Okay, so I just heard from somebody who is familiar with the work of the guy who produced the image. Apparently he is rather controversial because he is claiming really good results with equipment that should not be able to produce them. He has been asked to share his raw data and has refused. So it seems that you should take the imagery with a big grain of salt. It may be the result of substantial digital manipulation that creates something better than what is actually in the data.
Quote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 08:23 pmQuote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 07:25 pmQuote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 07:05 pmWas reading about the model hanging from the ceiling of the CIA exhabit, wonder how many realise what that is & it seems a fairly accurate representation of the basics of the KH-11 design from what you can ascertain from that image of USA-129. No. That model is wrong. It's just really wrong. Other than the fact that it is a tube, you can pretty much ignore all of the other details.For example, the museum exhibit shows an aperture on the side of the tube. That's not accurate. The aperture is on the end, like Hubble.Well I did suspect that to be the case. I just meant it was a useful very basic guide.For a start the solar panels seemed fairly unlikely, I mean what would the point of having such curved panels be.I've been working with an artist on some updated images of the KH-11. Not sure when he may want to debut them.
Quote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 07:25 pmQuote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 07:05 pmWas reading about the model hanging from the ceiling of the CIA exhabit, wonder how many realise what that is & it seems a fairly accurate representation of the basics of the KH-11 design from what you can ascertain from that image of USA-129. No. That model is wrong. It's just really wrong. Other than the fact that it is a tube, you can pretty much ignore all of the other details.For example, the museum exhibit shows an aperture on the side of the tube. That's not accurate. The aperture is on the end, like Hubble.Well I did suspect that to be the case. I just meant it was a useful very basic guide.For a start the solar panels seemed fairly unlikely, I mean what would the point of having such curved panels be.
Quote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 07:05 pmWas reading about the model hanging from the ceiling of the CIA exhabit, wonder how many realise what that is & it seems a fairly accurate representation of the basics of the KH-11 design from what you can ascertain from that image of USA-129. No. That model is wrong. It's just really wrong. Other than the fact that it is a tube, you can pretty much ignore all of the other details.For example, the museum exhibit shows an aperture on the side of the tube. That's not accurate. The aperture is on the end, like Hubble.
Was reading about the model hanging from the ceiling of the CIA exhabit, wonder how many realise what that is & it seems a fairly accurate representation of the basics of the KH-11 design from what you can ascertain from that image of USA-129.
Quote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 11:30 pmQuote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 08:23 pmQuote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 07:25 pmQuote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 07:05 pmWas reading about the model hanging from the ceiling of the CIA exhabit, wonder how many realise what that is & it seems a fairly accurate representation of the basics of the KH-11 design from what you can ascertain from that image of USA-129. No. That model is wrong. It's just really wrong. Other than the fact that it is a tube, you can pretty much ignore all of the other details.For example, the museum exhibit shows an aperture on the side of the tube. That's not accurate. The aperture is on the end, like Hubble.Well I did suspect that to be the case. I just meant it was a useful very basic guide.For a start the solar panels seemed fairly unlikely, I mean what would the point of having such curved panels be.I've been working with an artist on some updated images of the KH-11. Not sure when he may want to debut them.Sounds interesting.It seems like the area of ground based imaging for amateurs is definitely an area to watch for space enthusiasts. The thing that I always thought limited this though was the distortions caused by the atmosphere, obviously the professional astronomers can mitigate this issue, but are there tools coming along to help the amateur in this area?
