Jupiter: Opposition 1998

Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. The planet is 11 earth diameters wide. To give an idea of the size of the planet, the great red spot, visible in some of the images below could easily fit the earth within it. It is about 5 times further from the Sun that we are here on planet earth. It takes about forty minutes on average for the light from Jupiter to reach our eyes.
Jupiter is probably my favourite planet to observe, this is because it looks different from day to day, and year to year, there is always something happening on the planet.

These three images were taken in November 1998. I'm not sure of the exact dates. They were each taken by holding an analogue video camera to the eyepiece my 222mm F8 telescope. At that time the scope was set up as a Dobsonian. I have since transferred the short videos to my PC and processed them using Registax 3.
While the detail isn't spectacular, there are features visible. The most notable is the Great Red Spot (GRS) which is visible in two of the images. It isn't very red at all, in the image to the left it just resembles a break in the Southern Equatorial Belt (SEB), in the image below it is a little more prominent at the 10 O'clock position.
In the years since the GRS has reddened again and has become much more prominent.

For these images South is up.