Astronauts are many things. They are usually scientists, engineers or pilots. For his part, NASA astronaut Don Pettit is also an astrophotographer.
Pettit is currently on his third stay international space station (International Space Station), he is continuing his long-standing tradition otherworldly photos (pun intended). His latest photo, a photo of a celebrity and several galaxydemonstrating not only his visual prowess but also his engineering skills – he used a self-designed tool to complete the photo.
At first glance, this image might look like a fairly typical photo from the International Space Station: You see Star and curvature Earthemitting a distinct orange glow above our planet’s surface. But there’s something strange about this photo: The Earth’s surface is blurry, but hundreds or even thousands of stars are in perfect focus.
Under normal circumstances, a long-exposure photo like this should show the stars as streaks across the sky, since the International Space Station is moving at about 17,500 miles (28,000 kilometers) per hour.
But that’s where Pettit’s genius lies. He took a homemade thing to space star trackera device that rotates the camera to compensate for the motion of the International Space Station. This is a variation of the tool used astrophotographer Long exposures of stars are taken on Earth as the Earth rotates against the night sky, compensating for the rotation to prevent stars from streaking in the image.
“This tracker rotates every 90 minutes [sic] period to match the pitch rate of the International Space Station. Without this tracker, you can’t take a photo longer than 1/2 second [sic] No stellar blur due to orbital motion rates,” Pettit wrote on Reddit.
The result is incredibly clear images of the night sky, showing far more stars than with shorter exposures. (A longer exposure time lets in more light, or in this case, makes the star dimmer.)
In space, you can see stars! I flew a homemade tracking device that allowed me to achieve the time exposures needed to photograph the stars. pic.twitter.com/OO57o4oU8lDecember 5, 2024
This isn’t the first time Pettit has showcased his engineering skills aboard the International Space Station. In 2008, he designed zero gravity coffee cupbecoming the first patented invention in space.
The astronaut was tired of drinking tea and coffee out of a bag with a straw, a bit like the Isla del Sol in Capri – in microgravity you can’t tilt the cup to get the liquid out and if you shake it it splashes out. But Pettit created an open-container cup from a piece of plastic that uses surface tension to function similarly to a cup on Earth.
“It adds a human dimension in a civilized way,” he said in a statement. Youtube video.