses the sea turtles. So, it's a great place to watch stars.

My son and I went out there well after midnight and watched the stars for an hour. No moon at all, cloudless night. After our irises opened, we, saw the milky way, and many shooting stars. Good fun for a dad and his boy. Brought back some mosquito bites for souvenirs.
 
I grabbed a 52 second exposure tonight. ISS streaking over my house. Hallo up there!

iss-6oct13-61159.jpg
 
Nice shot! Have you noticed Jupiter shining in the night sky the past couple nights? Should look good thru a telescope. Also the Orionids meteor shower is coming up later this month, peaking on the 21st I think.
Regards, GF.
 
gratus fermentatio said:
Nice shot! Have you noticed Jupiter shining in the night sky the past couple nights? Should look good thru a telescope. Also the Orionids meteor shower is coming up later this month, peaking on the 21st I think.
Regards, GF.
Click to expand...

You can see Venus there. At least that's what I think the very bright one is. I wasn't aware that Jupiter was visible. I'll be on the lookout.

October 6 around 8pm. This is the view to the SW.

iss-6oct13-7-61165.jpg
 
Saturn has been really bright in the Western sky lately. ISS should fly near it tonight here. That may make a cool picture.
 
Triple shadow transit on Jupiter. A rare case of three moons — Io, Europa, and Callisto — casting their tiny black shadows onto Jupiter at the same time happens late, from 4:32 to 5:37 Universal Time October 12th (12:32 to 1:37 a.m. Saturday morning Eastern Daylight Time). Jupiter will be high and best placed for telescope users in Europe and Africa, and low in the east for eastern North America.
 
Anyone seen Gravity, the movie? Very cool. Two space shuttles in there.

This picture is overexposed. It was completely unattended (I was at a soccer game). Stacked them in software just now. There was a 10 second gap between exposures, hence the ISS disappears a bit there.

iss-stacked-61270.jpg
 
I've been spotting the space station for the last week or so. I don't see a "streak" or a "line" as some of the pictures in this thread show. Instead, I see a solid moving "star" that moves across the sky at a pretty good clip, only to disappear right around when the time predicts. Is that what everyone else is seeing? Or are you seeing "streaks" and "straight lines" formed by the space station? I want to make sure I'm actually seeing the space station, and not something else :)
 
JeffoC6 said:
I've been spotting the space station for the last week or so. I don't see a "streak" or a "line" as some of the pictures in this thread show. Instead, I see a solid moving "star" that moves across the sky at a pretty good clip, only to disappear right around when the time predicts. Is that what everyone else is seeing? Or are you seeing "streaks" and "straight lines" formed by the space station? I want to make sure I'm actually seeing the space station, and not something else :)
Click to expand...

Yeah, streaks are coming from long exposures...

The thing does look like a bright star moving faster than an airplane at an elevation much higher than an airplane but much lower than most satelites...
 
JeffoC6 said:
I've been spotting the space station for the last week or so. I don't see a "streak" or a "line" as some of the pictures in this thread show. Instead, I see a solid moving "star" that moves across the sky at a pretty good clip, only to disappear right around when the time predicts. Is that what everyone else is seeing? Or are you seeing "streaks" and "straight lines" formed by the space station? I want to make sure I'm actually seeing the space station, and not something else :)
Click to expand...

That picture above is actually two photos combined. Each photo was a 3 minute exposure. Over 3 minutes, the shutter on my camera was left open. The result is a streak. Even the stars are streaks there. there was a 10-second period between exposures. That's why a blank spot in the ISS streak.

I probably should have gone with a faster exposure (or stopped the lens aperture down) since the pic came out a little bright.
 
passedpawn said:
Quick shot of the ISS moving past the moon. The ISS is the vertical streak. The horizontal streak is an airplane that unfortunately made an appearance.
Click to expand...
Nice photo! Is that how large the SS appears or is that the camera causing that?
 
