Half-phase Dione rotating (13-image animation)

Filed under pretty pictures, animation, global views, amateur image processing, Saturn's moons, Dione, Cassini

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Half-phase Dione rotating (13-image animation)

This animation consists of 13 images of Dione taken about twice per hour over a period of six hours. Over that time, Dione's "wispy terrain" -- now known to be networks of crisp fractures in Dione's icy crust -- passes from day into night, and the long shadows caused by the low sun at the dusk terminator trace the topography of the fractures.

NASA / JPL / SSI / Emily lakdawalla

Images were taken from 00:04:49 to 06:17:13.

Processing consisted of enlarging the original 512-pixel-square images by a factor of two, then of aligning and animating them.

Copyright holder: Emily Lakdawalla

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.
Contact us to request publication permission from the copyright holder. Original image data dated on or about October 1, 2011