Quote from: Star One on 09/28/2013 10:13 amQuote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 11:30 pmQuote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 08:23 pmQuote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 07:25 pmQuote from: Star One on 09/27/2013 07:05 pmWas reading about the model hanging from the ceiling of the CIA exhabit, wonder how many realise what that is & it seems a fairly accurate representation of the basics of the KH-11 design from what you can ascertain from that image of USA-129. No. That model is wrong. It's just really wrong. Other than the fact that it is a tube, you can pretty much ignore all of the other details.For example, the museum exhibit shows an aperture on the side of the tube. That's not accurate. The aperture is on the end, like Hubble.Well I did suspect that to be the case. I just meant it was a useful very basic guide.For a start the solar panels seemed fairly unlikely, I mean what would the point of having such curved panels be.I've been working with an artist on some updated images of the KH-11. Not sure when he may want to debut them.Sounds interesting.It seems like the area of ground based imaging for amateurs is definitely an area to watch for space enthusiasts. The thing that I always thought limited this though was the distortions caused by the atmosphere, obviously the professional astronomers can mitigate this issue, but are there tools coming along to help the amateur in this area?Well if your a reasonably well off amateur (or perhaps a university) thorlabs offers a compleat kit to implement real time atmospheric compensation for about 25K. It has a Shack-Hartmann wavefront sensor, a 12x12 Mems deformable mirror and all necessary software and processing as well as the necessary optics. This will "compleatly" correct a telescope up to about 1 meter aperture.
Quote from: Blackstar on 09/27/2013 07:28 pmOkay, so I just heard from somebody who is familiar with the work of the guy who produced the image. Apparently he is rather controversial because he is claiming really good results with equipment that should not be able to produce them. He has been asked to share his raw data and has refused. So it seems that you should take the imagery with a big grain of salt. It may be the result of substantial digital manipulation that creates something better than what is actually in the data.Well, he is getting better than 1 foot resolution with a 10 inch aperture... Didn't the KH-7 barely achieve 1 foot resolution with a 20 inch aperture from much lower altitude? The claimed sub 1 foot resolution was obtained with the 40 aperture of the KH-8.Are you implying that his image processing results match his preconceived idea of what the results should be?
My point, that image of a KH-11 looks to have achieved better than 1' resolution with a 10" telescope. The KH-7 and KH-8 that resolution with much larger mirrors.
Communication skills are a problem, all us engineers have No worries!As for the KH-11 images, I seriously wonder if he kept applying image processing filters until he obtained the results that matched the results he wanted. It seems to be what Blackstar asserted.
1-I just received a pm that went into detail on the controversy with the photographer. It really appears on the surface to be better than expected results with a refusal to provide the data and processing steps for peer review. As such I can fully understand everyone's hesitation.2-Am I reading between the lines that Blackstar you are working on a new model based upon some nugget and this will lead to an up and coming article somewhere?
I just received a pm that went into detail on the controversy with the photographer. It really appears on the surface to be better than expected results with a refusal to provide the data and processing steps for peer review. As such I can fully understand everyone's hesitation.I think we should move on until the experts come to a conclusion. Am I reading between the lines that Blackstar you are working on a new model based upon some nugget and this will lead to an up and coming article somewhere?
the same way you wouldn't expect the negatives from a wedding photographer
He has at least given an explanation as to why he will not reveal data, something along the lines that he was a former professional photographer & the same way you wouldn't expect the negatives from a wedding photographer & that's why he wouldn't reveal it. He also stated that just by looking at the images you could decide if you thought they were reasonable or not.
Quote from: Star One on 09/30/2013 06:47 amHe has at least given an explanation as to why he will not reveal data, something along the lines that he was a former professional photographer & the same way you wouldn't expect the negatives from a wedding photographer & that's why he wouldn't reveal it. He also stated that just by looking at the images you could decide if you thought they were reasonable or not.Here is an outside review of the dust up this same photographer caused with Nanosail-Dhttp://legault.perso.sfr.fr/nanosail_vandebergh_analysis.htmlVery interesting reading
Quote from: Star One on 09/30/2013 06:47 amHe has at least given an explanation as to why he will not reveal data, something along the lines that he was a former professional photographer & the same way you wouldn't expect the negatives from a wedding photographer & that's why he wouldn't reveal it. He also stated that just by looking at the images you could decide if you thought they were reasonable or not.That's an interesting explanation. The problem is that while he may be approaching this as an issue of proprietary data, people are challenging his credibility. He has to weigh one issue against another. What's more important to him? As long as he continues to hold that position, it seems that people will continue to question him.