Gonna try and get a close up with my 500mm lens tonight. It's flying over just after dark and sorta close to the moon. Hoping that's enough ambient light for a quick shutter speed.

It'll be a challenge...
 
AZ_IPA said:
Gonna try and get a close up with my 500mm lens tonight. It's flying over just after dark and sorta close to the moon. Hoping that's enough ambient light for a quick shutter speed.

It'll be a challenge...
Click to expand...

Are you going to open the aperture all the way, or step down a couple?

What's your intent with the fast shutter? Are you taking multiple shots and stacking?
 
passedpawn said:
Are you going to open the aperture all the way, or step down a couple?

What's your intent with the fast shutter? Are you taking multiple shots and stacking?
Click to expand...

Not sure yet. :eek:

Most of the stuff I'm seeing on photog forums is using a 1.4-2x converter (which I don't have. yet. ;))...

I'd be happy with something similar to this (found on the the interwebz).

ISS2-1.png
 
AZ_IPA said:
Not sure yet. :eek:

Most of the stuff I'm seeing on photog forums is using a 1.4-2x converter (which I don't have. yet. ;))...

I'd be happy with something similar to this (found on the the interwebz).

ISS2-1.png
Click to expand...

Yea, I saw that pic. Crazy, looks like an x-wing fighter from Star Wars. It's a good test for your optics. I do see why you need fast shutter now.

Good luck!
 
passedpawn said:
Yea, I saw that pic. Crazy, looks like an x-wing fighter from Star Wars. It's a good test for your optics. I do see why you need fast shutter now.

Good luck!
Click to expand...

Thanks!

It's a long fly over tonight - 5 minutes with a SSW to NNE trajectory with a height of 51* so I should have plenty of opportunity to screw things up! :eek:
 
Here she is at 500mm (top left quadrant).
iss-uncropped20131209-61595.jpg


Here she is cropped.
isscropped220131209-61597.jpg


Not too bad for my first attempt. My tripod was shaking too much during tracking with the weight of that lens. Need to either get a better tri-pod or maybe shoot free hand.

Shutter was 1/250. Maybe need to bump that a bit, or adjust the f/stop as I think it's a bit too overexposed.
 
AZ_IPA said:
Here she is cropped.
isscropped220131209-61597.jpg


Not too bad for my first attempt. My tripod was shaking too much during tracking with the weight of that lens. Need to either get a better tri-pod or maybe shoot free hand.

Shutter was 1/250. Maybe need to bump that a bit, or adjust the f/stop as I think it's a bit too overexposed.
Click to expand...

I'm impressed. I didn't think it would work at all.

I use this tripod. It's very sturdy. Now I need that lens you have there.

Did you use a remote to release the shutter? I think I'd lock the shutter up and use the remote to trigger the exposure. Maybe you did that.
 
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passedpawn said:
I'm impressed. I didn't think it would work at all.

I use this tripod. It's very sturdy. Now I need that lens you have there.

Did you use a remote to release the shutter? I think I'd lock the shutter up and use the remote to trigger the exposure. Maybe you did that.
Click to expand...

Thanks! I've got the Sigma 50-500mm and I like it a lot for wildlife and astronomy.

I was surprised with how it worked. It was also the first shot out of ~60 that was at all in focus. Must have bumped the focus ring. :eek:

I was using a remote trigger with one hand as I was swinging the tripod with the other hand.

Here's a moon shot from awhile back taken with that lens.

moonsmall-61598.jpg
 
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AZ_IPA said:
Thanks! I've got the Sigma 50-500mm and I like it a lot for wildlife and astronomy.

I was surprised with how it worked. It was also the first shot out of ~60 that was at all in focus. Must have bumped the focus ring. :eek:

I was using a remote trigger with one hand as I was swinging the tripod with the other hand.

Here's a moon shot from awhile back taken with that lens.

moonsmall-61598.jpg
Click to expand...

I'm loving it. Much jealousy.
 

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