SAA Participants Chris L. Peterson and David Illig (Davoud) at the Midwest Astro-Imaging Conference, 2009
David Illig |
Chris L. Peterson |
Home and Upton Farm Observatory: Murky Swamp, Maryland. Elevation: 20 meters. |
Home and Cloudbait Observatory: Clear-As-Crystal, Colorado. Elevation: >2750 meters. |
| This photo was made on Saturday, June 27, 2009, toward the closing of the Midwest Astro-Imaging Conference that was held near Chicago on June 26 and 27. It was a great pleasure for me to meet Chris. I was an attendee and Chris was a presenter. I won’t get all gushy about the conference, but I'll tell you that for wannabee astrophotographers like me, a lot of useful information with real-world practicality came across in two days. Chris's presentation on autoguiding was, on its own, worth the cost of the conference.* Persons who have been participants in SAA for some length of time may note an attempt at humor in this photograph. *I was, of course, doing it wrong. Though I use a modern guide camera with my AP 1200GTO, my thinking was stuck in the ancient era of manual crosshair guiding where the guidescope had to be of much longer focal length than the imaging 'scope. I use wide-field 'scopes with focal lengths of 500 and 530 mm, and my guide ’scope was a Questar of 89mm aperture and a focal length of 1300 mm. I have replaced it with a Tele Vue 76/480 mm FL that was sitting unused and that was probably destined to be sold on AstroMart. |
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| Due to popular demand from their respective fans, Chris and David are making available for purchase a printed, autographed,* high-resolution version of this photograph. *Please note that Chris and David will not personally autograph the photograph; each print will carry a unique and random pair of autographs of insignificant persons. |
