A crescent Moon rises at the Teide Observatory. // David J. Eicher
Following the incredible Starmus Festival last week in Tenerife and La Palma, Canary Islands, an Astrophoto School put on by Starmus founder Garik Israelian has collected a small group of 18 enthusiastic attendees and speakers to delve into the mysteries of capturing great images of the sky. The school is taking place at the breathtaking Teide Observatory, on the summit of Tenerife, at an altitude of 7,841 feet (2,390 meters). The observatory, operated by the Institute for Astrophysics in Tenerife, was founded in 1964 and hosts an impressive array of telescopes, including the 70-centimeter Solar Vacuum Tower Telescope, the 90-centimeter THÉMIS Solar Telescope, the 1.5-meter Gregor Solar Telescope, the 152-centimeter Carlos Sánchez Infrared Telescope, the 50-centimeter Mons Telescope, the 80-centimeter IAC Telescope, telescopes in the Slooh Community Observatory network, and others.
The second day of our astrophoto talks began with frequent
Astronomy magazine contributor Rogelio Bernal Andreo describing the intricacies of deep-sky image processing techniques with the popular program PixInsight. Another name familiar to
Astronomy readers, Damian Peach, then described his sensational techniques for imaging comets, along with numerous breathtaking cometary images. It was an afternoon filled with mesmerizing details and great pictures.
At nightfall, we had relatively high winds, some very high clouds, and cold. Nonetheless, we tramped out to photograph a variety of Sun, Moon, sunset, star trails, mountain shadows, and other phenomena, enjoying the incredible otherworldly atmosphere of this beautiful facility.
Today we will have our last day of talks. I will share some astrophoto gems from the vault of
Astronomy magazine, and Damian will conclude with a workshop on using the helpful planetary software package WINJUPOS.
And then it will be back home, and the end, for now, of an absolutely stunning and amazing experience.
For all images from this trip, visit the
Online Reader Gallery.
For related blogs, see:
Starmus begins with Wilson, Eicher, Dawkins, and Harvati
Starmus Day 2: Hawking, May, 51 Degrees North film
Starmus Day 3: Book signing, Duke, Kroto, Cunningham, Ellis
Starmus Day 4: 108-minute round table at the world's largest telescope
Starmus Day 5: Sonic Universe Concert — Rick Wakeman and Brian May
Starmus ends, Astrophoto School begins