Images

The Book

February 17, 2020Richard WrightPublishing

My book is now available in print through Amazon print on demand! This is not a technical “how to” book on astrophotography, but rather this is a book I wrote for my family and friends who simply appreciate the images they see and are mildly curious about how much work goes into taking these photographs. It’s my love letter to the night sky and a tour of the kinds of targets we shoot, the gear we use, and the lengths we will go to to find dark skies suitable for this kind of imaging. I hope some of you will enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Image of cover of Evening Show Book — Now available in print!

Messier 55

June 6, 2019Richard WrightAstrophotography

How have I missed this gorgeous globular cluster? M55 is low to the South in the constellation Sagittarius from where I live, and capturing it was part of my recent surgical strike. My two favorite Northern Hemisphere globulars are M13 and Omega Centauri, and this one is every bit as beautiful. The core is not quite as dense, and you can easily resolve and bring out the amber and blue stars all the way through the core. Globular clusters are honestly low hanging fruit if you have a quality refractor. Nothing I own but one of my Esprit refractors will bring out the powdery nature of this star city. Also, short exposures are actually best! Short exposures will not saturate the star cores and it is far easier to preserve the star colors both in the cluster itself and in the surrounding sky. Only 70 minutes of two minute RGB exposures went into this image using an FLI Microline 16200 on an f/7 Esprit 150. Unguided of course on a Paramount MX+ 😉

Stardust Ranch

June 3, 2019Richard Wright& Travel, Astrophotography

How much longer will sights and images like this be possible? All over the world, astronomers, both amateur and professional alike seek out dark sites such as this dark sky camp shown here in Okeechobee Florida. Not only is it getting harder and harder to find areas far enough from city lights (and here, you can still see the sky glow from the city of Okeechobee), but inevitably the sky will be filled with satellites streaking through our images. The recent Space X launch has drawn a lot of interest to this, and bear in mind there are dozens of geosynchronous satellites already in this image that you can’t see. Make no mistake though, the drum of progress will demand that this number grows to thousands to tens of thousands in the coming years, and we need to be prudent and responsible about how we affect our environment, and this includes the night sky.

Milky Way over a dome — The glorious skies of Stardust Ranch

Cosmic Tourists

February 10, 2019Richard Wright& Travel, Astrophotography, Trips

This year the Winter Star Party returned to the Florida Keys after having to relocate for a year due to the extensive damage wrought by Hurricane Irma. We could not have been treated better by the weather, and there’s going to be several additions to my gallery from this years photography and imaging. This is my favorite image from the trip, and I think possibly my favorite nightscape I’ve ever taken. I also won first place in the wide field imaging contest with this shot. Just before dawn, I knew the Summer Milky Way would be making an appearance and I wanted to catch it behind a row of telescopes setup for the star party. While scoping out (ha, see what I did there) locations, I saw two other people shooting possibly Venus and Jupiter being reflected in the water. I knew I had the perfect shot that captured the essence of the Winter Star Party! Two star gazers enjoying the view in tourist central (the Florida Keys). Truly, we are all here as cosmic tourists.

Richard
Canon 5D Mark III
10 seconds @ISO 3200
Sigma 20mm art lens f/1.4