My first planet imaged in Singapore: Jupiter at opposition on 08 Dec 2024

[cytan299]

Hi everyone,
I took the opportunity to take my first Jupiter (and first planet) in Singapore while Jupiter was at opposition on 08 Dec 2024. My images were taken despite Mother nature literally giving me the finger with a cloud shaped like that just when the Great Red Spot was coming into view:

clouds.jpg

------------- [Note: The following paragraph has been Apple AI enhanced, I just had to try it ]
I was about to throw in the towel when I spotted that cloud, but I held on because I hadn’t given up yet. So, I decided to take a chance. And guess what? The satellite photo animation showed a good chance that the cloud would clear up between 11 pm and 1 am. I’m so glad I stuck with it! Earlier that evening, storm clouds passed overhead at 7 pm (according to the Singapore weather service, it wouldn’t rain. If it had, I’d have sent them a stern email). But thankfully, it didn’t rain. After the clouds parted at around 11:30 pm, the edges of Jupiter danced and waved at me for the whole session. It’s incredible how modern image processing techniques can extract something decent from those images, but let’s be honest, they can’t compare to the images I’ve taken with clear skies.
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I had wanted to upload an animation of the images that I took but since singastro disallows animated gifs, mp4's or apng's, I'm only uploading the best image of the lot that I had captured during that brief window (and if you're wondering, just 4 decent images out of 8):

00_07_06_lapl6_ap253_WS.jpg

Technical specs: ETX125 + Vivitar 3x teleconverter + ASI224MC.
Software: AutoStakker4! and WaveSharp 1.0 beta.

Of course, there's always improvements that can be made . So after about 24 hours, I decided to reprocess with waveSharp 2.0 which seemed to give better results. Here's what I have, again, of the best of the lot:

00_07_06_lapl6_ap253_WS2.jpg

I think the above does look sharper than the original.

cytan

[bernardchew]

Nice! Your photos inspired me to drag out my Intes 150mm f12 maksutov to look at Jupiter tonight. Decent views similar to your photos when clouds parted and atmosphere was steady. But couldn’t do imaging as my current setup with ASI Air not suitable for planetary imaging.

[cytan299]

Nice! Your photos inspired me to drag out my Intes 150mm f12 maksutov to look at Jupiter tonight. Decent views similar to your photos when clouds parted and atmosphere was steady. But couldn’t do imaging as my current setup with ASI Air not suitable for planetary imaging.

Hi Bernard,
I'm glad you took the chance to take your scope out last night. I, OTOH, relied on our useless Singapore weather service predictions. I should've given up on them because their prediction for "totally cloudy" was completely wrong because it was clear for a few hours! If I had known, I would've set up my scope to image Saturn rather than make other plans. Really annoying.

cytan

P.S. I will continue ragging on the Singapore weather service until their predictions improve. If anyone from this service is on this forum, what's going on with your weather group? Are you doing anything to improve your predictions?

[joachim.ong]

Nice image with a very modestly size scope! Weather in the tropics is always very volatile and unpredictable. so forecast will have to be taken with a pinch of salt. Unfortunately it is not like in drier climates where they can plan observations hours or days in advance. I think experience from watching the satellite image and cloud patterns in the sky may be more reliable than forecasts in SG.

[cytan299]

Nice image with a very modestly size scope! Weather in the tropics is always very volatile and unpredictable. so forecast will have to be taken with a pinch of salt. Unfortunately it is not like in drier climates where they can plan observations hours or days in advance. I think experience from watching the satellite image and cloud patterns in the sky may be more reliable than forecasts in SG.

Thanks! Seeing was really terrible and I'm glad that the final result was decent.

As for the weather predictions: since you brought up looking at satellite images and using experience to judge whether it'll be overcast or not, I've already done what you've suggested. However, my point is that since we can use our own brains for doing this, a weather AI can do it too. It'll probably perform better than any human if trained properly. And using AI is sooo obvious that I hope the Singapore weather service is looking into it and not simply relying on old methods to do weather predictions. In my experience, their 2 hours nowcast predictions are often wrong as well. If this type of lousy predictions persist, at some point it'll piss me off enough that I'll just do it myself.

cytan

[joachim.ong]

As for the weather predictions: since you brought up looking at satellite images and using experience to judge whether it'll be overcast or not, I've already done what you've suggested. However, my point is that since we can use our own brains for doing this, a weather AI can do it too. It'll probably perform better than any human if trained properly. And using AI is sooo obvious that I hope the Singapore weather service is looking into it and not simply relying on old methods to do weather predictions. In my experience, their 2 hours nowcast predictions are often wrong as well. If this type of lousy predictions persist, at some point it'll piss me off enough that I'll just do it myself.
cytan

Ah yeah AI... If you ever find something more robust, do share it with us!

[cytan299]

As for the weather predictions: since you brought up looking at satellite images and using experience to judge whether it'll be overcast or not, I've already done what you've suggested. However, my point is that since we can use our own brains for doing this, a weather AI can do it too. It'll probably perform better than any human if trained properly. And using AI is sooo obvious that I hope the Singapore weather service is looking into it and not simply relying on old methods to do weather predictions. In my experience, their 2 hours nowcast predictions are often wrong as well. If this type of lousy predictions persist, at some point it'll piss me off enough that I'll just do it myself.
cytan

Ah yeah AI... If you ever find something more robust, do share it with us!

O, this project will require both time and $$$, which, of course, are always in scarce supply

cytan