Boing Boing » venus http://boingboing.net Brain candy for Happy Mutants Sat, 25 May 2013 00:59:09 +0000 en-US hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.4.1 The surface of Venus http://boingboing.net/2012/10/04/the-surface-of-venus.html http://boingboing.net/2012/10/04/the-surface-of-venus.html#comments Thu, 04 Oct 2012 15:37:25 +0000 Maggie Koerth-Baker http://boingboing.net/?p=185319

I love rediscovering cool things. I'm sure I learned, at some point, that the Soviet Union had once sent probes to land on the surface of Venus. But I had completely forgotten this fact until today.

This photo comes from Venera 9, which landed on Venus on October 22, 1975. The lander remained operational for 53 minutes, which isn't bad considering we're talking about a planet with hydrochloric acid and hydrofluoric acid in the atmosphere, and a surface temperature (as measured by Venera 9) of 905° F.

The photo — at three different phases of processing — comes from the website of Don Mitchell, an enthusiast of Soviet space history. Mitchell did the processing that resulted in the clear, bottom image in this stack.

The upper image is the raw 6-bit data. The center images include the telemetry brust replacements, with remaining bursts blacked out. The 6-bit values have been transformed to linear brightness, using the published photometric function of the camera, and then converted to sRGB standard form (gamma 2.2). In the final version, I filled in missing regions, using Bertalmio's inpainting algorithm.

• Read more about these photos at Don Mitchell's website
• Read more about the Venera landers and how they survived on Venus

Thanks to OMG Facts for reminding me of this cool bit of history

]]> http://boingboing.net/2012/10/04/the-surface-of-venus.html/feed 23 Belly Time lapse transit of Venus http://boingboing.net/2012/06/05/belly-time-lapse-transit-of-ve.html http://boingboing.net/2012/06/05/belly-time-lapse-transit-of-ve.html#comments Tue, 05 Jun 2012 23:52:37 +0000 Xeni Jardin http://boingboing.net/?p=164885

"Last time you'll see that for 105 years."—Sam Cornwell. [Video Link]]]> http://boingboing.net/2012/06/05/belly-time-lapse-transit-of-ve.html/feed 4 Now under way: Transit of Venus across face of the Sun http://boingboing.net/2012/06/05/now-under-way-the-transit-of.html http://boingboing.net/2012/06/05/now-under-way-the-transit-of.html#comments Tue, 05 Jun 2012 23:11:04 +0000 Xeni Jardin http://boingboing.net/?p=164869

Q: Can I put 10 pairs of sunglasses together to view the sun? A: Not unless you are currently not blind, but wish to become so.

A better bet: watch the Griffith Observatory webcast (thanks, Andrea James!)

Photo: The transit of Venus from Denver, Colorado, USA, 2012 © by Jerry Knaus ]]> http://boingboing.net/2012/06/05/now-under-way-the-transit-of.html/feed 22