From the Begining

by: Simon Tang

Since I was a kid, I remember looking out my window and seeing a star that was always there before I went to bed. I use to imagine what it would be like to be at that star. What would I see? Are their even planets there? What about aliens?

As the years passed, I always want to see another world with my own eyes and after watching countless SciFi programmes and TV series, I began to start exploring what was really up in the skies.

So here I am today with piles of equipment that I own for work. Over 15 years of experience with various technologies I decided to point my camera to the skies.

I remember giving a brief lesson to a friend about shutter speed and the cool things you can do with it on a DSLR camera. We were driving back from San Francisco and decided to stop at a very dark road so I could demonstrate how this all works.

The result of this lesson yielded this photo of the Milky Way. For the rest of the journey home back to Canyon Country, I explained what light polution was and how light was collected on the camera's sensor to help better his understanding. Once I got home, I opened the picture on my laptop and was stunned by what I saw. From that moment on, I was hooked on taking pictures of the night sky.

My first attempts taking pictures of planets resulted in appalling results! I couldn't make out what it was and to be honest, they where so small that there was no detail.

Determined to get better results with little to no money, I stumbled on a gem of a lens that was being sold for 75% of it's original price. Better yet, it was NEW in a box! I grabbed the lens and ran to the checkout and exited the store very quickly in case someone said "Oops, wrong price".

Months went by before I got the chance to take some pictures of the planets as work and bad weather seemed to be my enemy. Then one night, my luck changed. The first thing I saw was the Moon. I screwed the lens into my camera and went outside and started taking pictures.

I was extremely please with the results of the moon. Unfortunately I had to wait to the early hours of the morning to catch any planets, so I set my alarm for 4am. It was freezing cold, totally pitch black outside and the air was totally still. I targeted the camera at a bright dot, which I knew to be Jupiter, and took a picture. When the preview of what I shot showed up on the screen, I was once again disappointed. I played with my camera settings and then took another shot. This time, the picture showed up with what looked like details of cloud bands on Jupiter. I wasn't sure. Is this atmospheric distortion? Is it dust? Or maybe something wrong with the camera. I played around till the Sun came up and went back indoors to see the results. To my disbelief, I had actually managed to get Jupiter and the cloud bands!

This fuzzy image got me wondering. How is it that other people with telescopes get such great pictures? After weeks of research I discovered stacking software. Suddenly the world changed. It was late January and it was another cold calm night. With all the knowledge I had acquired about stacking, I set off on a mission to catch Jupiter.

After playing around with the software, I finally got a result. For the first time ever, I was looking at another world in detail. I could see the clouds of Jupiter as clear as day. I was so excited that I posted, text and emailed the pictures to everyone I could think of.

A few months went past and I spent endless hours perfecting the new skills I had learned. The only problem was, I just could not get big enough images. The limit of all my equipment was starting to show. I started to crawl through the internet looking for information about telescopes. The sheer number of results and different types of telescopes was just overwhelming. I didn't know what to do. I was determined to get a telescope, but which one?

I deicded to stop and wait before I pulled the trigger on any telescope which lead to me discovering the Local Group Astronomy Club in Santa Clarita. I found it by searching for star parties and saw that they would be at the College of the Canyons which is actually behind my house. However, I couldn't wait that long for the event to roll round so I decided to make an effort to go to the club meeting. After meeting everyone at the club, I was fired up and ready to do some serious sky watching.

Once again, the camera and lens came out and for the first time ever, I saw Saturn not as a point of light, but as a ball with handles on either side. My jaw dropped as I watched Saturn wizz by on the camera screen. I quickly realigned and hit the record button. I fired up the stacking software and sat patiently for the results.

I could not believe my eyes. Saturn actually looked like it does on TV or magazines, except my picture was tiny! At that moment, I had to get a telescope. I had to make a choice. Since all my experience with astronomy has been with imaging, I had to buy something that would be useful with the equipment I own. Within days I went over to Woodland Hills Telescope and purchased a nice new Orion 6 inch Ritchey-Chretien Astrograph.

I got home and started to play with my new toy but hit a dead end. I decided to call up David Flynn and ask him 101 questions. He very kindly showed me everything about the scope and gave me a crash course on everything I needed to know! (Thanks Dave! Most appericated!!).

Like any kid in a candy store, I just had to get outside. First stop, the Moon!

I played around and got critical focus on the telescope. I knew where Jupiter was and tilted the telescope towards the bright dot in the sky. For the life of me, I could not find it in the viewfinder of the camera. I stood for what seems like forever nudging the telescope around to see if I could get lucky. Without a finder scope I was trying to hit a pea that was millions of miles away with a needle! I then got the bright idea of attaching my binoculars to the tube to act as a finder scope. After getting use to my rig job I had a good way of getting the telescope to be pointing in the right direction.

Within seconds I was able to capture Jupiter in detail. I could see cloud bands, color, even the moons of Jupiter. The moment I saw the Great Red Spot I remembered all those years back from looking out the window of my bedroom, wondering if I would ever seen another world with my own eyes.

For the next 3 nights I sat outside playing with the telescope. I can finally say that I have fulfilled a life long dream of being able to see the stars and planets with my own eyes. All those years of looking up and wondering what was out there. Everything I dreamed about looking up at the skies has lead me on this journey. This isn't the end, it's only the begining of it and what a great one it is.