T-Rex: When you look at the stars and planets, you're looking through a bunch of atmosphere that's moving around!
T-Rex: This is why stars twinkle: the rapidly-changing refractive index of moving air!
T-Rex: And yeah, it's pretty, but if you're trying to see space stuff in any detail, it suuuuuuucks.
Dromiceiomimus: Eight letters u?
T-Rex: Seven, but remarkably close - well done, Dromiceiomimus! Anyway, air moves and that means any photos you take will be all distorted in different ways.
Utahraptor: The result is blurry pics!
T-Rex: The result is SUPER blurry pics!
T-Rex: But sometimes - by pure chance - the distortion is minimal, producing a LUCKY PIC. And eventually we were like, wait, if we took a TON of photos and threw out all but the lucky ones, we could average those to increase image quality! And now "lucky imaging" is a standard astronomical technique.
T-Rex: In conclusion, LUCK is REAL and we use it to EXPLORE SPACE!
Off panel: I feel bad for unlucky astronomers.
T-Rex: I don't!
T-Rex: Unlucky astronomers can stay the HECK away from my telescope, for legitimate science reasons!!
