Spectacular Saturn Images by 'Amateurs' Will Make Your Jaw Drop

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Saturn's swirling clouds

NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute/Kevin M. Gill

Kevin M. Gill produced this false-color view of Saturn's clouds from raw images that Cassini captured on July 20, 2016. For those with photo-tech know-how, Gill said: "I mapped the CB2 filtered image (.75 micron wavelength) to red, MT2 (.727 microns) to green and MT1 (.619 microns) to blue."

Bizarre hexagon on Saturn

NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute/Val Klavans

"This is a true color view of Saturn's north polar region, taken by Cassini's Imaging Science Subsystem (ISS) on June 26, 2013," the producer Val Klavans said in a NASA statement. "Saturn's mysterious hexagon is visible in the center."

Klavans added: "This composite is made of images that were taken on June 26, 2013 and received on Earth June 27, 2013. The camera was pointing toward Saturn at approximately 402,383 miles (647,573 kilometers) away, and the images were taken using the CL1, RED, BL1 and GRN filters."

Enceladus feeding the E ring

NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute/Val Klavans

Val Klavans also created this Cassini image, showing the Saturnian moon Enceladus inside the E ring. "On July 19, 2013, you waved at Saturn. The Cassini spacecraft was there to snap a photo of not only us, but the Saturn system," Klavans said.

"This composite is made of images that were taken on July 19, 2013 and received on Earth July 20, 2013. The camera was pointing toward SATURN-ERING at approximately 740,000miles (1,200,000 kilometers) away, and the images were taken using the CL1, RED, BL1 and GRN filters," he added in a statement.

Jeanna Bryner
Jeanna Bryner
Jeanna is the managing editor for LiveScience, a sister site to SPACE.com. Before becoming managing editor, Jeanna served as a reporter for LiveScience and SPACE.com for about three years. Previously she was an assistant editor at Science World magazine. Jeanna has an English degree from Salisbury University, a Master's degree in biogeochemistry and environmental sciences from the University of Maryland, and a science journalism degree from New York University. To find out what her latest project is, you can follow Jeanna on Google+.