While solar eclipses are a class of their own, lunar eclipses are exciting events as well. During last summer, Europe witnessed the longest lunar eclipse of the century and we observed it on Mt. Wendelstein. Right after the main event ended, I used infrared to decrease the contrast between the bright and dark regions and […]
Full moon is a good time to attempt night-time infrared photography. This night, while working on Mt. Wendelstein, I was still covered in clouds with only very short moments of clear sight. While I couldn’t observe due to the high humidity, taking photos that night was rewarding enough.
After a long and productive night observing on Mt. Wendelstein, one of my highlights is watching the sunrise in the morning which announces the end of my shift. Since there is nobody here besides the observer, I put on classical music from Bruckner and sit outside for half an hour while liquid nitrogen is refilled […]
Astronomy has a few perks, one of them being able to travel to far-away continents (depending on the perspective) and explore locations you can otherwise never access. My main scientific work is the hunt for extrasolar planets and in the context of this, I regularly travel into the mountains of Texas, to the McDonald observatory. […]
–part 2 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– Having arrived in Texas, our final trip was a drive through the mountainside. While taking photos out of the car is a challenge, the light through the clouds and the pale traces of plant life on the rocky hills made it worth a try.
–part 3 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– The first time we could see the observatory. The road divides the image and provides a nice visual cue as to the difference of the telescopes: the left one, called HET, is an experimental, modern 10 meter class telescope that however can only rotate and not […]
–part 4 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– Having reached the top, weather got worse quickly. Here, one can see the HET, which is located on the opposite hill, in more detail. Infrared was able to pierce the fog while visibility was much worse in the visible.
–part 5 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– The weather cleared (more or less) nicely for the first night of the observing run. However, several thunderstorms were still visible on the horizon, which led to a sight I never thought I could see: lightning arcs below the milky way. Taken in full spectrum, lightning […]
–part 6 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– Several days later, an astrophysicist’s worst nightmare happened! Forest fires several dozen kilometers away spread out and slowly crept closer towards the observatory. We had to close down the dome and enjoy the show while everthing smelled like barbecue. Thankfully, the fire department was successful in […]
–part 7 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– Everything looked more peaceful on the next day. Sadly, infrared revealed a suspicious “cloud” in the sky, which is likely ash and not water. On the right, one can see how it slowly dissolves in the wind.
–part 8 of the essay An astronomer in Texas– Our visibility was extremely poor in the following night, i.e. while we couldn’t detect a cloud with our sky surveillance camera, stars appeared to be much fainter than they should be. Since we wanted to do spectroscopy where every photon counts, this was a huge problem. […]
Sometimes, strange things occur in astronomy and this was one of those nights. While observing in Texas, we realized that our instruments recorded almost no light but the sky was cloud-free. I therefore went outside to take infrared images which is when we finally realized what was going on. Seen here, the pink glow in […]
Don’t miss our emails with exclusive offers, inspiringphotos, and epic adventures
© Kolari Vision 2024 Web Design & SEO Services – Lavit Solutions
