Author: Andrew

An electrical engineer, amateur astronomer, and diver, living and working on the island of Hawaiʻi.

Shooting Film

I was pleasantly surprised to learn that one of my fellow voyagers our annual boat trip was an avid photographer. The wilds of Alaska are simply candy for a camera, spectacular photos can be seen in every direction waiting to be captured. As usual I was ready for photographic effort, with no less than four cameras along, not counting the cameras in my phone and iPad. The Canon 60D, EOS-M, a Canon G12 and a GoPro 2 HD comprised a nice array of capability. I was looking forward to the conversations and maybe a chance to learn a little from another photographer.

There was a surprise when I saw the photo gear Randy was unpacking, it looked a little odd.

Randy was shooting… Umm… How do I put this delicately… Randy was shooting film.

Yes, remember that stuff that came in rolls. For those who might not remember, this is how we took photos before digital sensors, megapixels and SD cards became the language of photography.

Randy Zelick
Randy timing an exposure with a medium format Pentax 6×7 camera.
Randy does it in style, a beautiful old Pentax 6×7 medium format SLR camera.

The setup is not compact, a bulky camera requiring a full backpack to carry with the camera, lenses and light meter. It is around fifteen pounds of gear, quite a contrast to the two or three pounds the EOS-M I used for most of my shooting.

The medium format camera presents difficulties on the boat. Taking long exposures is impossible from a moving and rolling platform. Still, he managed some nice shots when the water was calm, as it was when we visited walls of ice in Glacier Bay. Finding solid ground for the tripod required breaking out the launch and going ashore. We created a couple of great opportunities, landing on algae covered rock, we slip and slide to a place where the beauty of Marble Grotto is fully exposed. Another slippery landing, this time caused by glacial mud, allows us to explore the face of Reid Glacier with cameras and tripods at hand.

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iOS 7 Brightness Problem

Amateur astronomers learn to love the dark.

Astrophoto Acquisition
A small netbook computer busy running an astrophoto setup

Unlike the rest of the human species we enjoy seeing the night sky and have learned not to fear the darkness, rather to embrace it. This phlisophy is carried over to our devices as well. We set our computer screens for minimum brightness with red on black color schemes. We understand dark adaptation and what it means for our vision.

You may note that Darker View uses a dark color scheme. This is not by chance, there was a great deal of thought put into the light on dark color scheme here on DV, with full understanding of the advantages of dark on light schemes.

Many people do not like light on dark schemes, avoiding websites that use such colors. Other folks far prefer such color schemes, particularly people who spend long hours at the computer, programmers and CAD technicians in particular. Programming environments and CAD software make switching color schemes easy, understanding the personal color preferences are critical to good software useability.

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Too Blue? Make it Black and White

One of the major problems in underwater photography is the loss of color as you descend. The water filters out the red end of the spectrum, creating the blue world all divers are familiar with.

Visually this is a problem, divers are unable to appreciate the beautiful colors of marine life without using an artificial light source. Most divers carry lights, even on daytime dives, for this reason. It can be quite dramatic to turn on a light and watch brilliant reds and yellows appear where there was little color without the light.

Blue Manta with Histogram
A blue manta photographed at 40ft depth

Photographically it is even more challenging, a strobe can light up nearby objects, revealing the colors. For more expansive scenes even the most powerful strobes fail, resulting in photographs heavy in greens and blue, with very little red. For some photos, the blue works, a “true” representation of what was seen. Often the blue does not work, the resulting photograph is an unattractive blue tinged with green, that no amount of fiddling in Photoshop will salvage.

One method in dealing with the loss of color balance is to simply take the loss further, convert the image to a black and white photograph. This is a technique you will see used in underwater photography quite often. By removing the distraction of color, the viewer is able to focus on the subject. The same reason so many modern photographers eschew color, even in an age when wonderful saturated colors are easily reproduced.

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Fall Equinox

Fall equinox occurs today at 10:44HST. Today there will be little difference between the length of the night compared to number of daylight hours. This is the first day of fall as marked by many cultures in the northern hemisphere.

2013 Solstices and Equinoxes
  UT HST
Perihelion Jan 2 00:59UT Jan 1 14:59HST
Spring Equinox Mar 20 11:02UT Mar 20 01:02HST
Summer Solstice Jun 21 05:04UT Jun 20 19:04HST
Apehelion Jul 5 18:59UT Jul 5 08:59HST
Fall Equinox Sep 22 20:44UT Sep 22 10:44HST
Winter Solstice Dec 21 17:11UT Dec 21 07:11HST
 
Source: NASA Sky Calendar

 

Postcard from the Reef – Night Colors

Many reef fish change color for the night. Many lose their bright daytime colors to become rather drab, most likely in order to evade the predators who scour the reef at night. Moray eels, reef sharks, and more are on the hunt, looking for the fish hiding in the nooks and crannies of the reef. For the diver a nighttime reef it totally different, the clouds of fish hovering over the coral are gone. Here and there a few fish are visible, the color seemingly drained from them as they wait out the night.

Longnose Butterflyfish
A longnose butterflyfish (Forcipiger flavissimus) in nighttime coloration during a night dive at Puakō