Latest Looking ahead article (Rev149: May 30 - Jun 29) is up.
- Iapetus observations
- Titan-Rhea mutual event
- close (6,968 km) flyby of Helene
- Titan flyby
Interesting stuff.
A rare view of Iapetus, slight high-pass filter applied to reduce glare in the sunlit ice:
Image of Saturn on June 4, 2011. Assembled from CB2, GRN, and BL1 images:
Lots of Iapetus images have been posted on Cassini's raw image page http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/?start=1&storedQ=2350116.
Iapetus' double impact basin front-n-center. June 7th, IR1/GRN/UV3.
Much appreciated Gordan. It's great to see the old walnut moon again, and from a new angle.
Has any new terrain been revealed in this view? Obviously it isn't the best resolution, but just out of curiosity.
Imagine if you could rock Iapetus back and forth in your hand... well, this is the next best thing:
http://youtu.be/qY2DMMak5L8?hd=1
I downloaded all the flyby images this morning with the idea of assembling an animation if I find the time, but I think I'll just enjoy what has been done already.
Another random snapshot from the Iapetus sequence, June 9th, IR1/GRN/UV3:
Great as per usual, Gordan.
I've updated my Iapetus 'bouncy' flyby movie, which is derived from a sequence of 203 frames; tweened to 406:
http://youtu.be/qY2DMMak5L8?hd=1
as for Iapetus, my only wish would be to have high-res image - in daylight - of the snowman craters..
Its sad we don't get anymore closer flybys.
I'll take anything we can get.
Ian amazing work!
Methanovision composite [MT3,MT2,CB2] with an overlaid CB2 image to enhance cloud detail taken on June 11, 2011:
Mike, another fantastic composition - such beauty! Keep up the great work!
Two frame blink animation of two MethanoVision [MT3,MT2,CB2] composites from June 13, 2011. Some neat storm structures. It is subtle, but a counterclockwise motion can be seen in the left swirl looking at the inner cloud motions.
June 14, 2011 image. Not this might be similar (1 or two rotations?) to the view seen above. Note a new upwelling to the W of the bright little (cute!) cloud swirl.
I can haz mutual event?
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=238919
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=238924
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=238928
http://saturn.jpl.nasa.gov/photos/raw/rawimagedetails/index.cfm?imageID=238938
Oo, now they're getting all fancy with their camera angles. I assume that they did that technically to take advantage of the diagonal of their square FOV being 1.4 times longer than the path straight across...but it doesn't hurt that it looks cool!!
Until someone makes an animation of this mutual event, here's a quickly trown together cross-eyed 3D view of the encounter.
I had lunch with Carolyn Porco a couple of weeks ago and asked her about these "tourist" photos - i.e., was there valuable scientific data being obtained or was it sightseeing? She said that she actually has quite a fondness for these kinds of beautiful images. They add so much to the perception of the Saturn system as a "place," and so they are planned even though there is really no scientific data to be gleaned from them. I suspect that the positive PR impact gained from these sightseeing photos certainly is worth the hydrazine to aim the camera.
Don't go around looking for any alien bases, you might find them...
....that is drop-dead gorgeous, Gordan!!!
SUH-WEET!
Until someone makes an animation...
Well, not exactly an animation but a 15 second movie based on the Cassini images.
Rhea_Titan.wmv ( 854.28K )
: 861
or on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CXtk06d27Jg.
Enjoy
Astro0, very moving
Very nice and seamless, Astro0!
Wow, they totally NAILED it this time!
Holy smokes! Downslope flow features?
P
Wow. These tiny moons never fail to bewilder.
... that's a pretty astonishing little body. The solar system seems to have an endless supply of surprises.
I guess this is the face that launched a thousand [space]ships. Or a thousand excited exclamations of a word that sounds like ship.
RGB composites, one in natural-ish contrast and another contrast-enhanced:
I'm posting a link to my Helene 'mini-atlas' for reference:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/10795027@N08/4937315630/sizes/l/in/set-72157624830467026/
Wow. Yet another object in the Saturn system that qualifies as one of the strangest ones I've ever seen. Maybe it's becoming necessary to redefine what strange means in this context because the 'stereotype' small and irregular asteroids/moons with nothing but craters seem to be really rare.
I get the impression that we may be looking at erosion features but I'm not sure how something like that might work.
Congratulations to the Cassini team for perfect pointing this time.
Excellent images! Ski slopes on the Saturn's moon!
Surface of Helene is really extraordinary and it looks, that it is very young.
It looks as if a surface crust is eroding away... very odd.
