Atlas resolved? Shame it has so little contrast against the rings.
This one has three moons:
Notice the sliver of Titan at the very top. Here's one taken at nearly the same time:
Established Member
Atlas resolved? Shame it has so little contrast against the rings.
This one has three moons:
Notice the sliver of Titan at the very top. Here's one taken at nearly the same time:
Established Member
It really is worth people browsing all of the latest batch of photos - there are some real beauties. When Cassini threads its way through Saturn's moons like this, the mission controllers must be hard pressed to decide where to point the camera next.
Almost reminds me of kids in the back of a car on vacation in a new country - "Ohh - look over here!" "No, you come look this way!"...
Great stuff =D>
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Ooh, ooh, another one - Mimas silhouetted in front of the rings:Originally Posted by Tacitus
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedi...iImageID=33230
But then, people tell me I'm a complete sucker for silhouettes. Moons and rings, dust clouds in the Crab Nebula, M51 and its buddy - backlight it and I'll be right there. Used to drive a Silhouette, even, until that guy in the sporty red car with no insurance wasn't looking during that turn...
Order of Kilopi
Some guy made an animated GIF from this:
http://www.skytrip.de/temp/animation2.gif
Harald
Member
Isn't the moon in back actually Tethys? I see Ithaca Chasma there. Also Rhea is bigger, though there might be perspective tricks going on.
Member
Hmm, from the time of the occultation it appears that it really is Rhea, and there is a perspective trick going on. If so, then what I thought was Ithaca Chasma is actually relief in Rhea's wispy terrain, which is interesting in itself.
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I ran a simulation with Celestia. It seems that Tethys passed behind Dione, but on 21th February. It was nowhere near Dione in 20th February, but Rhea was. Celestia view looks almost identical to real Cassini view, althoug Dione don't quite occult Rhea thanks to minor uncertainties.
According to Celestia, just a moment earlier Dione occulted also Enceladus.
If you have Celestia installed you can see the event by clicking this link.
Order of Kilopi
If you think it's necessary to include all those cool images, could you put some line breaks between them, like I did in the quote, so the images don't abut horizontally and force much scrolling to read the text? Thanks.
[Snipped many images]
Some guy made an animated GIF from this:
http://www.skytrip.de/temp/animation2.gif
Harald
Order of Kilopi
Seems to be a browser issue. With Firefox, he puts as much in one line as there is room and then the rest in the next line. Is it really my pics that force scrolling or is it some other long link in another posting? My browser starts horizontal scrolling because of some links ngc3314 posted.If you think it's necessary to include all those cool images, could you put some line breaks between them, like I did in the quote, so the images don't abut horizontally and force much scrolling to read the text? Thanks.
[Snipped many images]
Some guy made an animated GIF from this:
http://www.skytrip.de/temp/animation2.gif
Harald
Harald
[added] Browser issue. IE makes one long horizontal display of all images. I'm going to fix this. Sorry for the inconvenience.
[added] I put a blank between each link, so now the IE also wraps.
Order of Kilopi
That's beter. Thank you.
Established Member
I'm just relieved the two moons didn't run into each other....phew! :PThat's beter. Thank you.
(Mind you *that* would have been quite a show)
Member
The fact that I managed to confuse Rhea for Tethys got me thinking, and I came up with a pet theory (mind you, I am not a real planetary scientist, so I could be completely off base here):
I've been thinking of Rhea and Dione as similar bodies (except in size), and Tethys as different from the two. But perhaps the only thing differentiating Tethys is a matter of chance.
All three moons are generally bright on the leading hemisphere, and apparently stained by some darker material overlaying the old craters on the trailing hemisphere; this is most pronounced for the case of Dione and least for Tethys, but you can see it on all three. (In the case of Tethys, the darker hemisphere is the one with the cross-shaped arrangement of craters of which the largest is Penelope.) And all three moons have a giant system of what are probably tectonic rifts of some sort crossing a hemisphere.
For the case of Dione and Rhea, the rifted hemisphere happens to be approximately the same as the stained hemisphere, and the rifts show up as bright wisps against the darker background. For the case of Tethys, they do not coincide. For Voyager, the rift system was lit in such a manner as to present prominent topographic relief, and we call it Ithaca Chasma.
Perhaps the coincidence on Dione and Rhea is due to chance, and all three moons experienced more or less the same history.
Vulcan Administrator
Mimas, with Saturn as a backdrop.
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.
Vulcan Administrator
Features on Saturn's moon Phoebe given names
Twenty-four of the largest craters on Phoebe, the small, retrograde outer moon of Saturn have been assigned names by the International Astronomical Union.
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.
Order of Kilopi
One thing I like about the Mimas pics in particular is that they drive home just how HUGE Saturn is. Maybe its just the angles they used, or the fact that the rings amplify the effect, but even pics with Jupiter and the Galileans lack the kind of perspective these give.
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Here is a set of Hyperion images taken recently by Cassini:
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I'm watching the next couple of days' worth of raw images in the faint hope that someone thought of a sceintifically useful reason to get images during today's transit of Titan across the disk of Saturn. A little something for everyone - curved ring shadow, edge-on rings, big fat moon covered with haze...
Order of Kilopi
Is this a transit as seen from Earth or as seen from Cassini?I'm watching the next couple of days' worth of raw images in the faint hope that someone thought of a sceintifically useful reason to get images during today's transit of Titan across the disk of Saturn. A little something for everyone - curved ring shadow, edge-on rings, big fat moon covered with haze...
Order of Kilopi
ESA's little Flash orbit gizmo shows Titan between Cassini and Saturn on some time March 1 to March 2.
Established Member
Almost there - transmission still hasn't finished March 1, when the Titan transit happened between about 2230 and 2400 UT, but here's one of that set of littler icy ones I still confuse, seen in transit:ESA's little Flash orbit gizmo shows Titan between Cassini and Saturn on some time March 1 to March 2.
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedi...iImageID=33965
There is also a nice series of one of the inner ones in silhouette just "below" the rings, such as http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedi...iImageID=33830
Member
I think that one is either Janus or Epimetheus; their orbit seems to be a little bit inclined like that.
Order of Kilopi
Order of Kilopi
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Vulcan Administrator
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.
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Ooh - a triple with ring!
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/multimedi...iImageID=35536
Order of Kilopi
Art and Science
As artful as it is informative, this captivating portrait captures Saturn's wispy moon Dione over the shoulder of smoggy Titan in a single inspiring scene. Dione is 1,118 kilometers (695 miles) across and Titan is 5,150 kilometers (3,200 miles) across.
Vulcan Administrator
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.
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I ToSeeked them:
That is, if I actually remembered to post that somewhere.ops:
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More close-up images of Enceladus:
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