SkyWatch Manchester - Double Orb UAP (solved- Venus & Jupiter)

[flarkey]

So this was an interesting one. I was made aware of this video when it was featured on the UAP Files Podcast recently. The guest on the show shared an additonal video of two bright UAPs that they were unable to identify. The two bright UAP (there's actually 7 UAP in the video if you look closely) appear to move slowly against the backdrop of Stars - its quite a lot of stars that the IR camera is able to pick up and they appear to be clearer as the gaps in the clouds move past.

This is the source video, showing a view east at 3am from Manchester UK....


Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KdWUddwRcI


Trying to work out what I was looking at in this video confused me for a while, because I wasn't able to match the starfield against any known constellation or star positions - nova.astrometry.net continually failed to recognise any pattern.

But it then it occurred to me - the UAP are moving in exactly the way I'd expect the stars to move if facing east at dawn - slowly to the right and up - perhaps they were stars? And yes, they were. - I've since been able to identify the UAPs as Venus and Jupiter by manually matching 4 of the UAP to stars in Gemini. The apparent gaps in the clouds aren't gaps - they are thicker clouds that just make the sensor artefacts more visible.

It turns out that the "starfield" in the video are just noisy pixels on the CCD of the camera - which was an Akaso Seemor 200. Perhaps they are an artefact of non-uniformity across the CCD?

https://www.amazon.co.uk/AKASO-Seemor-200-Night-Vision-Goggles/dp/B0DLP452W2

I've since had a bit of a to-and-fro with the guy behind @SkywatchMCR on youtube, and he seems reluctant to accept the identification of the UAP as planets, particularly because he doesn't accept that the starfield are just pixels.

Anyway, just thought I'd share this as someone else might experience something similar. And if anyone has a better idea as to what is causing the noisy pixels then please let me know.

Now in Sitrec:

 

[Trailblazer]

It's fairly obvious that the darker areas are not gaps in the clouds, but actual clouds, because the "UAPs" get dimmer as the darker areas move across them, whereas the pixels get (relatively) brighter.

Towards the end of the video as the cloud gets thicker the noise seems to get less across the whole image, though.

Also, if the pixels were stars, as claimed, they would move relative to the frame over the 5 minute+ duration of the clip, but they don't. They remain absolutely motionless.

For example compare this video posted by the same person, which does show stars. Even watching at normal speed (which is about 4x real time) you can see the motion. Over the space of 5 minutes they move a large distance across the frame.



This appears to be filmed using the same camera, as the timestamp style matches.

 

[Trailblazer]

You can also see that real stars (like the "UAPs" in the original video) are much fuzzier than the sharply defined pixel noise. There's no way the speckles in the original video can be stars.

 

[FatPhil]

Anyway, just thought I'd share this as someone else might experience something similar. And if anyone has a better idea as to what is causing the noisy pixels then please let me know.

The typical way to see what your hot pixel problem is like is just to capture something in the complete dark (just the lens cap is usually sufficient). Artefacts being stationary on the sensor is usually a very good indicator that it's a property of the sensor.

 

[jdog]

An interesting point was that the AKASO system uses "AI-ISP technology" and promises that the raw data is algorithmically altered before it gets to you, especially in low-light conditions: "The AI instantly reconstructs true textures, restores natural colors, and sharpens details so you see your environment clearly as you observe."

 

[MonkeeSage]

Random internet commenter so take it with a grain of salt and all that, but in a review thread on the AKASO Seemor on r/NightVision a commenter said this:

I've had mine for some months now from their Indiegogo campaign. The company has been very responsive to requests to enable a lower screen brightness so that it doesn't destroy night vision, and the latest firmware is good for that. I am using mine for stargazing, mounted on a tripod, and I have sent videos to their Facebook group. It was great at showing full colour meteors during the recent Perseids. Also shows the many satellites that cross the sky continually. They could improve night sky viewing, as it is a bit too powerful - I would like a gain control, and I am urging them to keep improving the firmware.

The digital zoom mode is no use for star watching as it just emphasises the noise, but works OK for general night vision.

Source: www.reddit.com/r/NightVision/comments/19870ga/comment/lnvzkyd/