Perseid Meteor Shower

JayJay65 · Aug 11, 2007

http://www.earthsky.org/radioshows/51468/the-2007-peak-of-the-perseid-meteor-showe

Perseid Meteor Shower is supposed to occur at August 12/13th (12am) from what I know.. Im really nervous, its my first meteor shower (seeing)..

Couple of questions..

1) Were will this be viewable? (north, south, ect)
2) 16 sec shutter, f4, 80 ISO.. are these good settings?
3) Will the meteors be coming and going to the same place, or scattered?
4) How long will it be viewable?
5) What time will it be viewable? (from what i know, its 11pm-12am eastern TZ)

Any info is nice, thanks guys, if i sound weird its cause im mega nervous

-Jess

JayJay65 · Aug 11, 2007

" December 14 and August 12 (the peak mornings of the Geminids and Perseids) will still produce more activity with moonlight than all the others without. They should not be missed regardless of the conditions. "

- http://www.amsmeteors.org/visual.html

Jeff Colburn · Aug 11, 2007

1 - It will start in the low northeast and slowly rise as the night progresses.
2 - If you just shooting the sky, keep the shutter open until you have enough meteors to make you happy, then move to the next image. Anything over a couple of minutes will show the stars moving though.
3 - They will come from the same area of the sky and moving in roughly the same direction.

From http://www.space.com/spacewatch/040806_perseid_guide.html
The Perseids are also an excellent meteor display to attempt to photograph. Meteor photography is popular and can be carried out with practically any camera. However, the chance of recording a meteor is enhanced by using a fast lens (f 2.8 or better) and ultrafast film (ISO 400 to 1600). It makes no difference whether the camera is clock-driven or fixed on a tripod.

In a dark sky, exposures of 10 to 20 minutes long can be made, but should be kept much shorter if background light threatens to fog the film. Slight moonlight, twilight or city glow can be tolerated, as they have little to do with the efficiency of a particular lens-film combination in recording bright meteors.

A successful photograph has many added values if an observer has witnessed and described the same meteor. Also, the chance of obtaining a good meteor picture can be increased by pointing the camera well away from the radiant.

Have Fun,
Jeff

JayJay65 · Aug 11, 2007

Yeah I read that.. but the thing is, from my knowledge, it varies from the time.. that article talks about 2004...

astrostu · Aug 11, 2007

They will all appear to come from the constellation Perseus, hence the name. The show will begin for you around 9:00-10:00 PM LOCAL TIME because that's when the constellation will rise.

I can't find any information on when the real peak is other than the night of August 12/13. It doesn't sound like it's going to be a spectacular show, perhaps a few dozen per hour (one every few minutes?). But meteor showers are notoriously difficult to predict.

Check out http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2007/11jul_greatperseids.htm for some more information.

Edit: I've found significantly more information on photography suggestions: http://luminous-landscape.com/tutorials/meteor.shtml . So have your lens wide open 'cept stopped down one or two stops. If this gets you to anything smaler than an f/3 or so, use ISO 100-200. Otherwise go to a higher ISO. It reads as though the article was written for older cameras (written in 2001) so the noise properties of newer cameras should be better and you should be able to take longer exposures than it says. But that's just my guess from what I know of astrophotography.

Miaow · Aug 12, 2007

This article has some info on taking pics of the showers also
http://www.space.com/searchforlife/070809_seti_aurigids.html

JayJay65 · Aug 12, 2007

My first meteor I saw, it was VERY bright.. and it was fast, it stayed in the air for about 1/2 - 1 sec.. omg it was beautiful!!

Garbz · Aug 12, 2007

Photographing meteors. This is guess work at it's finest. I've seen professionals setup at local mountains for hours and then go home angry that they brought their cameras in the first place. That said if you can get the settings and timing right then the results sometimes look great.

JayJay65 · Aug 12, 2007

Any tips.. Earthgrazers.. what are these? I read that they are slow and very colorful and pretty "among the prettiest".. are there alot of them or just a few or one??

Also, when taking pictures, do I focus on one spot or what?

(I was out there from 11pm-2am)

neea · Aug 12, 2007

Oh I'm excited.
I've never seen a meteor shower before.

aMac · Aug 12, 2007

Well being a few hours ahead, I've already had the event here. I hadn't real done star-gazing photographs before so from my experimenting, I ended up finding ISO 400 and a 30s exposure worked best (and aperture at around f4) because longer exposures on bulb were making the stars themselves streak too much for my liking. Also you need the higher sensitivity because the meteors themselves only appear for 1-2 seconds, and most of that time is spent fading out.

After all that, I only managed to get one good, clear meteor on camera in the end anyway. I had a few very faint streaks captured but nothing exciting. It's pure guesswork as far as where to point after all (well, after knowing they come from roughly East anyway)!

JayJay65 · Aug 12, 2007

Thats gorgous.. any tips for me?

aMac · Aug 12, 2007

Only that you should just keep taking pictures once you've got your basic setup down. You won't be able to guess when they're coming, or exactly what part of the sky they'll be next, so pick a fairly wide lens to cover more area and be persistent. As long as you're pointing the thing the right way and take enough shots, you should hopefully be lucky enough to get a nice shiny one. Feel free to chance the angle every now and again if you like though, and remember to keep looking with your eyes! You'll at least SEE plenty, even if you don't capture any.

astrostu · Aug 13, 2007

JayJay65 said:
Any tips.. Earthgrazers.. what are these? I read that they are slow and very colorful and pretty "among the prettiest".. are there alot of them or just a few or one??

Also, when taking pictures, do I focus on one spot or what?

(I was out there from 11pm-2am)

I believe that Earthgrazers are the ones that come early and late in the night. These are when your particular spot on Earth is not heading directly for the meteors, and so when they come they graze the atmosphere. Hence, they produce a longer streak of light.

Focusing is extremely difficult no matter what lens you use (in my experience with a kit lens and a professional lens (see signature)). I spent about 10 minutes focusing tonight around the little spot that said infinity on my lens and finally got something that was reasonably acceptable. If the moon were out it would've been much easier, but then it would've been harder to see the meteors.