September 15, 1999
The story of your birthday began billions of years before calendars existed, in furnaces of light and clouds of dust.
The Big Corona
Birthday · September 15, 1999
A little universe, just for you
Your date.
Ready to give.
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APOD published September 15, 1999. Credit: Fred Espenak (NASA /GSFC). A publication-date match, not a photo taken on your date. Independent of NASA.
Most photographs don't adequately portray the magnificence of the Sun's corona. Seeing the corona first-hand during a total solar eclipse is best. The human eye can adapt to see features and extent that photographic film usually cannot. Welcome, however, to the digital age. The above picture is a combination of twenty-two photographs that were digitally processed to highlight faint features. The outer pictures of the Sun's corona were digitally altered to enhance dim, outlying waves and filaments. The inner pictures of the usually dark Moon were enhanced to bring out its faint glow from doubly reflected sunlight. Shadow seekers need not fret, though, since as yet there is no way that digital image processing can mimic the fun involved in experiencing a total solar eclipse.
Image credit: Fred Espenak (NASA /GSFC)