Anthonys Image Gallery and Website
Anthony is perhaps best known for the discovery of a large asteroid impact on Jupiter in 2009 while recording data as part of his ongoing observation programme of the giant planets Jupiter and Saturn. This event captured the attention of astronomers around the world and was one of the major astronomical events of 2009.
Observation report for July 19 2009
Wikipedia article on 2009 impact
In 2010 he recorded the live flash from an estimated 10m diameter meteor in Jupiter upper atmosphere, the first time such an event has been captured from the Earth.
NASA article on 2010 Jovian fireball
Anthony was born in 1965 and grew up in the small country town of Glen Innes in rural New South Wales. He was interested in all things science as a child, from chemistry to electronics, mathematics and astronomy. After receiving a small refractor for christmas at the age of 8, he spent many hours out in the backyard looking at the sky (with absolutely no idea what he was looking at, but just for the love of looking).
There were no astronomy related courses available at his school or university, so he eventually graduated in 1988 with a double major in mathematics and computer science instead, and an honours degree in Computer Science in 1989, but astronomy remained his first love.
He met Leisa in 1990 and it was love at first sight, she had a voyager picture of Neptune pinned to the wall above her computer. She shares his passion for astronomy (although she's more than happy for him to be the one going outside in the middle of the night). They were married in 1992.
In 2003 he bought a video camera and started experimenting with planetary imaging during the favourable Mars opposition of that year. He is now completely addicted to planetary imaging and spends far too much time looking for ways to improve the quality of images that he takes. His background as a software engineer allows him to try solving many of the problems in this area using advances in computers and algorithms.
In 2005 he started an ongoing imaging programme for Jupiter and Saturn, and has accumulated a large body of data for each. Despite their brightness and large relative size, they are challenging to photograph at high resolution. Both planets are very dynamic and interesting, and he thinks that more people should be trying to image them. Saturn in particular hs shown an amazing variability in its appearance over the last few years as it comes out of solstice, with the infamous North polar Hexagon now clearly visible from earth.
Anthonys Image Gallery and Website
