{"id":59117,"date":"2024-05-16T07:59:46","date_gmt":"2024-05-16T07:59:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/5e85637b-739a-43f0-b3e7-e2cf6f4e5870"},"modified":"2024-05-16T08:08:22","modified_gmt":"2024-05-16T08:08:22","slug":"sirius-brightest-star-in-the-sky-flashes-green-and-twinkles-as-it-sets-in-smartphone-video","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/sirius-brightest-star-in-the-sky-flashes-green-and-twinkles-as-it-sets-in-smartphone-video\/","title":{"rendered":"Sirius, brightest star in the sky, flashes green and twinkles as it sets in smartphone video"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/p>

By Iain Todd\n <\/p>

Published: Thursday, 16 May 2024 at 07:59 AM<\/p>

\n\n

Have you ever seen bright star Sirius flashing and changing colour as it sets below the horizon?<\/p>

Astrophotographer Paolo Palma has captured the effect in a beautiful video captured on his smartphone.<\/p>

Sirius is the brightest star that can be seen in the night sky<\/a> in the northern hemisphere, and is well-known for its ability to apparently change colour as it moves low down and close to the horizon.<\/p>

Composite image showing the green flash of star Sirius as it sets below the horizon. Captured using a Huawei p30 Pro smartphone and 12-inch Dobsonian. Click image to expand. Credit: Paolo Palma<\/figcaption><\/figure>

This is a phenomena that can also occur with a setting Sun, or even the green flash of the planet Venus<\/a>.<\/p>

A low-down full Moon can appear orange<\/a>, too.<\/p>

The optical effect is to do with light from a low-down celestial object passing through a thicker part of Earth’s atmosphere on its way to our retinas and cameras.<\/p>

The light is scattered by the atmosphere and so the object seems to change colour.<\/p>

Sirius’s twinkling and colour-changing<\/a> is a known phenomenon, and astrophotographer Paolo Palma has managed to capture a video showing the effect of this via his smartphone camera.<\/p>

Green flash of Sirius captured by Paolo Palma \/ www.unsaltonelcielo.it\/<\/figcaption><\/figure>

How the Sirius green flash was captured<\/strong><\/h2>
Paolo describes the video and accompanying composite image, captured on 11 May 2024, as “the green ray of the brightest star in the sky.”<\/p>
“Around mid-May, Sirius reaches the western horizon and sets in the twilight lights, ” he says.<\/p>
“This is the best time to try to admire its ‘sunset’ and the play of colour it creates with the atmosphere in a still, bright context.<\/p>
“I captured this video through a 12-inch Dobsonian telescope as Sirius set, less than 4\u00b0 from the horizon, next to a pine tree more than 1.6km away from my observation point.<\/p>
“The video was taken using a Huawei p30 Pro smartphone, and the image collage was made using frames from that video.”<\/p>
See more of Paolo’s work via his website www.unsaltonelcielo.it<\/a> and his Instagram profile @unsaltonelcielo<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n
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