In the Cactus Garden

The UofA has a wonderful Cactus Garden in the middle of the Mall near the Student Union. Friday afternoon, there were lots of birds to be found there. I've been trying to ID this relatively small bird - is it a female Brown-Headed Cowbird or some kind of Sparrow? This image was taken at 300mm focal length with an exposure of 1/500 seconds at f/8, ISO 400.

Moon in twilight

Here's an image from a few weeks ago showing the nearly quarter phase moon in the sky next to the Spacewatch 36 inch dome in morning twilight. The Moon was in Saggitarius at the time and you can faintly see the constellation left of the moon. This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 10 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 800.

Infrared Telescopes

Some of the telescopes from last Saturday's star party are shown here. Most are looking at the sun which was getting low in the sky when I took this photo. This image was taken with the kit lens at 37mm focal length with a Hoya R72 IR filter and an exposure of 1.3 seconds at f/5, ISO 800.

KGUN 9 live weathercast

David was popular Saturday afternoon and did several TV interviews. This one was done live by the KGUN 9 weekend weather reporter, Bill Harris (in the red shirt). This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1/160 seconds at f/8, ISO 100.

Infrared Levy in B&W

Here's a black and white version of the previous image. I sorta like the colored version, but I know some people prefer to see the B&W version.

Infrared Levy

Saturday afternoon, I visited with David Levy at his "National Sharing the Sky Foundation" Star party. It was a great success with lots of telescopes and visitors. During the daytime, the filtered sun was the subject in most telescopes along with the nearly quarter phase moon. After sunset, the Moon would be the "star" along with Venus and other evening astronomical targets. Here, David sits next to "Apollo", a 6 inch telescope that has been recently reconditioned. This image was taken with the kit lens at 18mm focal length with a Hoya R72 IR filter. The exposure was 1 second at f/3.5, ISO 800.

Son in IR, B&W version

Here is yesterdays image, converted to B&W.

Son in IR

Got some new toys today - a 50mm f/1.8 Canon lens (the so called "nifty fifty") and a Hoya R72 IR filter. This image shows my son trying to ignore his dad while I was playing around with the new filter. While I had a B+W 092 IR filter, I had bought it for my earlier point and shoot digital and it was a 52mm filter, but my kit lens and 70-300mm zoom both use 58mm filters so this new R72 filter has 58mm threads. I had been led to believe that the 092 filter was equivalent to the R72, but initial exposure comparisons indicate that the 092 has more red transmission and does not have as strong an IR affect with my Canon 20D. This image was taken with the kit lens at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1 second at f/3.5, ISO 800.

Daytime stars?

Not really daytime - this image was taken in quarter phase moonlight a few nights ago and with just a little level adjustment, makes it look like a daytime photo, but with stars up in the sky. The high ISO setting on the camera along with the level adjust and an unsharp mask combine to give this image a very grainy appearance. This image was taken with the kit lens at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 10 seconds at f/3.5, ISO 800.

Venus, the Plieades and zodiacal light.

Shortly after watching the ISS fly over a couple nights ago, I turned the camera west to capture this view of the planet Venus (the brightest star visible) right next to the Plieades star cluster. Also visible is the broad bright band of light extending from the horizon up past Venus which is the Zodiacal light from scattered dust in the inner solar system. This image was taken at 24mm focal length with an exposure of 30 seconds at f/1.8, ISO 400.

Space Station over Kitt Peak

The International Space Station (ISS) made a nice pass over Kitt Peak for the 2nd night in a row. Here it is seen trailing through the constellation Cassiopeia and over the 36 inch Spacewatch Telescope dome (with the 90 inch Bok telescope and 4-meter Mayall Telescope domes at right). The orange glow is not twilight - that is the glow of city lights from Phoenix and Casa Grande. This image was taken with my 24mm lens with an exposure of 30 seconds at f/1.8, ISO 200.

ISS through Orion

The International Space Station (ISS) made a very nice pass over Kitt Peak in twilight last night. Here, it passes through the constellation Orion on its way around the globe with its 6 passengers that includes both the Expedition 14 and 15 crews and paying passenger Charles Simonyi who rode up with the Expedition 15 crew aboard a Soyuz spacecraft, docking with the ISS earlier yesterday. This image was taken with my 24mm lens with an exposure of 30 seconds at f/2.5.

Setting Sun

Just before the sun started setting into the dust storm last night, I got this image of it and the clouds around it. This image was taken at 55mm focal length with an exposure of 1/320 seconds at f/5.6, ISO 200.

Sunset into a dust storm

The wind was high tonight at sunset when I took this shot of the setting sun as it descends through a dust storm over the Tohono O'odham town of Sells west of Kitt Peak. You can see the lighter color of the dust below the real horizon which is buried under the sun in the dust storm. This image was taken at 18mm focal length with an exposure of 1/60 seconds at f/5.6, ISO 200. I used the Gimp to stretch the levels a little and applied an unsharp mask before posting.

Stormy skies

The last day of my last observing run last month had an impressive lightning storm with the usual dark storm clouds. Here, the 1.8-m dome is lit by the sun poking through the clouds low in the west making an impressive contrast with the storm behind. This image was taken at 35mm focal length with an exposure of 1/800 seconds at f/8, ISO 200.

Reflecting on downtown Tucson

I hiked around downtown Tucson a couple weeks back and couldn't resist taking a picture of the reflection of one building on another building. This image was taken at 86mm focal length with an exposure of 1/250 seconds at f/9, ISO 200.

OOOT Art exhibit

I entered a B&W photograph of a silhouetted lamp in the annual "On Our Own Time" Staff Art Exhibit here at the UofA and it won 2nd place in the photography catagory. The website for the exhibit (linked above) shows this years winners and also has a link to a powerpoint presentation which shows all of this years entries including another photo I posted on this blog that showed the Mercury Redstone rocket at Cape Canaveral in 3D.

Fouled back

Diamondback third baseman Chad Tracy fouls a ball back. This image was taken at 238mm focal length with an exposure of 1/400 seconds at f/8, ISO 200.

The pitch

Diamondback outfielder Eric Byrnes leads off first base as Rockies pitcher Josh Fogg delivers a pitch. This image was taken at 190mm focal length with an exposure of 1/640 seconds at f/8, ISO 200.

RBI Single

Todd Helton onf the Colorado Rockies signles, driving in Steve Finley who had made it to 3rd base after walking. This image was taken at 190mm focal length with an exposure of 1/640 seconds at f/8, ISO 200.