Tonight, on the 40th anniversary of the first man setting foot on the moon, I realized that the International Space Station (ISS) was doing another fly-by at an estimated magnitude of -3.3*, so I taped it; sorta.
I have stacked 4 images into one here and screened them together using Photoshop.
Not the best astro-photography to be sure but it marks the occasion and isn’t bad for a point and shoot.
I set the camera to Shutter Speed Priority, set the shutter to four seconds, ISO at 400, put the exposure bias to -2 and set it upside down on the ground…on a t-shirt. Oh and I also set it to take ten, 3 second pictures in a row.
Here, once I thought that maybe the subject was out of range of my original placement I moved the camera so that if the ISS flared again like Saturday night I might capture it.
It didn’t flare again, but it sure looks like it wiggled a lot.
The flare: On Saturday I woke La Grande Mermaid up at 22:56 to see the ISS fly over at an estimated magnitude of -3.5 and, well, she doesn’t wake up too easy; but I was eventually successful, she did see it, and she corroborates my story about the flare on the south side.
BopOp and Monya, watching from 2+ miles away didn’t notice a flare.
I didn’t see a flare tonight but still really cool all the same; especially so because tonight there were 13 astronauts on board with the new crew from the now docked shuttle Endeavour coming on recently. I think that makes this the cut-over from Expedition 20 to Expedition 21 combined shuttle and Expedition 20 crew the largest crew under one roof in space ever. Expedition 21 is expected to take command in October of 2009.
Considering where we were forty years ago, where we are today, where we could be if only…well it is all pretty amazing that we can do this at all.
Go Space Station Go!
* by the way, a magnitude of -3.3 is no slouch; the wikipedia article on apparent magnitude claims the following apparent magnitudes:
−4.7 Maximum brightness of Venus and the International Space Station (when the ISS is at its perigee and fully lit by the sun)[3]
−3.9 Faintest objects observable during the day with naked eye
−3.8 Minimum brightness of Venus when it is on the far side of the Sun
−3.0 Maximum brightness of Mars
−2.8 Maximum brightness of Jupiter
−1.9 Maximum brightness of Mercury
−1.47 Brightest star (except for the sun) at visible wavelengths: Sirius
blief 
Very interesting list of apparent magnitudes. I’ll bet most people don’t understand the “daytime” portion of the “faintest” observable during the day” statement.
I guess that means the apparent size of the ISS is comparable to the apparent size of Venus. Amazing! I can see the shape of Venus with my telescope, so that might mean I could see some type of shape of the ISS, assuming I could track it steadily enough.
Your first four frames are a nice example of astro-photography. I’ll bet Jerry can tell you which stars are in the background too.
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North is roughly towards the bottom left corner of the frame though more to the right of that.
Top just left of center is Corona Borealis.
Top just right of center is the keystone of Hercules
Left center is the top of Bootes
The head of Draco can be seen on the right side just up from the bottom and the bright star that is in the lower left almost lost in the camera amp glow is Alkaid the last star in the handle of the big dipper.
I sent an annotated version of the picture to Lief.
Very cool shot though. I bet if I had my hands on the full resolution images I could highlight M13, M92 and maybe a galaxy or two. You’d be surprised at what you can find in the image.
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