Week in Review: To boldly go

Exposure times for stars differ from that of other objects. If you expose an image of Jupiter from Earth for instance, you'll only see Jupiter's moons or stars if you dramatically over-expose the planet. If you don't, you won't see any moons or stars. As DR increases, this may change a bit. Plus, we don't know what direction the camera was pointing so the Milky Way, which appears as a band, might not be in view.

Jul 20, 2015permalink

PorscheDoc

Images taken of Pluto during New Horizons' approach should have the Milky Way in the background as Pluto is in Sagittarius and should appear close to Sgr A*. But due to DR limitations, the background is black. Remember that New Horizons was launched 9.5 years ago, using 10 year old sensor technology.

Jul 20, 2015permalink

jimrpdx

I paid $275 for my compact, a K-s1. Add a prime & go..

Jul 18, 2015permalink

(unknown member)

The price poll was really badly done. 3 options with a $100-200 price range, and then a single option with a $400 price range ($400-800). Of course you found the answer you were looking for DPR. Unfortunately, it also ended up not telling us very much at all.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

CaPi

I beg to differ. I found it quite interesting - and that includes the results.

Jul 19, 2015permalink

exapixel

We threw a grand piano faster than any other spacecraft in history over three *billion* miles. We hit a bullseye, and all the cameras and other sensors worked on the first and only try.

Great nations do great things. I'm proud to have paid for that trip. The probe also had some of Pluto's discoverer's ashes on board. That was very classy.

Jul 18, 2015*permalink

Flashback

I believe it was fitted with a Garmin..

Jul 19, 2015permalink

"Panasonic announced the first-ever 20MP Micro Four Thirds camera."

Product announcements are usually not reviews. Also, since we have had cameras with app. 20MP sensors for seemingly ions, and including all sorts of form factors and size sensors to boot -- why is it a "big deal" if Panasonic now is announcing one such camera with the same pixel density sensor?

Whereas I do not wish to rain on anyone's parade, summertime is usually not the time to get overly excited about new camera products and announcements about them. Let's hope this autumn and winter will bring a more palatable crop of them to fruition.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

bluevellet

Are you serious?

Jul 18, 2015permalink

exapixel

I don't see how ionization is relevant.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

ANAYV

Um, because after years of the 12MP sensor, they finally moved up to 16MP. That was years ago, and now, they finally moved up to 20MP.

First time any micro 4/3 had this much resolution. Panasonic was first to do it. If Olympus came out with it first, then they would be mentioned.
But I don't think they ever made a sensor, so they wait, whereas Panasonic does make their own sensors. Not saying it's their sensor in this new camera, but not an impossibility.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

Okay, so M4/3 sensor resolutions are what -- 5-6-7 years behind APS-C form factor size sensor resolutions. Why should Panasonic get some sort of a credit for THAT?

In fact, we have got 1-inch sensor cameras now with 20+ megapixels.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

(unknown member)

My 20 mp NX3000 aps-c camera which cost £189 actually has a lower pixel density than this camera. I use my EM5 MkI for its higher specification, ease of use and viewfinder but the cheap and cheerful Samsung camera for the best image quality. It is a funny old business this camera world.

Jul 19, 2015permalink

Hex144

16MP FT sensors already had higher pixel density than 24MP APS-C.

Jul 21, 2015permalink

@Nathan Cowlishaw: The present economic climate is neither the time nor the place for 'Star Trek' style adventurism and fantasy.

We should concentrate on solving the real problems we have with the limited resources available to us.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

Yawn. If mankind concentrated solely on the problems of the welfare class, we'd still be in the trees. You have about as much chance of solving them as the Greek Debt Crisis (more welfare). The REAL travesty is the $160-$200B they spent on the ISS, a floating white elephant that has produced almost NOTHING of value. Contrast that to the Hubble Telescope which for about $2 billion has become the most one of the most productive scientific instruments in history.

Jul 18, 2015*permalink

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/earth/earth-from-space.html

@Wubslin The solution of many, many pressing problems on Earth depend on space science. For example, few things have advanced weather/storm forecasting and climate science than the last 20 years of data from our satellites in space. Satellites do things like help farmers, including those in poor countries, find new sources of water. Or petroleum. Sun research helps us understand the solar flares that could knock out the electronics you are using to write your post.

