Hi, Everyone!

First of all, I want to apologize for my unannounced absence from The Train of late.

And unfortunately, second of all, I want to take a moment to turn that unannounced absence into an announced hiatus. Having ten days left in my college career would be a hectic time even if I didn't work the way that I do – but since my writing style tends to consist in several months of "thinking" and "research" followed by a couple weeks of nearly uninterrupted writing, well, it's really hectic.

But here's a glimpse of what I've been doing on the astrophotography front.


ATTEMPT 1, 11/21/08 (already showcased here):




ATTEMPT 2, 12/3/08:




While the first image is a single shot, taken on my first successful night of imaging, the second is a composite image of 23 separate exposures stitched and blended together in Photoshop. This not only allows for a much wider field of view, it means that I can balance different exposures and levels of focus. And the good news is that I haven't fully taken advantage of the technique, so should be able to get something even better (though not so much better) before finishing the project.

While I was hesitant to recommend that anyone click on the previous image (it looks about as good as it ever will at the smaller size), this time I encourage everyone to check out the larger version.