ASTRO
morning twilight @sunrise on shores of Bahia ******, Baja Mexico (Sea of Cortez). Looking towards western horizon, saguaro cactus lit by oncoming sunrise
same site as above, for May 1994 annular solar eclipse. This is where I was setup, on the shores of a remote peaceful beach. The small Bay featured very interesting wild life, including large iguanas, coyotes, "diving ducks", desert cactus dwelling birds. There was a fisherman down the ways -- just he & I witnessed the eclipse. Looking towards the eastern horizon, where the eclipse would begin. Would you believe that the night before, I got stuck in the sand (30 yards away) -- I had to DRAG all my equipment out in order to DIG myself out. Damn, what a nightmare! Well, that orangish multiple exposure eclipse shot (on opening page) was the culmination of my effort. Well worth the effort..
That's the fisherman going out, early sunrise. On the right, were some particularly panoramic isles -- spotted with cactus.
My remote site at Chattargargh, India (20 miles from the border of Pakistan) -- far western Thar Desert. I hired a driver, and we drove 500 miles from New Delhi to get to this desert site. This, in order to maximize chances of clear skies. The eclipse shot on opening page was taken here. Met a nice family, who gave me food & "chai" (tea), to alleviate my illness. I returned the favor by letting them check out the post totality partial phases thru telescope, and looking at their camels (at distance) using a telephoto lenses. I dragged ~200 lbs of telescope equipment (2 large cases, and 3 knapsacks). Sheesh, what an all out effort 1/2 way across the world. Check back for more to this story..
This is from RTMC '94, a well-known amateur astronomy conference in Southern California. That's my friend Chuck Edmonds, an avid ATM (amateur telescope maker). Kim Gordon & him are veteran astrophotographers & are quite knowledgable/helpful for many of my projects.
This is Graham Flint's awesome modified Baker-Nunn astro-camera, with a specially designed color-corrector. It features laser assisted polar alignment, 8x10 film (!), Byers 15" gears. An astrophotographers dream-setup, for those with an unlimited budget. He works out of New Mexico, and plans to do some Southern Sky shooting from Australia.
This is the parking lot @sunrise after a nights work of shooting, from the legendary Mt. Pinos site (9000 ft) in Southern California. Note that everyone is sleeping, as most astrophotographers set-up long (1hr or more) exposures using CCD auto-guiders. Well, except for me (I still manually guide) & was up ALL night (groan). Some of the telescopes you see take some of the best astrophotos - that's T. Hallas' 7" f7 APO refractor on the left, and K. Zussman's 14" f8 Classical Cassegrain on the right. In the background, is my "snoring" friend (very LOUD, noise pollution) who is also a comet-nuts photographer like myself.