Part-time prevaricator
Half an hour’s rotation of the earth sure does look interesting.
And here’s Orion, next to a power pole, with the bright lights of Souris, MB, on the horizon.
In related good news, my camera and lens appear to have survived last week’s tumble unscathed.
It was clear and reasonably warm last night, and there was a reasonable chance of getting some aurora Borealis, so I headed to my usual spot about fifteen minutes out of town. I got my tripod set up, and retired to the warmth of the car—the temperature was only ‑10°C or so, but the windchill was significant, a south wind howling along at what felt like about 40–50 km/h—and listened to music for a while.
After about ten or fifteen minutes, I noticed that I couldn’t see the little red light on my camera anymore. I briefly wondered if maybe the battery had died, but then I realized that I also couldn’t see the thin dark lines of the tripod.
Sure enough, the wind had tipped it over into the snow. See the photo below, which is the ten-second window when it actually fell.
I cleaned the lens off as best I could, then packed it all up and headed home, where I gave the lens a more thorough cleaning and then set it aside to dry. This morning it looks OK, so I think I got away lucky.
I went out last night, since it was clear, and visited my friend Tim, who’s camping this weekend at Wasagaming. I snapped some star trails at his campsite (my battery, almost dead, managed 80 shots at 10 seconds each).
On the way home, I pulled off the highway about ½ a mile down a gravel road, and tried out a panoramic photo of the Milky Way. I set my camera up in portrait mode and shot 5 photos, 45 seconds each, tilting the camera up after each shot. The camera started out aimed at the horizon and the last shot was pointed straight up at the zenith.
I stitched the photos together using Hugin, which did a very good job of automatically orienting the photos and finding the matches. I didn’t have to massage anything manually.
Le voilà:
This is something I’d love to replicate, some lovely evening.
Saturday, I:
Continue reading “Writing Retreat, Day 6”“Can I help you with something?” Headless mannequins wore flimsy cotton dresses in earth tones. Countertop racks displayed neacklaces and bracelets made of beads, pearls, or smooth and polished stones. A sign at the back said RESTROOMS FOR PAYING CUSTOMERS ONLY.
“I need a washroom,” I said.
She motioned at the sign.
“No, I need a washroom.”
She sighed, though I couldn’t tell whether she was exasperated with me or with the situation I was evidently trying to put her in. “Policy,” she said. Then, giving me a good looking-over, she said, much more quietly, “You okay?”
Yes, I wanted to say.
“No.”
From Translations
I:
So far so good.
Top photo: taken about 11:45 PM or so. 12mm, 44 seconds, f/2.8, ISO 3200 (I think).
Last night was clear, at least until I got to my shooting spot, about 15 minutes south of town. Even with the clouds sliding across the sky, I still managed to get a few decent shots of the galaxy.
Continue reading “The Milky Way on a cloudy night”
Last weekend, as Jupiter approached opposition, I went out into the backyard with my camera and tripod to see if I could get a photo of it.
Behold, Jupiter and the four Galilean moons. As near as I can work it (thanks to this handy calculator), we’ve got (bottom-left to top-right) Io, Europa, Ganymede, and (way off to the side) Callisto. The photo was taken June 7, 2019, just before 11:15PM Central Daylight Time, if you want to check my calculations.
Photo info: 1 second exposure, 250mm, ISO 1600, f/5.6. Photo taken in RAW format, processed with Darktable. Cropped from a larger image to show the detail.
Sometimes it’s absolutely worth it to stay up past your bedtime.
