Andrew McCarthy, an astrophotographer from Arizona who goes by the username @cosmic_background on Instagram, has revealed some incredible images of the solar surface that are extremely clear. To showcase these intricate details of the sun, Andrew layered a whopping 150,000 individual photographs of the star of the solar system in order to obtain these stunning photos. In Andrew’s amazing photos, fine details of the solar surface such as the building space flare, little craters, and the fiery ripples are clearly captured. The final image that represents all of these details is 300 megapixels in size, which means that its resolution is 30 times larger than that of a standard camera image of 10 megapixels.
In the most detailed picture of the solar surface, we can see swirls, feather-like patterns, and also bizarre dark spots. These dark spots are caused by the inversions caused by the photographic process. In reality, they are extremely bright areas of the sun with very high energy. Andrew states that he doesn’t see what the final product looks like till he finishes processing the image. He also added that the final results of these images were very special. Andrew finds lots of joy and excitement in photographing the sun as it appears different every time. The extreme magnification is created by a modified telescope. Thanks to this, the final processed image is extremely detailed.
The Sun, also known as the heart of the solar system, is a massive sphere of energy-radiating hot plasma. Its mass is 330,000 times the mass of the Earth, and its diameter is 1.39 million km. The sun is most abundant in Hydrogen and Helium held together by its own gravity, which amounts to 98% of its mass. So, check out the pics below and share your thoughts in the comments!
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Image credits: @cosmic_background (Instagram) / Animal News Agency
