Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
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Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#2Why are the pictures so fuzzy?
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#3Why are the pictures so fuzzy?
Perhaps because of the conditions of space + limited power supply?
Edit: Thank you to all the other posters who wrote way better answers with more information!
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#4Why are the pictures so fuzzy?
Insane Contrast ratio - ultra bright sunlight when the sun gets in the frame (no atmosphere to diffuse light) plus ultra dark hard shadows as the light source is millions of miles away, and again no atmosphere to diffuse the light.
Again ultra dark, so the camera needs to have an incredibly sensitive sensor.
And incredible motion, the spacecraft is whipping by the asteroid quickly.. so you'd need a fast shutter speed to get sharp detail. Which is made difficult by the lighting conditions.
No human photographer on the shutter button. Way too far away for that.
Incredibly challenging photographic environment.
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#5Wonder what material that greyish rock looking stuff on the surface is.
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#6Wonder what material that greyish rock looking stuff on the surface is.
I went poking around Wikpedia. Ryugu's surface is mostly carbon. It's also a "rubble pile" and about 50% of its volume is empty space. There could even be large voids within because the force of friction between pieces is greater than the force of gravity holding it together.
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#7Why are the pictures so fuzzy?
Insane Contrast ratio - ultra bright sunlight when the sun gets in the frame (no atmosphere to diffuse light) plus ultra dark hard shadows as the light source is millions of miles away, and again no atmosphere to diffuse the light. Again ultra dark, so the camera needs to have an incredibly sensitive sensor. And incredible motion, the spacecraft is whipping by the asteroid quickly.. so you'd need a fast shutter speed…
> no atmosphere to diffuse light
Could the spacecraft—just in theory—introduce an atmosphere? Maybe not this spacecraft, but if we’re riding around in the starship Enterprise and want to get better snaps of asteroids, would it be a good idea to just send out a big pair of glass hemispheres, encapsulate the asteroid with them, pump them full of air, and then take a picture of the asteroid-capsule system?
Alternately, could you stick something really good at diffusing light—like a big block of aerogel—between the sun and the asteroid?
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
Insane Contrast ratio - ultra bright sunlight when the sun gets in the frame (no atmosphere to diffuse light) plus ultra dark hard shadows as the light source is millions of miles away, and again no atmosphere to diffuse the light. Again ultra dark, so the camera needs to have an incredibly sensitive sensor. And incredible motion, the spacecraft is whipping by the asteroid quickly.. so you'd need a fast shutter speed…
> no atmosphere to diffuse light Could the spacecraft—just in theory— introduce an atmosphere? Maybe not this spacecraft, but if we’re riding around in the starship Enterprise and want to get better snaps of asteroids, would it be a good idea to just send out a big pair of glass hemispheres, encapsulate the asteroid with them, pump them full of air, and then take a picture of the asteroid-capsule system? Alternately,…
It... might be easier to 3D-scan the asteroid and render it with the lighting conditions of your choice in a 3D program?
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#9Earlier quoted context omitted.
Insane Contrast ratio - ultra bright sunlight when the sun gets in the frame (no atmosphere to diffuse light) plus ultra dark hard shadows as the light source is millions of miles away, and again no atmosphere to diffuse the light. Again ultra dark, so the camera needs to have an incredibly sensitive sensor. And incredible motion, the spacecraft is whipping by the asteroid quickly.. so you'd need a fast shutter speed…
> no atmosphere to diffuse light Could the spacecraft—just in theory— introduce an atmosphere? Maybe not this spacecraft, but if we’re riding around in the starship Enterprise and want to get better snaps of asteroids, would it be a good idea to just send out a big pair of glass hemispheres, encapsulate the asteroid with them, pump them full of air, and then take a picture of the asteroid-capsule system? Alternately,…
You'd need miles and miles of air to get the kind of blue sky environment we think of as diffuse light. If you wanted to try this trick, it would be easier just to deploy a big translucent sunshade over the frame.
Or just do the science with the camera you have and ignore the fact that human viewers don't like the results aesthetically.
Re: Japan’s Hayabusa2 spacecraft grabs close-up thirty feet above asteroid
#10It bothers me (too much) that we are going to space and still using 'feet' as a unit of measurement.