I can only speak for myself but I don't think I misunderstood anything you said. I think you were very clear and succinct in your reply. The only exception that I take is that Michael asked a simple question. I'll not only quote it I'll cut and paste it. "I'm curious if anyone (on these cloudy nights) could give a succinct explanation of what is interesting about astrophotography. I have not (and will not) been drawn in, and I'm curious about what interests others". I think those that have responded with comments about the beauty of it or the joy it brings have answered his question. They have even drawn attention to some of the downsides without approaching it from a what do you hate about astrophotography standpoint. Like I said, "speaking for myself". Steve
Date: Tue, 11 May 2010 15:45:37 -0700 From: outwest112@yahoo.com To: utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] why photography?
Hum, I've been missunderstood again. I didn't say I hate the results of the process, I just hate the process. I've been collecting astrophotos for 10 years now. Starting with a dialup modem in format BMP I would save any picture I could find that I didn't have or was better than the one I already had. Now my collection has been converted or superseded to all JPG .
I have several folders with the following number of photos I've collected.
Milkyway 283 Messier 104 external galaxy 183 solar system 27 astro images 56
The last folder is for stuff that contains multiple object like m108 with m97. This one is my desktop background.
I have watched the hardware war from the sidelines for the last decade. Every year as targets emerge from behind the sun they were being shot again with equiptment that didn't exist 6 months earlier when the target left the night sky. The new versions were almost always better year to year until recently when the trend started to slow down. Now new images worth saving have become more and more scarce, except on the bleeding edge of very high end equiptment beyond the reach of almost all the amateurs that I've ever met. Send me a flash drive and you can have a copy of all of it.
At the same time I don't consider any of this to be science. It's art. and I don't use amateur astrophotos as a source of science information.
DT
--- On Tue, 5/11/10, Robert Taylor <Rob.Taylor@digis.net> wrote:
From: Robert Taylor <Rob.Taylor@digis.net> Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] why photography? To: "'Utah Astronomy'" <utah-astronomy@mailman.xmission.com> Date: Tuesday, May 11, 2010, 1:36 PM Big Ouch! on having your telescope ripped off. As mentioned on a previous post I dabble in it and will continue to do so. It's how I indulge my inner masochist. I use essentially the same equipment I use to take regular photos, my DSLR. It is not necessary to spend tons of money to get nice images so consider what you already have if you decide to try it again. I often try to get a single good image rather than take a bunch and then stack, I understand the benefits of stacking and if you want the kind of results some of our members produce you need to do that but you can get a decent image without the extra steps and shorten the post processing time. However in general the time involved is still significant. Sounds like you know at least a little about the process. I have been known to bring two scopes with me when I image or at least my 80x20 binocs so I can enjoy the sky while the scope and camera are doing their thing.
Bob
-----Original Message----- From: utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com [mailto:utah-astronomy-bounces@mailman.xmission.com] On Behalf Of Michael Vanopstall Sent: Tuesday, May 11, 2010 12:47 PM To: Utah Astronomy Subject: Re: [Utah-astronomy] why photography?
Hello --
No, I have no curiosity, or desire to try photography. I definitely don't have the money. I probably don't have the patience. I can't imagine driving an hour or two, setting up, and then letting the telescope work by itself for an hour or two. Actually, I plundered my camera batteries for a flashlight, which shows how often I take any pictures at all. The stacking and photoshop part of the process really sounds like not my cup of tea. Like taxidermy after the hunt. I like a pretty fast-paced hunt.
Did I mention that my first telescope was stolen off my front porch when I went inside to unload moon photos on to the computer?
---- Rev. Michael A. van Opstall Department of Mathematics, University of Utah Office: JWB 313 opstall@math.utah.edu
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