PATRICK TAN'S DIGITAL ASTROPHOTOGRAPHY WEBPAGE
From the green Oxfordshire village of Sunningwell, England
1º 17' 14.52"W, 51º 41' 59.6"N
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EQUIPMENT SOFTWARE PICTURES: Wide field new 27/05/2020 PICTURES: Solar system new 17/07/2020 CONTACT ARCHIVE pictures: Narrow field
//SITE HISTORY (Most recent first)
July 2020
After Hale-Bopp, we have not had a naked eye comet to view until now. As usual, cloudy skies every night until the 17th permitted viewing and photography while it was just east of the stars Talita Borealis and Australis on the edge of Ursa Major, magnitude 1.8 - easily visible over our northern sky.
May 2020
I ran out of accessible deep sky objects to photograph - so have done no astrophotography since 2014! In this time, two computers have died and needed reconstituting, which is always a fear because of compatibility with Autostar Suite and my telescope hardware. Not the least of my worries were, maintaining the image processing software and the licenses amidst compatibility issues with newer operating systems. But we have prevailed so far. My latest offering is modest as I noticed that I first imaged M104, the Sombrero galaxy, with the Meade DSI through my 8" reflector. Here is a wide-angle view of the galaxy in its starfield as seen through my apochromat 66mm refractor.
August 2012
Photos from this year's Perseid meteor shower. Click HERE.
September 2010
After a surprisingly fruitful Summer (see Wide field page above), my brother Paul and I went on holiday to Maui, Hawaii to do some surfing. I was so stunned by the transparency of the night sky that we borrowed a tripod and used Paul's Nikon D70 to capture some pictures of the summer Milky Way as seen from here. A couple of local night anglers were surprised that we were out taking pictures in dead of night - they are so used to their sky at night that they don't realise how lucky they are! For an account of the night sky here and a view of the best of the pictures we took, click HERE.
August 2007
All the photos on this website taken after this date were made through an f6.6 apochromatic refractor mounted on the larger telescope which is essentially a very accurate tracking platform. Details of the refractor are in the `Equipment' page.
March 2007
Purchase of a Nikon D80 digital SLR, modified for astrophotograph. All the photographs in the `Wide Field' page were taken with this D80. Details of the camera are in the `Equipment' page.
February 2007
A trip to Australia: my first time in the southern hemisphere. What clean skies the Australians have - most of my observing was carried out in Castle Hill, just outside Sydney, where for the first time, I was able to see Centaurus, Crux, all the constellations that make up Argo Navis, Dorado, Tucana, the LMC and SMC, Reticulum and Eridanus in its entirety. The activities of one hectic night pursuing clear skies from the Blue Mountains to Palm Beach is recorded in the following link: BLOG
September 2005
This website was started as a repository for my astrophotographs beginning with the rudimentary pictures taken with the Meade DSI pictured above. The original DSI photographs are in the page marked `Archive' and are only of personal historical value to me as they are very limited in quality and resolution. The main pictures I wish to exhibit are in the link marked `Wide field' and new photographs are added here as and when I get them. A few of the important events which determine the content of this website are listed below.
Property of Dr Patrick S.T. Tan, updated 07 June 2010