Two years after I retired I stepped back into the hobby I had enjoyed as a schoolboy but had felt obliged to set aside in favour of ‘getting on with life’. (There’s a whole blog series buried in that phrase, but it’ll not be written by me … unless some of my earlier posts, like this one, cover some of those bases.) I’d been saying for years and years that I missed it and had long declared that I would spend a fraction of my pension pay-out in order to get the telescope that I’d always wanted as a teenager. With hindsight, a useful rejoinder might have been “be careful what you wish for”.
Cutting a long and convoluted story short (more details here should you wish to know; if you’re having trouble sleeping there are also a few updates*) I finally put my money where my schoolboy aspiration lay and bought a 150 mm Newtonian reflector from a local supplier, which sat beautifully upon a sturdy tripod and equatorial mount. Patrick Moore would have used the old-style measurement of six inches back when I was a kid watching ‘Sky at Night’ on a low resolution monochrome TV – this was the size he’d recommended and it had evidently lodged in my mind for more than half a century. It was lovely; so much fun. I spent the first hours of many a clear night gazing through it at all those objects I’d struggled to see using my original tiny pocket-money telescope. However, the more I gazed the more my aspirations grew. Unfortunately, the associated challenges seemed at times to expand even faster.
 |
| Here it is: one of the most fun presents I’ve ever treated myself to, fresh out of the box and assembled indoors awaiting better weather, and darkness. |
The core issue was that I wanted to capture images of what I was looking at, and in the process to go beyond the limitations of my eyes – which the attributes of a superbly flexible short focal length ‘camera’, but limited by a relatively inefficient light capture mechanism. I tried to use my smartphone, but with limited success. The next step was to persuade family members to buy me an entry-level astronomical camera as a Christmas present – but that also necessitated retro-fitting motorized drives to my equatorial mount and loading (and learning to run) a whole family of software packages on my PC. All this software requires effort if it is to be used to the full and it was at this point that my attempts to learn from blog sites and YouTube began.
“YouTube is your friend” was a mantra cited by several people at my local amateur astronomy society. (Sadly, their meetings are held at a venue which is over an hour’s drive away: a journey I don’t attempt these days, although I can get to the much closer Beacon Observing Group - but that's not quite the same thing.) There’s certainly a lot of relevant material there, along with copious bite-sized snippets of advice on astronomy-related Facebook groups and the like (e.g. Altair Astro's). I muddled through on this basis and in the process collected a few pleasing images of major solar system objects, along with a few binary star systems. I still haven’t captured an image of Mercury, but that’s another story. However, this learning curve was insignificant compared to the issues associated with my deeper aspiration of capturing images of nebulæ within the Milky Way and more particularly images of other galaxies. Another telescope, a computerized mount and a second astrocam were required. Actually, a pair of telescopes was needed: a small one to piggy-back on the main ’scope in order to control the mount so that the main telescope+astrocam holds the target object steady in the field of view for extended periods of time. This is where the limitations of trying to learn something from online sources really kicked in since the technical demands on setting up the assembled equipment are severe and the slew of new software to get to grips with (and to get in communication with the equipment!) is prodigious. There is so much to learn and to master; even if astrophotography was my only hobby or commitment I would struggle to set aside enough time.
 |
| This is the ‘new’ setup – actually, both the telescope and the astrocam (the larger of the two purple cylinders where otherwise an eye might be) were purchased second-hand from trustworthy people – photographed during a session of daytime astronomy whilst imaging sunspot clusters. Getting used to the new kit in the light was extremely useful, although it can never resolve the issues associated with long-exposure imaging. (It's taken me by surprise a little bit how difficult I'm finding this given that I spent an entire career writing and using complex software in order to handle large datasets and get something meaningful out the other side. An acquaintance - himself an experienced astronomer and astrophotographer with his own observatory - recently described it as being 'rocket surgery'; he's not wrong. Perhaps it's an age thing ...) |
Online is usually the only place to go for information since ‘deep sky’ astrophotography is intrinsically a solo pursuit (i.e. suitable for introverts). Having said that, there are a handful of people who have offered useful bespoke advice via email or similar - people like Ewan who I met at the local astronomy society I mentioned earlier, and like Alex at First Light Optics. Nevertheless, I’d dearly love to have an experienced person nearby who’d be willing to spend an evening or two giving me a tutorial – but even those few I know with a nearby postcode use different kit and more importantly, different software packages. So, I’m back online again.
This is probably true of all hobbies, but search for topics in ‘astrophotography’ on YouTube and you’ll be met with an ocean of suggested videos, many of which have words like ‘beginners’ and ‘tutorial’ in their titles. They are tags I have learnt not to rely on. For every instructional video that tackles beginners’ issues well – i.e. none of those frustrating missed steps or the use of jargon etc. – one might have waded through another five that confuse or even demotivate. On some topics I have failed to find a single video that addressed my questions and therefore that I’d recommend to another struggling beginner. Don’t get me wrong, I admire and am grateful to these people for at least making the effort. Moreover, most of their videos contain nuggets of useful information and I’m confident that, should I ever move on from my present inexperienced state, some will be of use as I seek to progress further. I’m also acutely aware of my own limitations, having uploaded many hours of physics-related video material during the more severe phases of the COVID pandemic. These were notionally aimed at my local u3a (University of the Third Age) and specifically for those with a non-science background: see here and also here. I have already been told by a couple of people that I ‘lost’ them in some instances – for them, at the very least, I failed to deliver. I had attempted to teach something, but those viewers had not been able to learn from the material I supplied. That’s down to me, not to them. Thus, even someone like me who used to teach for a living – and do it well by most accounts# – found it difficult. It was easier when I was in the lecture theatre, face-to-face with students and thus able to fine-tune my words in real-time as I responded to the learners in front of me. Such responsiveness is simply not possible when limited to the one-shot nature of a YouTube video and its analogues. Or is it …?
These reflections have suggested to me a way forward which might work were it practicable – which, unfortunately, it probably isn’t without time-consuming effort, coordination and sponsorship. What if one were able to bring together an experienced practitioner and one or two (or more) beginners and film the interaction as our expert got the beginners up-and-running. The expert has the resources needed and the beginners will keep the pace and details at an appropriate level. If none of them has simultaneously to handle the filming/editing process then such matters as line-of-sight, clarity of shots, sound levels etc. can better be assured. Thus, we have a team effort; expensive of time etc. but potentially better able to generate something of worth. Of course, this would be a long series of videos since one would need to cover a wide spectrum of tasks using various combinations of equipment and software.
It’s a dream, nothing more.
______________________________________________________________
* here, oh and here and also here ;-)
# Please forgive me if this sounds boastful. In truth, I have never felt completely satisfied with my skill as a teacher and I know I have made mistakes, but I look back on decades of complimentary feedback from students and can smile nevertheless at a job done to the best of my ability.
