Author Archives: philipp
Huge Sunspot AR1944
This week a huge sunspot rotated into view:
winter galaxies
Winter is not normally a good time for galaxies because the Milky Way is porminent in the sky, but while waiting for comet Lovejoy to rise, I used the time to spend a little exposure time on some bright galaxies.
The Leo Triplet
Trying to catch ISON, got Lovejoy instead
On November 17th I decided at 1:00 to try to take some pictures of comet ISON before it’s rendezvous with the sun.
To get above the fog in the Rhine valley I drove up a still-open (normally closed in winter) mountain pass.
I arrived early at the Furkajoch (a mountain pass in Vorarlberg), so I had the chance to take some pictures of the alpine landscape and of comet Lovejoy.
The full moon and a thin layer of high cirrus cloud made the process of locating and imaging the comet difficult.
Read More
A summer night in the Alps
While bivouacing with my family high in the Alps I took some wide-angle shots of the summer sky:
Nikon AF Nikkor 20mm f/2.8
15s @f/2.8
How to take images of lightning
The subject
Lightning occur during thunderstorms – apart from the dangers of a hunderstorm (floods, hail, storm, breaking branches, falling trees) lightning itself is dangerous, and potentially deadly. So don’t go outside when lightning is near. If 3 seconds pass between lightning and the accompanying thunder-clap the lightning was only 1000m away! More information on lightning can be found here:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lightning Read More
C/2011 L4 (PANSTARRS)
It looks as if 2013 will be a good year for comets. This spring Comet Panstarrs is visible in the darkening sky after Sunset and in December comet ISON should put up an even more impressive show.
