Photograph by Mary MacIntyre
Mary is a familiar face with the club and is always well received with her knowledgeable Astro-photography talks always a firm favourite topic.
This month, Mary focussed her talk on photographing the Milky way & explained how she goes about it with her many Canon 1100, kit lens, tripod & shutter cable. Mary entertained her audience explaining the best way of keeping her lenses warm in the colder months is to use cheap, easy to buy, hand warmers wrapped in socks which are then held onto the outside of the lens with Velcro or hand sewn buttons & fastenings.
That’s where the basic equipment ends. Her vast array of technical star viewing equipment ranges all the way up to her Star Adventurer mini tripod which can be controlled from an app, from the comfort of your home.
Mary went onto explain that on the Burtle dark sky scale, where 1 or 2 is best and only found far south in Devon or in the northern parts of the UK, Oxfordshire is 4 and the better parts being the villages, out of the light pollution.
As it happened, July is the peak time for photographing the Milky Way, with the 23rd of July around midnight is the absolute optimum milky way evening, for anyone wanting to try their hand at this fascinating hobby.
Mary advises that its optimum to have some type of foreground interest within your photo, which as a windmill or trees and to try and stack 30 x 20 second exposure and stitch together in post processing in Lightroom, Photoshop or programmes such as Sequeator.
If this has peaked your interest, social media is a great way to see what others are photographing. Stephen Cheatley @starman_1969 is a great account to follow. Mary Macintyre can also be found on YouTube, Instagram & Facebook @spiceyspiney.
Looking forward on the 28th of August we will be exhibiting our members images at Steeple Aston Flower show. We are really excited to be there and look forward to meeting you all and talking about our images, the club & anything else photography related.