A Darker View

Oregon Star Party 2013 Photo Album

Andrew and the Galaxy — Andrew Cooper taking astrophotos under the Milky Way Galaxy

Telescopes at OSP — Looking down the observing line at Oregon Star Party 2013

Mark and Telescopes — Mark Folkerts preparing his equipment for the night

Chris Collimating the Monster — Chris Fuld collimating his 40.5 inch dobsonian

Telescopes at OSP 2013 — Telescopes at Oregon Star Party 2013

Camping Under the Stars — A camper and telescope set up under a starry sky

Ken Jones at the 18" — Ken Jones observes with his 18″ dobsonian

Monster — Chris Fuld using his monster 40″ dobsonian at Oregon Star Party 2013

Ken and Ann Jones oberving with their 18″ at Oregon Star Party 2013

Lightning over OSP — Lightning lights the sky over the Oregon Star Party encampment

Bob Clements and 10" Dob — Bob Clements demonstrates his 10″ dobsonian with an equatorial platform

David Nemo and 20" String Scope — David Nemo and his handmade 20″ string telescope

Chris Tribe and an Ultralight 20" f/4.5 — Chris Tribe with his 20″ f/4.5 built from ultralight materialsChris Tribe with his 20 inch f/4.5 built from ultralight materials

Brett Schaerer and WikiKea — Brett Schaerer and his WikiKea travel scope, a 6″ that has some ingenious features

Classic Orange — An observer with a classic orange tube C-8 waits for darkness at Oregon Star Party 2013

Lightning Started Fire — A fire started by lightning burning just below the Oregon Star Party site

Astrophoto Acquisition — A small netbook computer busy running an astrophoto setup

Scope at Sunset — Bright sunset colors silhouette a telescope at Oregon Star Party 2013

The plan is simple, a vacation combining a visit to my family and a run to Oregon Star Party. I miss doing the larger regional star parties, six telescopes is a big star party on the island. OSP would feature hundreds of telescopes, speakers, and hopefully dark skies. I also volunteered as a speaker, may as well bring and share little Keck experience.

Heading to a major star party takes some planning. Worse, I would be doing this with what could be packed for airline travel. The answer would be to implement my usual star party plan… Set up for astrophotography, this would allow vising other telescopes while my camera ran under computer control. Good astrophotography can also be done with relatively small equipment.

The site is quite remote, no nearby hardware store to replace a missing bolt, no internet connection to allow download of a missing driver. The setup would have to work with what was packed to start with. Several iterations of packing showed that two cases would be required to carry the setup. An ancient hard suitcase I have had since my Air Force days, and a hard equipment case purchased years ago for a portable telescope I have yet to build. At least both had wheels and could be hauled by one person through an airport terminal.

After a few very nice days visiting with my parents I steal away in the camper for the drive to OSP. Four hours sees me over the Cascades, into the Ochoco Mountains east of Prineville. It is a very pleasant drive, a beautiful day, open roads, Mt. Hood soaring over the trees that line the highway. The sort of driving you just can not do on the island, the sort of vacation I grew up with.

Continue reading “Oregon Star Party 2013”

Lava Entry Toned

Same shot as yesterday, but some severe toning put into the mix. Processing this way can reveal a great deal of texture lost in a more realistic processing of the image. The result is a hyper-realistic image. Such images are fun to play about with, but are they real? Are they honest? Are they art?

Ocean Entry

Postcard from the Reef – Too Close

It was a reasonably big eel, not the largest I have seen, but large. I stopped to take a couple pictures, even though I have plenty of photos of yellow-margin moray. The yellows are among the friendlier members of the morays, known to play with divers. Undulated morays, on the other hand, are downright nasty, biting at anything that intrudes on their space.

This is too close.

When this fellow comes out to inspect the camera, it is my turn to pull back a bit. True, it is the camera front and foremost, most likely to get nipped. Still, I give the eel a fair amount of respect, a “friendly” eel still possess a substantial bite.

Mercury Exits the Dawn Sky

Mercury is sliding into the light of dawn this week. Currently about 10° elevation at sunrise, the planet will disappear into the Sun’s glare over the next few days. It will pass through superior conjunction on August 24th, to reappear for an evening apparition around September 8th.

Way Too Much Color

Ever take a photo you think is going to be great, to have it ruined by too much color?

Lobster & Cup Coral — A spiny lobster (Panulirus marginatus) among orange cup coral (Tubastraea coccinea) at 20′ depth, Puakō

I turned the color down in the image, then turned it down again. Even working from the raw data was of little use, the colors in this image are just too much. Not that it is a bad photo, just that given the elements of a pretty lobster and brilliant cup coral, I had expected it to be a great photo.

Some of the best underwater images I have are full of subtle colors and textures. While a splash of bright color can make a photo, too much bold color can take it too far. Another lesson in learning the art.

Postcard from the Universe – Eclipse Viewing

Solar Eclipse Viewing — Setup to view and photograph the partial solar eclipse at Pu‘u Kohala Heiau National Historic Site on May 9th, 2013

Postcard from the Reef – Sleeping Parrotfish

A number of parrotfish species can secrete an odd mucus cocoon in which the fish will sleep through the night. Divers will often find these fish at night, enveloped in a transparent balloon. The discarded cocoon makes an odd sight rolling around the reef the next day.

Even within the same species some fish will use this technique, some will not. It is not known how this behavior is useful to the fish. This very large bullethead parrotfish is sleeping without aid of a cocoon…

Bullethead Parrotfish — A large bullethead parrotfish (Chlorurus spilurus) sleeps in the coral