Getting Intimate with the Night Skies
October 17th, 2010 Posted in Ametaur Astronomy, Astronomy, Astrophotography, Gear, Jupiter, Telescopes | 3 Comments »
Me, Cannon, and Celestron 8 Advanced SGT
I remember when I was about 9 years old, lying on the front lawn one warm summer night, gazing at the stars. They seemed so close, yet so far, and I had no idea how true that was. The lights I saw had traveled to my eyes for over the course of thousands to billions of years. The stars fascinated me. It was around the same time the US had landed on the moon, and I wanted them to go farther, out to another solar system.
People can’t travel there physically, but my love of the heavens has not diminished and now I get even more intimate than ever with that light that has traveled so far. Read the rest of this entry »
To say that Northern California is beautiful is putting it mildly. It’s a long drive up there from San Jose, but such an enjoyable drive. The terrain is diverse from vineyards, to mountains, to acreage of corn, to towering redwoods.It’s hard not to set expectations when going to places like that for photography. Yet, even with all the beauty, shooting Northern California has a lot of challenges. 
Many photographers and camera dealers would try to convince you that a DSLR is the only way to go, that you’d never go back to a point and shoot, but that’s not necessarily true. I really like and have made good use of my Nikon DSLR cameras. No doubt about it. What I don’t care for is having to change lenses, the weight of the cameras that makes using a tripod necessary, and they’re just overkill for the informal indoor, family/pet shots I want to take. Yet, there I am, trucking through the trails with a heavy backpack and my tripod, and family and pet just rarely get photographed. Until recently. 