Antares Launch from Wallops, Photo Op (Revised)

Antares Launch Viewed from Fairfax

Each track segment is a 15 second exposure at f/3.5, 50mm, ISO 100.

The large gap near the top is Antares coasting after first stage cutoff.

Revised 2016.10.20 to describe photo and to replace unfinished photo by final.

• A total of 19 track segments comprise this image, including two blank segments during which Antares is coasting after first stage cutoff.   
•          Cutoff occurred near the apparent peak of the trajectory.  About ¾ seconds after cutoff is a dimmer light lasting about 2 seconds, perhaps related to separation of the 1^st and 2^nd stages.
• Second stage ignition occurred after the blank segment.  The first seconds of ignition appear brighter than the rest of the segment.   
• The rocket rises high enough above the horizon that an observer in Fairfax does not require a clear view of the horizon to see most of the trajectory.   
• A diagram of key launch events is available from http://spaceflightnow.com/2016/10/17/key-events-during-the-antares-rockets-climb-to-orbit/, courtesy of Orbital ATK.  

Revised 2016.10.17 AM to note the launch delay and 2016.10.17 PM to add image.

From the Antares "Launch Status" Blog: "Today’s launch of Orbital ATK’s Antares rocket is postponed  24 hours  due to a ground support equipment (GSE) cable that did not perform as expected during the pre-launch check out. We have spares on hand and rework procedures are in process. The Antares and Cygnus teams are not currently working any technical issues with the rocket or the spacecraft. The launch is now scheduled for October 17 at 7:40 p.m. EDT." 

Revised 2016.10.16 to include references for future launch photography.

Depending upon whether we have clear skies, the nighttime launch of the Antares rocket from Wallops Island will be visible from Fairfax.  A view of the horizon is possible from a spot at the Pickett Shopping Center in Fairfax City, behind the Fedex on the delivery ramp, looking southeast over Route 236 heading toward Annandale.  The earliest launch time is this Sunday at 8:03 pm.

Original Post 2016.10.15

Attached is a photo taken three years ago with a point-and-shoot from the Fedex location of another launch from Wallops, a composite of 15-second exposures with a 15-second, noise-reducing dark screen between each exposure.  This launch was in an easterly direction, hence the rocket appears to be traveling right to left.  Today’s Antares launch will be in a southeasterly direction, so, since Wallops is southeast of us, the rocket may appear to be traveling almost straight up.

Visibility Map and Other Details
(Be aware of the mouse-over ads embedded in the double-underscored text of this site.)
http://www.space.com/34348-nighttime-private-rocket-launch-east-coast-visibility.html

Launch Status
http://www.nasa.gov/centers/wallops/home

Cloud Maps
Weather Underground WunderMap: https://www.wunderground.com/wundermap
Clear Sky Chart: http://www.cleardarksky.com/c/WashingtonDCkey.html

General Information
http://www.space.com


No Longer Available:
Infrared Satellite: https://www.wunderground.com/maps/us/IRSatellite.html
Visible Satellite: https://www.wunderground.com/maps/us/VisSatellite.html
Visibility: https://www.wunderground.com/maps/us/Visibility.htm
Zoom Satellite: https://www.wunderground.com/satellite/vis/1k/US.html

LADEE Launch from Wallops, Viewed from Fairfax, 2013.09.06

"Zoom Satellite" Image

LADEE Flight Path Viewed from The Lincoln Memorial

Photo Management: A Million Memories

Added "workaround" paragraph, 20170208

Photo management software is a Godsend for packrats like me.  It’s also valuable for anyone who wants to find a particular photo in their collection in seconds rather than minutes… or months.  The routine upfront work required to maintain such a managed database of photos is surprisingly minimal, at least from my experience using Adobe Lightroom as a photo manager.  The biggest challenge is deciding how to both “store” and “organize” one’s own photos.  To understand the difference, see the American Society of Media Photographers (ASMP) article on File Management, and particularly its “Storage vs. Organization” section, at

http://www.dpbestflow.org/file-management/file-management-overview. 

