Size Comparism Of The Moons Of The Gas Planets, Moon Systems of the gas giants compared |
Size Comparism Of The Moons Of The Gas Planets, Moon Systems of the gas giants compared |
Guest_spaceffm_* |
Nov 15 2005, 12:10 AM
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edited out
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Nov 30 2005, 12:23 AM
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Member Group: Members Posts: 259 Joined: 23-January 05 From: Seattle, WA Member No.: 156 |
Say - not to drag things off topic here - and it's sort of a size question, in the generic (not technical) sense of magnitude - but...
Has anyone here ever seen a graphical comparison of the albedos of various solar system bodies? One's always reading about how the Moon's albedo is really quite low, so that images of the Earth and Moon have to amp up the Moon's relative brightness so it can be seen, or about how such-and-such object (comet, asteroid, TNO) is "black as coal". But I've never seen a graphical comparison, or an attempt to relate albedos other than coal or fresh snow to ordinary objects. |
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Nov 30 2005, 01:00 AM
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Senior Member Group: Members Posts: 2530 Joined: 20-April 05 Member No.: 321 |
QUOTE (Gsnorgathon @ Nov 29 2005, 04:23 PM) Say - not to drag things off topic here - and it's sort of a size question, in the generic (not technical) sense of magnitude - but... Has anyone here ever seen a graphical comparison of the albedos of various solar system bodies? One's always reading about how the Moon's albedo is really quite low, so that images of the Earth and Moon have to amp up the Moon's relative brightness so it can be seen, or about how such-and-such object (comet, asteroid, TNO) is "black as coal". But I've never seen a graphical comparison, or an attempt to relate albedos other than coal or fresh snow to ordinary objects. FWIW, the different bodies receive different levels of solar illumination, so the Moon is actually brighter per unit surface area than, say, Uranus. One thing that makes it hard to display albedos accurately is that monitors just aren't bright enough -- not even close. A white screen in a dark room is much dimmer than coal in daylight. As it happens, Uranus is about the brightness of a monitor, but the first six planets and their moons are lit significantly more brightly. So you'd have to use bar graphs or something to represent the brightnesses. I once observed seven planets and the Moon through my telescope on the same night, sometimes getting a peek at two planets as fast as I could point (~2 min). Of course, rare (unless the Moon is one body) conjunctions let you compare two bodies at the same time through a low magnification. You can find pictures of Moon-planet occultations and compare away... |
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