The Comet

 This month I went out on two separate occasions and captured some images of the recently passing comet. Which one? Well...here's what Wikipedia had to say about this comet.

C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan–ATLAS) is a comet from the Oort cloud discovered by the Purple Mountain Observatory in China on 9 January 2023 and independently found by ATLAS South Africa on 22 February 2023. The comet passed perihelion at a distance of 0.39 AU on 27 September 2024, when it became visible to the naked eye. Wikipedia

Orbital period: ≈ 110 million years (inbound); ≈ 235,000 years (outbound)

Discovered: January 9, 2023

Discovered by: Purple Mountain Observatory; ATLAS South Africa

Mean diameter: ~3.2 km

Aphelion: ≈ 270,000 AU (inbound); ≈ 3,800 AU (outbound)

Argument of periapsis: 308.5°

Comet nuclear magnitude (M2): 9.2 ± 0.3

Now, here are the images I captured over those two nights.

That streak in the upper right corner was an aircraft flying by while the camera shutter was open during the exposure. Which was for several seconds.

Overall, I'm pleased with the images. For the first batch, I used three-second or longer exposure times. I cranked up the ISO for the second batch and made no more than two-second exposure times. I wanted to reduce the trailing effect of the stars while the Earth rotated when the shutter was open.

Something New

 It's been a while since I posted any recent images. So, since I'm sort of convalescing after a recent fall from my bicycle. I have some idle time on my hands. Below are a series of images I've taken on recent walks over to and back from Rancho San Antonio. I've even entered three of the images in the Midpenninsula Open Space photo contest. I should find out if I have been recognized sometime in August. Otherwise, only those who know of my blog can enjoy my images.

I'll start out by directing my/our attention up to the sky. Looking at the wonderful blue sky with lots of interesting clouds.

Next, will be some of the local critters we usually see during the warmer months when we visit the park.

This relative close-up of the lizard face is one of the images I submitted to the MedPen photo contest. The little thing just seems to have a kind of character in its expression.

I really like this image. It is simple in composition. And yet bold in color and contrast. I considered entering this image, but it was not recommended by my small group of voters.

This is another image I like for the same reasons. But, once again, it was not picked by the small panel of voters I asked to judge the potential images I wanted to submit. So, it didn't make the first primary.

This image was chosen by the entire group as an image I should submit. The lighting and subject seemed to inspire a yes vote from everyone.

I have a thing about getting up close and appreciating the details in the image. I like the color, the shadows, and the feel of depth in this image. But, it didn't pass the panel of voters.

This image and the next two images show my fascination with droplets of water. To me, those little droplets appear as tiny, ethereal gems that materialize out of thin air.

Come on now. Isn't that just fascinating?

I couldn't let this one pass by. It's another of my reflections on the surface of water in a creek images. I just like these images. They are so real and yet they seem to look like abstract art at the same time.

I used my macro lens to capture this image. The little bug is probably no more than 6-7mm long. Yet it totally commands the subject of this image.

How many angels can dance on the head of a pin? That phrase comes to my mind every time is see one of these seed heads. This first image has almost half the little seeds missing. They've been scattered by the wind or they were disturbed by some passerby.

Here is another one almost entirely intact. At least for the moment. I liked this image so much, I thought it would be fun to push the editing a little over the line.

So, I cranked up the contrast and color saturation. Just to give it a bit of a Punk culture look. It's not the same image as the one above. But, I liked this one enough to play around with it. 

H2 Oh Yea!

 I know. I know. This seems to be a recurring theme with me. I just can't help myself. I find these images so compelling that I keep adding more.

I'll start off with the undulating reflections on the surface of water in a small stream. I shot this one in color, but I thought it had more of an impact if I converted it to black and white. Many cameras simply refer to this as Monochrome.

In another, even smaller stream, I noticed some bubbles had formed in the vortex of the current in the stream. 

Once again, I just couldn't ignore it and walk by. So, in this post, those images went.

Oh, but I couldn't stop here. The motivation is strong and there's so much more to share.

By using my Macro lens, I was able to get down even closer. I noticed some dew drops had formed on some tiny plants.

A little further along on my walk, I noticed a ground cover spider web covered with really small dew drops. As I approached the web with the Sun over my shoulder, I noticed a kind of rainbow effect in the water droplets. So, I tried to see if I could capture this color bias if I moved in really close to the droplets.