Phil
Here's a 'bouncy' flyby movie:
http://youtu.be/HiHSM-_fes4?hd=1
Great work Ian. I know how time consuming that can be.
Is that series cycling through images taken with different filters?
Great work, everyone.
Phil
To me, it looks like ring material is coating up and loading onto the surface. Then at some point, it releases and makes an avalanche that fills into the basin.
Trying to get a sense of scale, this is about the size of a big avalanche chute on Earth, but I imagine the whole motion being much gentler due to the really low gravity.
Amazing image and interesting craters and errosion of the surface.
Awesome with a capital 'awe'
I've been looking forward to this flyby for a couple of months. I get home from work hoping to browse the raw images; and come here first to find that not only was the camera pointing inch-perfect, but the raw images have been enhanced and stacked, there's a cross-eye stereo view to enjoy, and even a flyby movie on 'You tube'
Phenomenal work everybody!!
I'm sure there's a little detail to be teased out courtesy of saturnshine too.....
Incredible. Thanks again and again to the Cassini team and all of the image mavens here for providing the rest of us with a seemingly endless chain of such awe inspiring moments. Longest day of the year (almost), and I have a sudden yearning for winter.
Looks kinda like a used painting sponge:
No, that's Hyperion!
Phil
I'd love a hi-res enough view to do a good comparison of Helene's flow features with Martian gullies.
Thanks CASSINI and UMSF image mages....
Agree with Juramike and ugordan. Think this is some ring particle loading phenomenon.
Whatever.... man... is she beautiful!!!!
Craig
Good... ***grief***...
Just got back from a day in Blackpool (bought some rock, ate some ice cream, met some daleks, as you do) and went online to see what I've missed -
Look at THAT!!!
I'll say it too: great work everyone who worked on these images. Just brilliant processing and "citizen science" (hate that term but it seems to have stuck... oh well...)
See, DAWN team? See what happens when you release your images quickly and generously? People like those here treat them with care and admiration and use them to create works of art and wonder, which get other people buzzing like bees on crack about your mission! Stop ****ing about and let those pictures fly free!!
Stu: Well said!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Helene: !!! GREAT work, everyone!
After seeing this, I'm beginning to wonder if Cassini herself might glaze over in a few years!
I'm just blown away by the subtlety of the light in this image - the first frame in Cassini's Helene sequence - image N00172780.
Does anyone know if the light shining at the bottom of the frame is Saturn's limb/terminator, a moon or some other feature? Is the planet part of the background?
Also, with an eXtreme contrast stretch (right), Helene's body comes out of the darkness
I wonder if the color changes on the surface are a grain-size phenomenon? Fine coating --> lumpy bigger grained avalanche debris
or grains on the surface slowly subliming-redepositing to get bigger grains, then getting ground down to dust during the avalanche event? (initial Fine coating --> bigger recrystallized grains --> avalanche dust). Hyperion also has the same kinda look.
Anyone know if VIMS also got images?
"Anyone know if VIMS also got images?"
It's highly probable. VIMS worked together with ISS almost every close flyby . This was for example case of last Helene flyby and
results has similarly bad alignment.
Anyone else reminded of Clarke's novel, A Fall of Moondust ?
High praise for that high phase... WOW !
Stanley Kubrick would be envious.
The distant view from January essentially shows the same side of Helene, albeit illuminated from the opposite angle:
http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA12758
Now, the caption states that this is the trailing hemisphere, which I *think* is a mistake; the 'Eyes on the Solar System' simulation and the http://www.flickr.com/photos/10795027@N08/4937315630/in/set-72157624830467026 suggest that this is actually the leading hemisphere.
Here are two shots from the January and June flybys side-by-side:
Fantastic finding!
From this angle Helene looks like heart, what it is not very surprising, when one come to realize, that Helen was beautiful Troy's princess.
Very nice, Dilo!
Phil
I concur with Phil: Dilo, that was a really good idea to colourise the two halves in different hues; both informative and eye-catching!
Phil, as an expert in small heavenly bodies, do you agree that this is indeed the leading hemisphere of Helene?
This flyby made me go back and take another look at the images Cassini took from last year's encounter. I decided to stack the Saturn-shine pictures, resulting in a reasonable enhancement of the facing hemisphere:
Very nice. I think that other face is the leading side as you say.
Phil
Just "discovered" Helene, what a peculiar-looking moon! Any idea what its surface gravity would be?
Here's my RGB composite from N00172891, N00172892, and N001728913
007 m/s2 from Wolfram Alpha: http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=helene+surface+gravity
The equation is pretty simple to calculate oneself, though: g = G * M / r2.
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