What Is This Near The Moon

A week or so back I was outside at around 3am - 4am taking some pictures of the moon with my old 5 mega pixel Panasonic TZ1. I was messing about with it to see how close it could capture the moon. It wasn't very close. You can see that post here. Then, because I never used the digital zoom, only the optical, I wanted to take some pics again, but this time use the full 40x zoom - optical + digital combined. Turns out it was terrible. Very hard to hold still by hand and the results show no close up detail of the moon at all, which is no surprise. Anyway, it wasn't until I was looking through the photos that I noticed something weird near the moon, an object.

When I took the pictures I remember seeing an object near the moon, but at the time it just looked like a star, so I didn't think much of it. Upon viewing the images again one of them stood out. And ironically it was the one shot I kind of took by accident. It was a zoomed out shot. But it has ended up being the most interesting.

 

The Moon on a cloudy night with an unknown object overhead

It shows an object above the moon to the left. It looks like an orange arrow or squiggle. When enlarged it looks like it could be a UFO, or an energy source of some sort. Now, I'm not claiming this is an Alien UFO, as I have no idea what it is. But I was looking at some pictures of star formations to see what could be near the moon at the time I took the pictures, and its possible that it could be planet Venus, Mercury or the Arcturus star. Is that what it is? And my old camera is picking it up as some strange looking UFO / anomaly? Or could it be something else. This image is genuine, straight from the camera. It has not been faked or enhanced.

Nothing Unique

I will add. I have seen this type of "UFO" before, reported by other people. Some call them flying serpents. The colour and length varies. There is footage online. More info. I went outside again in the early hours and took some more shots with the same camera of the same object that I believe is more than likely a star or a planet. They all came out similar to this one. Whatever it is, with the Lumix TZ1 It shows up as an orange energy source. This star, planet, UFO, or whatever it might be is always there. So it must be something known to those who study the sky / space.

Update

When I have the time I'm going to take more photos of this thing with other cameras and compare the results. I did that last night with the Panasonic TZ3 and a Samsung WB500. The results were fairly similar. However some came out like white lines rather than orange. Conclusion: I believe its just the camera(s). The far zoom combined with a slowish shutter speed makes any slight of hand / movement pick some things up as lines and squiggles rather than their true form. Including stars and planets. What are your thoughts. Comment and let me know.

10x The Moon TZ1

I know I know. An old Panasonic Lumix 5 mega pixel point and shoot camera with a 10x optical zoom has no chance of getting a good close up picture of the Moon. But I've been looking at lots of Moon footage, pictures and video recently that has been taken with Nikon's and a Panasonic with excellent zooming capabilities, so its got me curious. I thought I'd see how close the Panasonic TZ1 could get. Just an experimental test. And the result. While laughable in comparison, it gives a little insight in to just how great the zooms are on the Panasonic FZ80 and Nikon big zoom bridge camera "P" series.

Picture: The Moon at full optical zoom, which is 10x. The Lumix TZ1 can go all the way to 40x zoom if digital is applied. But that wasn't used for this picture. Maybe next time when the sky Isn't so cloudy like it is tonight and there's a full moon I'll try. Digital zoom was off at the time of taking this pic, and it never even crossed my mind at the time to turn it on. It was late. The Moon @ 10x optical with the TZ1 just looks like a white ball of light. Hehe.

4K Moon With Nikon Z6 Celestron C14 EdgeHD

How close can we get to the Moon without actually going there. Amazing 4K (2160p) north pole to south pole moon footage with a winning combination of a Celestron C14 EdgeHD [on 10Micron GM 2000 HPS], a Baader FFC and the Nikon Z6. The conditions were also perfect. I believe the footage was shot in Austria by Christoph Kaltseis. Stand alone cameras like the Nikon P950 can capture the Moon very close up, and the quality is good. But I've never seen anyone capture it so far with any of the Nikon Coolpix superzoom bridge cameras this clear without the use of additional equipment. But this set up costs a hell of a lot more than a P950, so really its an unfair comparison. With that said, the detail and sharpness of this footage is excellent. Channel: BaaderPlanetarium.

#Astrophotography #Scope #MacroMoon