One thing to realize is that after spending years organizing tens of thousands of photos on one brand of photo management software, there may not be an easy way to fully migrate the “organizational” structure to the next best brand coming down the pike.  The geeky explanation and manually intensive workaround for this is below.

BTW, the Library of Congress funded the ASMP to document Digital Photography Best Practices and Workflow (dpBestflow®).  See their comprehensive best practices page at http://www.dpbestflow.org/links/32.  Though this was written for the professional, much is useful for the eager beginner and amateur.

Migrating from One Photo Management System to Another

Some of the organizational structure of a photo management database will be established via metadata, e.g., the photos of Aunt Betsy will not be contained in a folder named "Aunt Betsy," but within a folder structure based on simpler, unrelated storage hierarchies, e.g., by camera or date.  But Aunt Betsy’s photos will be quickly accessible via a metadata tag (a “keyword”) named "Aunt Betsy" which is known to the photo management system.  The keyword can also be written to the DNG, RAW sidecar and JPG files, but any keyword hierarchy information will be lost.  For example, one may establish within Lightroom a keyword hierarchy with "Aunt Betsy" beneath "Family;" but though the photo file will contain the tags "Family" and "Aunt Betsy," there is no standard method for the tags in those photo files to be associated hierarchically.  Thus, if one decides to migrate to a new photo management software system, the new system will recognize the keywords but may not present to the user a hierarchical representation (e.g., a "tree" structure like Microsoft Window's File Manager) of the keywords; in other words, Aunt Betsy may not “appear” to be part of the family. 

A workaround may not be possible, though I’m not sure.  Non-geeks, take a deep breath before reading this paragraph.  Lightroom indicates keyword hierarchy relationships with the “pipe” symbol, a vertical line, e.g., Family | Aunt Betsy (read as “Family pipe Aunt Betsy”) means the keyword “Aunt Betsy” is contained within the hierarchy space of the keyword “Family.”  The sequence “Family | Aunt Betsy” is stored in an image file’s metadata section, but it is stored as an Adobe-specific field; so unless another company’s photo management software recognizes the Adobe field, the hierarchy will be lost.  Here is an example of the field:

<lr:hierarchicalSubject>
    <rdf:Bag>
       <rdf:li>Family|Aunt Betsy</rdf:li>
    </rdf:Bag>
</lr:hierarchicalSubject>

Another major organizational structure of a photo management database is the association of photos with albums or collections.  In Lightroom a collection is not a metadata item associated with a photo; the user must specifically assign an “album name” as a keyword to a photo, just as he would assign any other keyword to a photo.  For example, 1,000 photos may contain the keywords “Riviera” and “Vacation.”  Ten of those photos may also contain “Aunt Betsy.”  One of Aunt Betsy’s photos may also be part of the album “Riviera Vacation Album, 201606.”  But to make sure that a migration to another photo management database system will succeed, each of the photos in the album, including the single one of Aunt Betsy, should also have a keyword with the same name as the album, namely, “Riviera Vacation Album, 201606.”

Want to Capture a Blazing, Flaming Sunset Photo?

You have to know the right meteorological conditions, or have a neighbor who’s a meteorologist, or use a program written by a trio of meteorologists from Penn State.

The upcoming photo competition on textures got me to thinking about capturing the shading and coloration differences in clouds.  “Simple,” I said to myself, “just go outside and snap a sunset.”  The problem is that clouds put on wonderful light shows on their own schedules, which have not been published until now.  A little research uncovered a handy web site providing a map of the US, colored to indicate the probability of a “good” sunset (and sunrise).

Penn State News Article
http://news.psu.edu/story/385020/2015/12/15/academics/forecasting-beauty-student-alums-make-model-predict-vivid-sunsets

Sunset/rise Forecast Map
https://sunsetwx.com/

And for the geeky (and not so geeky) crowd, here are a few other interesting sites.

Great Photos and Explanations (zackiedawg, DPReview)
https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/41028410

Techy Stuff on Clouds (Bruce Wunderlich, Digital Photography School)
http://digital-photography-school.com/predicting-dramatic-sunsets/

Cloud Type Graphic (helps one understand Wunderlich’s article, Wikipedia)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Cloud_types_en.svg

Happy Snapping!