Some of those satellites are reaching the end of their lives but the blind, ignorant cutting of space science may result in problems no longer being solved for millions of ordinary people on Earth.

The cost of the Pluto mission is less than one of the many sports stadiums that private owners managed to get partially funded by taxpayers in many cities. And the budget of NASA is at one of its lowest points in history.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

And how can you say it's "adventurism and fantasy" when so much science is coming back? You've got it backwards. This is actually the opposite of fantasy: This is reality.

No longer do we have to fantasize about what Pluto looks like. Now we have the facts. We are getting actual data that results in advances in geological science. We are no longer making things up.

Ironically, if we followed your advice and cut space science, that would leave us exactly where you don't want to be: Devoid of facts about the universe, without science, ignorant, left to merely fantasize.

You might as well put away your computer and start posting on this forum by sending in letters written on paper, because if you don't believe in basic science, you don't believe in the process that led to it being possible for you to afford a computer.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

The ghost of Senator William Proxmire is with us!!

Jul 18, 2015permalink

Becksvart

https://xkcd.com/1232/

Jul 19, 2015permalink

@graybalanced: Ironic that you should mention the computer in support of your argument. Whatever date you accept for the invention of the computer, it significantly predates the space programme.

As does the invention of the transistor.

Jul 19, 2015permalink

CaPi

@Wubslin. I value everyones opinion but am happy to differ from your view. That argument could be made for everything including money spent on commercials for smartphones or whatever you would want to name. I see no negative connection to this NASA mission.

Jul 19, 2015permalink

@CaPi: The diference between NASA and smartphones and commercials the source of the funding.

One is funded from taxation and the other from private enterprise.

Do you not see why some people might object to taxpayers' money being wasted on this sort of thing?

Jul 19, 2015permalink

@RichRMA: Because saving taxpayers' money is wrong?

Jul 19, 2015permalink

Well, you could leave space exploration up to companies like Space-X, but their rockets keep blowing up. At least though with space exploration some knowledge is developed, unlike dumping money down the vast black hole of the welfare state.

Jul 19, 2015permalink

@RichRMA: You've got yours, screw everyone else. And you want us to fund your space adventures as well?

Jul 19, 2015permalink

No, I want them to keep subsidizing places like Greece so more Greece's will be created so more dollars have to be spent, increasing and perpetuating the endless cycle.

Jul 19, 2015permalink

Jasen70

@Wubslin - You do realise that projects such as this take years to well over a decade to play out?? Not only that, the level of technological innovation that filters down to normal level society is invaluable.

Jul 20, 2015permalink

Don't waste your time. He thinks anyone who has anything has been given it. The concept of earning is alien. The result of cradle to grave nanny state care.

Jul 20, 2015permalink

Random Asian Guy

Space exploration is important for the whole of humanity. You can think that the money can be better spent on current problems, but it doesn't solve any long term issues like over population.

The Planet has only a finite amount of resource and unless there is a global dictator that decides who can breed and who can't. The population will keep growing.

I wrote this once in another article:
Give a man a fish, it feeds him for a day.
Teach a man to fish, it feeds him for life.
and when there are too many fisherman, find another pond.

Everyone has the right to think what they like. And if you think your tax payer money shouldn't be spent on Space Exploration. I Hope in the distant future, your grandchildren, or their grandchildren are willing to stay behind on this planet when an asteroid hits and we have the ability to leave the planet due to other tax payers.

Jul 20, 2015*permalink

@Random Asian Guy: I don't appreciate you making that kind of threat. You've been reported to the admins.

Jul 20, 2015permalink

@Jasen70: That is irrelevant and dishonest. How about working on the problems that exist now?

Jul 20, 2015permalink

@RichRMA: Careful when you drive on those taxpayer-funded roads, you might catch the socialism from them.

Jul 20, 2015permalink

Wubslin: May we ask what country you reside in?

It is by any chance a country that was made possible by highly speculative exploration?

