Saturn photo trend that drives me crazy - rings always oversaturated

I've been looking at astronomy photos for about 20 years now, and I keep seeing people pump the colors on Saturn way too much. The rings come out looking like neon yellow and bright orange. Real Saturn has subtle gold and tan tones. I know because I compared my own telescope shots from my backyard in Phoenix with the raw data from Cassini. Has anyone else noticed this in the submissions here, or am I being too picky?

3 comments

3 Comments

ivanbell6d ago

Load up GIMP or Photoshop and pull the saturation slider down about 30-40% on those ring shots and you'll see the real dusty look come through. The Cassini raw images from the mission site are the only way to go if you want accurate colors, everything else is just Instagram bait lol. I run mine through a simple curve adjustment to match the raw data and it kills that fake neon glow every time. Saved myself a ton of frustration once I stopped fighting the algorithm and just processed shots for my own wall. The upvotes will be lower but at least Saturn looks like Saturn again.

karencampbell4d ago

Wait, did your friend actually try that RAW processing thing from the mission site? My buddy Mark spent like three HOURS one night trying to match his Cassini shots to the real color data, and he said it was the most frustrating thing ever because the raw files come in all grainy and weird. He finally got it to work, but ONLY after he realized the default settings in his editor were adding that fake glow back automatically. Now he prints his Saturn shots on canvas for his basement and they look SO much better than anything online. The dust and tan colors actually show up instead of that neon blue mess. He even stopped posting to social media because his processed photos got less likes than the fake ones, but he said that was fine because Saturn actually LOOKS like Saturn now.

the_paul6d ago

Read an article about this last week. The photographer admitted to cranking the saturation to make posts stand out on social media. Blamed the algorithm for needing those bright colors. Real Saturn has rings that are almost dusty looking when you see them unfiltered. The Cassini raw data shows that gold and tan mix you mentioned. People just prefer the fake look I guess. Makes me skip a lot of those heavily edited shots.