Jupiter

Return to Planets

Jupiter is the largest planet object in the Solar System and provides some of the most interesting photographic opportunities. Four of the Jovian Moons are bright enough to see with very modest optics such as binoculars and are a challenge to capture along with the great gas giant planet. Jupiter rotates quickly, spinning once every 10 hours or so. As a result the planet has racing stripes or bands. The bands are clouds of different colors and within the bands you can see what look like swirling storms as the clouds mix along the border lines. Another feature of Jupiter is a large storm known as the Great Red Spot - even though it more of a light pink or salmon color.

Our attempts to obtain an image of Jupiter started with afocal lens projection and negative projection (through a barlow) on to film. We were lucky to capture the central bands and to see the moons we had to over expose the planet. The results were most non triumphant.

Meade 10" - Negative projection

Things got a lot better with the arrival digital CCD cameras. The Sirius CWIP-12a CCD was designed for planetary imaging and produced excellent black and white results.

Meade 10" w/barlow - CWIP-12a Blue 80 filter

Meade 10" w/barlow - CWIP-12a variable filters

Using a digital camera afocal style produced some decent results. At least they were in color.

Celestron 5" with Canon EOS Rebel afocal

Then the Meade LPI CCD camera came into the picture and the results are amazing.

Celestron 5" with 2x barlow - LPI

Questar 3.5" with 2x barlow - LPI

Jupiter with three moons visible - Questar 3.5" with 2x barlow - LPI

 

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