Archive for the 'My vids' Category

It isn’t a bird, it isn’t a plane…

Posted by on May 27th 2013 in Astrostuff, My vids
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I caught this thing on video while out shooting the Moon with my telescope this morning.

This clip is a 10fps cut from a 1-minute video, originally 60fps.
No post-processing apart from the addition of frame times and numbers in VirtualDub.

Telescope: 6" f/9 RC Astrograph - 152mm Aperture / 1370mm Focal Length.
Camera: DMK 21AU04.AS (Sony ICX098BL CCD chip 640 x 480 pixels @ 5.6 µm x 5.6 µm).
Calculated FOV: 6.7 x 9.0 arcmin.
FOV centre: Alt: 17 deg, Az: 178 deg, RA: 18h, Dec: -21 deg

I'm trying to work out if it's a satellite, a rock or just space-junk.

If I figure it out, I'll let you know.

Maths Test

Posted by on May 21st 2013 in Just for fun, My vids, Video (YouTube, Vimeo etc.)

Good with numbers? Try this for size:

Given that the video's angular field of view was 18' x 14' and that the original frame-rate was 60fps, estimate the speed of the photo-bombing bird and its distance from the camera.

Assume that the flight was parallel to the plane of the camera's sensor and that the bird's speed was constant during the fly-past.

You'll need to suss the size of the bird yourself, and that depends on what species of bird you reckon it was. The best-guesses (according to incoming emails) include Falcon, Gull and Pigeon.

Show your calculations.

 

Bird photo-bombing Sunday's sunspot shoot.

Observing Report 1st-2nd April 2013 (Another pop at Pan-STARRS)

Posted by on April 4th 2013 in Astrostuff, My vids, Observing Reports, Pics
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Same Comet, same conditions, same tree, same faff, different night:

Comet Pan-STARRS (C/2011 L4).
Subs: 25 light @ 30s, darks, bias frames, ISO1600.
1000D on the 6" R-C, unguided.

The main difference is that this time there's a time-lapse movie. I created it from 100 frames, each representing 30 seconds of exposure and 5 seconds of "gap", so that's nigh on an hour crammed into this 10-second clip:

No peace for the wicked

Posted by on March 17th 2013 in My vids, Rambling on...
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So there I was, sitting in a car-park in town after dropping-off one daughter to meet the other for some united retail therapy. While waiting for them to return I was enjoying a rare moment of peace and quiet until this little fecker decided to shatter the peace and take umbrage at me and my car. It didn't hassle anybody else and I've no idea what I'd done to upset it but it was barking like mad while chucking nutshells and bits of stick at me and the car. It wouldn't shut up or leave me alone until I'd recorded its noisy antics on the phone and then played it back at max volume:

https://www.youtube.com/v/7d26oBHrm5Y

I'll have the little sod next time - I'll take my catty and some ball-bearings and then we'll see who's the boss. He'll go well in a game casserole  🙂 

Radiotext fail

Posted by on October 17th 2012 in My vids

I can do without this sort of confusion in the morning:

 

 

🙂

A class act

Posted by on October 11th 2012 in My vids

Band Night at the local high school* is always a great occasion, the talents of the pupils really do get let loose on the audience.

There's always a good mix of genres - some jazz, some thrash-metal, some pop-classics (usually played by the staff) - but IMO this performance was head and shoulders above the others:

??

Just in case you're wondering, it's a rip from the DVD that I bought from the school.

Four times I've asked the copyright-holder for permission to post it, and four times I've had no reply.

Hopefully the maxim "Qui tacet consentire" still holds in these matters.

* years 7-9, ages 11-14
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