CCD vs Film? Lots of time vs no patience? Alright, this is your place to discuss all the astrophotography what's and what's not. You can discuss about techniques, accessories, cameras, whatever....just make sure you also post some nice photos here too!
2021-6-24 Last evening's shooting took a toll such that I had no energy to get up in the wee hours to shoot the stars. Nevertheless, in the pre-dawn time I was excited by the clear skies and what it could mean to the sunrise vista.
At around 6:20, the twilight was already a bit bright over the eastern horizon. Managed to capture the images of Pleiades and Hyades, the Golden Gate of the Ecliptic. Not meant for beautiful deep-sky imagery, but a nice moment to remember -- the two prominent clusters have returned to the morning twilights. Only when back home processing the images, I remembered that Mercury has also returned to the morning sky -- albeit a bit faint and low in altitude.
But the biggest achievement today is the capture of a sunrise just 67 hours after June solstice. This gives me a good opportunity to search where the solstice point -- especially what is the northmost point the sunrise can go from this observation site.
Now the Sun is heading steadily to the December Solstice in 2021. Will see it back to this position in June 2022.
It is always intriguing to watch the highly squeezed (vertical) image of the sun thanks to the optical diffraction by the thick layers of the atmosphere.
This is a heavy crop of the original photography taken on the evening of June 23. I could not help but make this crop because here are among the most beautiful things of the universe in harmony: heaven, light and children.
