Blue features on Jupiter: Are these common?

I was observing Jupiter last night at about 11pm, and noticed a
prominent feature on the equatorial side of one of the two equatorial
belts (never can work out which way is north!)

I took a picture of it with my LPI (sorry, my astrophotography skills
are few, but I am quite pleased with it as a first attempt, especially
since I was using a Macintosh to take the image and do the image
processing, since I don't have a Windows PC any more) and the image is
at:

http://www.thecutts.org/users/tim/astro/Jupiter.jpg

As you can see, and to my inexperienced surprise, this feature is quite
distinctly blue. Is this sort of feature quite common?

Tim

Tim Cutts wrote:
I was observing Jupiter last night at about 11pm, and noticed a
prominent feature on the equatorial side of one of the two equatorial
belts (never can work out which way is north!)

I took a picture of it with my LPI (sorry, my astrophotography skills
are few, but I am quite pleased with it as a first attempt, especially
since I was using a Macintosh to take the image and do the image
processing, since I don't have a Windows PC any more) and the image is
at:

http://www.thecutts.org/users/tim/astro/Jupiter.jpg

As you can see, and to my inexperienced surprise, this feature is quite
distinctly blue. Is this sort of feature quite common?

Tim

Hey......that's a great image, the blue feature is very prominent.

What Mac software did you use to get this image?

Yes, they are quite common (12 to 13 are present on the Jovian
Equatorial Zone (EZ) at any given time). They are usually called
festoons or dark/blue EZ projections. They arise from the southern
border of the North Equatorial Belt (now you know which side is north)
and plunge into the EZ.

BTW, not too bad for a first attempt.

Best

Andrea T.

On 22 Apr 2005 17:56:08 +0100 (BST) in uk.sci.astronomy, Tim Cutts
wrote:

http://www.thecutts.org/users/tim/astro/Jupiter.jpg

What a superb picture!
--
Phil Stovell, Hampshire, United Kingdom

I do not reply to usenet posts containing ad hominems.
Except in uk.politics.misc, of course, which is nothing but.

In article ,
Karatepe wrote:
Tim Cutts wrote:
I was observing Jupiter last night at about 11pm, and noticed a
prominent feature on the equatorial side of one of the two equatorial
belts (never can work out which way is north!)

I took a picture of it with my LPI (sorry, my astrophotography skills
are few, but I am quite pleased with it as a first attempt, especially
since I was using a Macintosh to take the image and do the image
processing, since I don't have a Windows PC any more) and the image is
at:

http://www.thecutts.org/users/tim/astro/Jupiter.jpg

As you can see, and to my inexperienced surprise, this feature is quite
distinctly blue. Is this sort of feature quite common?

Tim

Hey......that's a great image, the blue feature is very prominent.

Thanks!

What Mac software did you use to get this image?

I captured a Quicktime movie for about 30 seconds using Keith's
AstroImager, and then used Keith's Image Stacker to stack the images and
perform the unsharp mask, and finally Photoshop Elements for a little
final tweaking (there was a very bright moon not far from Jupiter last
night, so the sky background wasn't totally dark).

Tim

Tim Cutts wrote:

What Mac software did you use to get this image?

I captured a Quicktime movie for about 30 seconds using Keith's
AstroImager, and then used Keith's Image Stacker to stack the images and
perform the unsharp mask, and finally Photoshop Elements for a little
final tweaking (there was a very bright moon not far from Jupiter last
night, so the sky background wasn't totally dark).

What cam are you using? I take it it's not an iSight?

Jim
--
Find me at http://www.ursaminorbeta.co.uk AIM/iChatAV: JCAndrew2
Lost: Stack Pointer. Small reward offered if found.

I notice that they appear on the images from Patrick's Newt as well.

"Tim Cutts" wrote in message
...
I was observing Jupiter last night at about 11pm, and noticed a
prominent feature on the equatorial side of one of the two equatorial
belts (never can work out which way is north!)

I took a picture of it with my LPI (sorry, my astrophotography skills
are few, but I am quite pleased with it as a first attempt, especially
since I was using a Macintosh to take the image and do the image
processing, since I don't have a Windows PC any more) and the image is
at:

http://www.thecutts.org/users/tim/astro/Jupiter.jpg

As you can see, and to my inexperienced surprise, this feature is quite
distinctly blue. Is this sort of feature quite common?

Tim

In article ,
Jim wrote:
Tim Cutts wrote:

What Mac software did you use to get this image?

I captured a Quicktime movie for about 30 seconds using Keith's
AstroImager, and then used Keith's Image Stacker to stack the images and
perform the unsharp mask, and finally Photoshop Elements for a little
final tweaking (there was a very bright moon not far from Jupiter last
night, so the sky background wasn't totally dark).

What cam are you using? I take it it's not an iSight?

I was using the Meade LPI that came with my LX-90 telescope. It's
possible to find Mac drivers for the CCD chip the LPI uses out on the
net, although you won't find them anywhere near Meade's website, of
course.

Tim