Unintended uses...

Dec 6, 2014
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South Dakota
So I am wondering who has aimed their PTZ skyward?
I zoomed in on Venus and Jupiter for a while tonight--- boy that really messes with auto-focus, and the lack of defined objects in frame seems to send noise skyrocketing. Still, I noticed while zoomed in I could see a LOT of satellites that would not be visible otherwise. It was interesting to mess with settings to try and improve the picture on my SD49225XA-HNR PTZ to try to get it to do something for which it was not intended. LOL

A clip from this evening. Venus is the bright fuzzy ball of light, and a very dim satellite goes by underneath. At one point I had 3 different very-dim satellites going through the zoomed frame in different directions. Focus really is the hardest part. So--- who else has done this, and have you been able to better dial in settings??

View attachment Clipboard_Front-ptz.20230223_195307-195338.112.mp4
 
When you point at the sky for that type of viewing, it is one of the few times that the auto settings work best for.

I have been able to see the moons of other planets with my PTZ.

I got this cool shot of the space station with my Reolink :lmao:

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LOL.... I was trying to zoom in on Jupiter which has moons that are pretty easily visible... too low in the sky when I tried though.

Geee... maybe I should get a Reolink system! :D :winktongue: :highfive:
 
There have been some Clear night recently where after Sunset, Venus Jupiter and Mars were in a line in the western sky.
 
There have been some Clear night recently where after Sunset, Venus Jupiter and Mars were in a line in the western sky.
the moon, Venus, and Jupiter were all lined up tonight... caught my attention when I let the dogs out.
 
This is from the Stellarium App. I pointed it at Jupiter last week. ...to see what else was out there. and it tells me whats in that field of view.
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What do you get when you point it at Uranus :lmao:
Yeah--- can you see the ring around it? :rofl:

Great ad on my star app...
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And it turns out I DID get some fuzzy pics of the moons of Jupiter. I had Venus & Jupiter mixed up... :)
 
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Reminds me of a VERY old joke...

Q: You know how the starship Enterprise and toilet paper are similar?
A: They both circle Uranus hoping to get Klingons....

:highfive:
 
A neighbor's brother just flew up to Alaska. One the things he wants to see is the Aura Borealis. A little too cold for this old Desert Rat.
there is a Fakebook group based in South Dakota for people to get notified when it's going to happen. Good photography results come out of that group. This was taken by someone posting there-- taken at Bear Butte over by Sturgis (where the motorcycle Rally is in August).


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