World history would have been different if King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella said "You know, Columbus, we have better things to spend money on than your fantastical speculations about lands too far away to visit safely. Now go away."

Jul 21, 2015permalink

Roads were supposed to be funded by taxes earned from the sales of gasoline. Almost none of it goes to roads, it goes to welfare. As a result, infrastructure in major old Eastern cities is going to HELL. Sorry to bring a little reality to you.

Jul 21, 2015permalink

Random Asian Guy

@Wubslin, Feel free to report all you like as there was no Threat.

from the Oxford Dictionary:

A statement of an intention to inflict pain, injury, damage, or other hostile action on someone in retribution for something done or not done: members of her family have received death threats
More example sentences
Synonyms
1.1 Law A menace of bodily harm, such as may restrain a person’s freedom of action.

Saying 'I hope' is not a Threat, and legally, when I said 'Willing' Means it's their choice.

Unless your idea of the English language is vastly different to my interpretation.

Personally I think you are wasting the administrators time and they seem already to be rather busy reviewing cameras for us.

Jul 21, 2015permalink

AlexRuiz

graybalanced,
It depends on who you ask. A Native American would for sure give you a different response from a European.

Jul 21, 2015permalink

You might get a different response AlexRuiz but what I said would still be true to both sides: World history would have been different if Columbus' exploration was defunded.

The USA might still exist but mostly speaking French with the Russians still owning Alaska, and the Native Americans were marginalized anyway. Or America never existed, so Hitler was stopped mostly by the Soviets, who took over Europe except for the UK...

Jul 21, 2015permalink

"Just to put NASA's cost efficiency into context: $700 million is less than a tenth of the amount Microsoft wrote off after its takeover of Nokia. Apple could fund fifteen New Horizons missions with just the profit from its last three months. And AT&T's proposed takeover of DirecTV is close to 70 times more expensive than the humble Pluto probe." - Vlad Savov, The Verge

Jul 22, 2015permalink

How much are the taxpayers on the hook for this particular exercise in adventurism?

Jul 18, 2015permalink

Nathan Cowlishaw

Why does that matter? It's worth more than you could ever fathom, I bet? This is humanity's first real step beyond our neolithic selves. We cannot be truly an advanced intelligent life without taking off towards the stars. This is our next step in evolution.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

A trip to Pluto is probably worth nothing. Money down the drain.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

dccdp

A lot less than the long chain of hard scientific work and sacrifices that made your country prosperous and civilized so that you are now able to be bored and use technology to post narrow-minded questions about the relevance of fundamental science research.

Jul 18, 2015*permalink

@Francis Carver: Exactly, we should de-fund anything that doesn't turn an immediate profit. There is nothing we should care about except for money.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

Money should be spent, indeed -- on useful things. By jolly, we have got tons of great causes to support. This quest for "what is beyond the Universe" is wasteful and nonsensical, in my view. Even if it was for free. Just Man fooling himself and playing mini-Gods...

Jul 18, 2015permalink

dccdp

Yes, profit, there's nothing else out there. (he doesn't seem to get it, apparently)

Jul 18, 2015permalink

@Francis Carver: 'This quest for "what is beyond the Universe"...'

Except there is no such quest. There is one for knowledge of this universe though. Is that such a bad thing?

Jul 18, 2015permalink

@dcccp: There is nothing narrow minded about questioning the reckless spending of taxpayers' money on enterprises of dubious utility.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

dccdp

@Wubslin: Yes it is, because "taxpayers" as a whole have neither the expertise nor the scientific understanding to be able to decide what are the avenues science should pursue long term. Common taxpayers will never understand why, for instance, math research is good for their well being, and if asked, they may just as well decide to end it all as it doesn't help them cook their next pizza.

Real science is hard, and most people will never understand its significance or priorities, so they shouldn't interfere.

Jul 18, 2015permalink

NASA is currently 0.5% of the federal budget. That is the second lowest point in history. That percentage was twice as much 20 years ago and nine times as much in 1966.

If you want to complain about wasted money, there are much larger targets in the federal budget than NASA because NASA's budget keeps getting cut further every year.

Jul 18, 2015permalink