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| Cygnus area fron Dark Site X |
The patience that must once have been required to be an astro photographer is is definitely of the same order of magnitude as the proverbial saint. Back in the old days for a start, the astro phot had to know one end of a camera from another - now don't get me wrong - an astro phot still has to know one end of a camera from another, but one of the crucial differences between then and now is that back in the day, the astro phot had to get it right first go, by application of skills and knowledge honed with practice. Today, the same applies, but if you don't like what you've just taken, you can just delete it and start again. Even today, your choice of camera can have a big impact on your results. I used to shoot with Olympus, which, while they were great daylight cameras, were far too noisy for astro. I am now on my second Canon (they control the noise much more effectively) and I cant complain about the results, and the update (a 550d) is am improvement on my previous Canon - an entry level 1000d. Back in the day your astro phot had to devise ingenious methods of keeping track of the rotation of the Earth - that way stars were pinpricks of light not streak - no all you have to do is have the right sort of tripod head - aside from setting it up correctly, all the hard work has been done by the R&D departments at various equipment manufacturers. Back in the day, the astro phot like as not had to spend hours in the darkroom developing his image, using skills that are rapidly disappearing as there are less darkroom spaces available and less companies making the equipment to stock them. Besides, now there is Photoshop (for the adventurous) and a host of drag and drop, do it all for you image post production applications for the less adventurous. Who needs a dark room?
One thing we all need though is more dark sites. I have already wittered on about dark sites in an earlier post, so I wont bore you now, but if you find a good one, it may be worth keeping it to yourself, taking time to get to know the locals (so they know who the wierdo standing out there in the dark and the freezing cold is).