I couldn't quite get the effect I was hoping for. But, it still looked so cool. Then I came upon a sort of tunnel-shaped web. There didn't seem to be any occupant, but I still felt compelled to move in really close.

I'll hit the pause button on this theme for a while. Until I, once again, feel compelled to upload more images to share.

Rain On Me

 Over the past several days, we had been experiencing some pretty good rain storms. Due to the contours of the asphalt in front of our garage door, a nice-sized puddle had formed. Seeing an oppertunity here, I took out my camera with the Macro lens and set up the tripod. Here's a sample of those images.

When editing the images, I did not find it necessary to do a lot of digital enhancement. All I had to do was just increase the contrast of the images slightly. And that was about it. Then, I just cropped the images to a 16:10 format. I love it when nature does all the work and creates these beautiful images in front of my lens. I just hold up my camera and capture what life presents to me. What could possibly be both more simple and satisfying at the same time?

About an hour after I captured the previous images, the rain returned with a fleeting downpour. I couldn't just stand and watch it. So, I set up the camera on the tripod again and captured some more images using very high shutter speeds. And, yes. These are all color images.

Then, as quickly as the rain had arrived. It was gone. Before I closed my garage door, I looked down where the concrete meets the asphalt. There it was. Just waiting for me. A dried leaf with beads of water resting on the surface. I felt as though it was calling to me. So. I indulged once again.

Remembering the Dream?

 The other day, I took my DSLR and tripod with me when I hiked over to the little creek near our place. I have this ongoing fascination with water droplets and the light reflections on the surfaces of water. 

I like the way the surface of the water ripples and undulates in such a way as to distort the reflections on its surface. I took the images in color, but I felt converting the images to black and white helped convey a stronger feeling. See what you think.

To me, trying to comprehend the reflections on the surface of this water is like trying to recall the content of a dream I just had. Some parts of the image are vaguely clear, while the rest of the image is all broken up and makes no sense. 

Night of the Perseids

 I tried again. With limited success. I was able to do better in a different location. But, as would be the case, nature failed to cooperate. I got some better images of the Milky Way. But, I didn't catch a single meteor in my images. Save for a short trail at the very bottom of one image. Not even worth posting.

So here's one decent image I caught of the Milky Way. Pretty cool to think that the white-ish haze is really lots and lots and lots of really distant stars. Not too much different than our own Sun. Except that those stars are so, so far away that the light they emitted hundreds or even thousands of years ago is just NOW reaching us. So, traveling at the speed of light, that light is only NOW reaching us. 

So, when we look up at the night sky, we are actually seeing history. We are are not seeing the way the universe is today. We are actually looking back in time. I find that kind of awesome when I stop and think about it. 

Alright. Enough mind blowing for the moment. Here's the image I took of the Milky Way.

To see the complete image, you need to open it up by clicking on it.

A few days later, I decided to invest in an equatorial mount clock drive. I will be able to align the axis of the drive unit with the polar axis of the Earth. Then, I will be able to have my camera track the stars across the sky as the planet rotates. 

This will keep the view of the sky for the camera stationary within the frame. I'll be able to make long exposures without any blurring of the stars. And, I will be able to make multiple exposures of the same patch of the sky and then, digitally, layer them together when I do my editing. 

I have high hopes for this endeavor.

Astrophotography anyone?

 On Saturday night the 5th of August, I drove up to Montebello Ridge off Page Mill Road. I tried taking a few images of the night sky in hopes of seeing the Perseid Meteor shower. This was about a week before the predicted peak, but I was still optimistic. Perhaps, overly optimistic. Because I didn't see a single meteor in the two hours I was in that location.

I tried doing a few time exposures and I got mixed results. The one thing that did surprise me was that I was able to actually see the milky way from this close to the Bay Area. I guess the sky was clear enough and the light pollution was low enough that I could easily make it out as a sort of light thin cloudy trail across the sky. In fact, I first thought it was just a thin trail of clouds. 

I opened an app on my phone called Sky Safari and the app put up a display of the stars according to my actual location and which way I pointed the back of the phone. I could easily pick out the names of the stars, constellations, and planets by aligning the display with the points of light in the sky I could see. The app played a soothing music in the background as I amused myself with the display. 

Below is a five minute exposure I made on that night.

My plan is to try again from a different location. About 1.8 miles further West. That will be over the ridge and I shouldn't have as much light pollution from the Bay Area. Of course, wishing is not the same as having. So I'll just have to see how it goes.