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Jupiter and its moons--through an iPhone camera

An amateur astronomer has captured this image of a planet more than 500 million miles away--with his iPhone.

Matt Hickey
With more than 15 years experience testing hardware (and being obsessed with it), Crave freelance writer Matt Hickey can tell the good gadgets from the great. He also has a keen eye for future technology trends. Matt has blogged for publications including TechCrunch, CrunchGear, and most recently, Gizmodo. Matt is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CBS Interactive. E-mail Matt.
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Matt Hickey
Mike Weasner and Mac Observer

The fact that an amateur astronomer named Mike Weasner was able to take a photograph of Jupiter and its moons is hardly something worth a mention on Crave, but the fact that he did it with his iPhone camera is rather remarkable.

It was aimed through a telescope to create a 267x magnification. He then cleaned it up in aperture on a Mac and posted it to Mac Observer.

Before you rush out and try to duplicate the image, you should know that you've got to have perfect conditions and fairly expensive gear. Still, it's incredible that a 2-megapixel, fixed-focus camera can see more than 500 million miles.