Great Views Of Saturn

rehannan writes "Saturn is now a mere 750 million miles from earth; the closest point in it's 30-year orbit. Saturn's rings are facing earth this time around, which should make for some pretty good views. For more details, check out Space.com or the CNN article."

Comments

close isn't that much closer

[bcrowell]

For Saturn, close isn't really that much closer than any other time. Saturn's orbit has a radius about 10 times Earth's, so the shortest distance between Earth and Saturn is only about 10% shorter than average.

Now what's really going to be cool is Mars's opposition coming up in August, which is going to be the closest in thousands of years.

I have a little planetarium applet that lets you play around and look at this kind of stuff.

Re:close isn't that much closer

[Spock the Baptist]

"Now what's really going to be cool is Mars's opposition coming up in August, which is going to be the closest in thousands of years"

Yep...

It ought to be a really striking opposition. This would be a good Christmas to get that promising young scientist a not so shine new telescope.

Right after Santa pays a visit he/she can go outside and see great views of both Saturn, and Jupiter and still not miss their bedtime.

A telescope, a microscope, and chemistry set, all on one Christmas morning! Not to mention that Radio 100 in 1 electronic experiment set!

Ah! The joy of being a young nerd!

Re:close isn't that much closer

[rehannan]

I think the biggest deal is the fact that teh rings are facing towards us more than they usually do. I was able to see the rings last night with a simple little telescope (not sure what the magnification was). It was pretty darn cool.

Re:Numbskulls.

[CanSpice]

Do you expect to see Saturn's rings face-on? The view of the rings changes from year to year, as you've implied. However, at no point do we ever see the rings directly face-on. At most we'd see them tipped about 28 degrees towards us, not the 90 you'd expect if they were directly face-on.

Stupid required subject field

[PaddyM]

My only view on Saturn is that Sega didn't do a good enough job marketing it.

oxymoron

[Transcendent]

a mere 750 million miles

=\

great way to get some nice shots of saturn

[evacuate_the_bull]

webcam astronomy

this guy has great instructions on how to "mod" your telescope for a webcam addition as well as documentation on how best to capture these images.

this chance comes along about once a lifetime, take advantage of it!

Help choosing a telescope?

[Trane Francks]

It's a great idea and I'm totally stoked. This leads me to the very real problem of choosing an appropriate telescope. I got a 100x "department store" 'scope last year and it's barely useful for looking at the moon. There's too much chromatic abberation and the optics are plastic junk. My airline mileage club telescope has been more of a frustration than anything.

I will confess that I'm partial to the Celestron 'scopes. Which Celestron scopes would be good to get a view of the rings? Please bear in mind that I live in Tokyo, so I'm entirely unsure of whether an equatorial mount is appropriate due to light pollution affecting my ability to sight on Polaris. Therefore, comments regarding the use of telescopes in bright areas are highly encouraged.

Is it even possible within a bright city such as Tokyo to see Saturn and Jupiter?

Saw it last night

[Caractacus Potts]

Wow! Turns out I have a neighbor who has an 8" telescope. He set it up the other night in a nearby park and let passersby take a look at Saturn and Jupiter. With this size scope you can see the gaps in between Saturn's rings and multiple bands on Jupiter. No matter how many Hubble pictures you look at, it's still a great experience to see these things with you own eyes. There's currently a guy on eBay selling 284 6" scopes. Maybe one of them has my name on it...