The Perseid Meteor Shower

Well the above image is my best Perseid meteor, it was taken a couple nights ago during a wild Aurora event, and I might add made the front page of SpaceWeather.com, and their online Aurora gallery here. I'll be posting a bunch of the Aurora images next post, as far as the actual shower, well the picture below speaks for itself, lots of clouds and lightning.


I should have known better, after all on my way to my site I almost hit a black cat, slammed on the brakes, the cat stares at me with shiny black eyes, then crosses in front of me, I figure I'm doomed. I get to the site and take some pics of the clouds and lightning just in case I get lucky and a Perseid crosses my path as well, no luck, so I sit it out in my car hoping the clouds roll away. Two hours later, they do, woo hoo, get out of the car, set up my equipment and start enjoying the shower and taking pics.



Got some images, the meteors themselves were very small and fast, then all of a sudden off to my right and behind me, the brightest meteor in Cosmos land, think it burned a hole in my retina and I wasn't even looking at it, the camera of course was pointing towards Perseus, where the meteors are supposed to be.


So I'm minding my own business viewing the meteor shower when along comes the Fuzz, driving slowly by my location, then stops and starts to back up.


So I'm thinking to myself, look inconspicuous, well as inconspicuous as a man on a dirt road with a tripod and camera in the middle of nowhere at 1:00 am can be. I'm going through all the possible scenarios of what is about to take place, like can they arrest me? Like the master chess player and wordsmith I am, I anticipate and meticuliously plan out the various possibilities of intelligent banter that will ensue. So the officer exits the vehicle, walks up to me and says;

Police guy : "Taking Pictures?"

Me: "Yeah, I'm taking pictures of meteors"

Police guy: "Cool, I wish I was, I have a camera as well"

Me: "Cool"

It went on a little longer, and then he had to get back to patrolling the city, fun well it lasted, always cool when your not arrested. After about half an hour the clouds rolled back in and it was back home for me. I stayed up all night in case the sky opened up again, at 4:30 it was clear, went back out, saw a few more and was lucky enough to capture another Perseid.


I'll leave you with a clip a put together of some of the meteors and Iridiums I've imaged since the camera purchase.