Chris Curtis Web Site

The Deer Lick group, originally uploaded by ThinkingCamera.

NGC7331 and companions – There are at least 5 galaxies in this image – I have labelled with the NGC numbers.
This is not a great astrophoto, but I am pleased with what I managed to capture with short exposures on a moonlit night with a LOT of light pollution and thin, high cloud.
I remember looking at images of galaxies in books when I was a small child and being awestruck. The faint glimmer of far-distant suns, on an unimaginable scale, brought home a little of the vastness of the universe.
Making this image had a similar effect on me.

M42 – The great Orion Nebula reprocessed. I took 30 x 30 second exposures, 20 x 20seconds and 20 x 10 seconds using a CPC800 telescope at f3.3 and an Atik 16ic camera.
I processed each set separately in Maxim DL until I had three images at different exposures. I combined these as a HDR image in photoshop and processed from there.
Although the object was low in a misty sky lit by a very bright moon, this is the most detail I have been able to show. Definitely worth doing more like this.

This is an image I made with with Bradford Robotic Telescope‘s “clustercam” earlier this month. It shows the Pleiades (M45) or “seven sisters” a cluster of new stars, which are still surrounded by some of the gas and dust from which they formed. The stars burn hot and blue.

I am very pleased with this image. It took some work. There is a huge difference in brightness between the main stars and the wispy gas which caused “bloom” – where the light of the bright stars “spilled over”. The colour took a lot of work too and is still not quite right, but the sense of being overwhelmed by the sheer number of stars is strong.

All images from the BRT are copyright Bradford University.

• just finished the #wwfor 10k in 82:14. Beautiful day in old England – autumn sun and warm. #

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I did not really feel up to it, but I am glad I stuck to my plan to run 10km today as part of the “worldwide festival of races”. This is a “virtual” race where people all over the world run 5k, 10k or a half marathon in celebration of being alive on planet Earth.

It has been many months since I ran 10k, and a fortnight since I ran at all. I set off cautiously but soon began to enjoy myself. It was a perfect afternoon for October. This morning’s cloud has gone, leaving a deep blue sky and buttery sunshine – warm but not too much. A last taste of summer and very precious. There are golden leaves and cobwebs everywhere now and that sense of general dampness that tells you we are in the dark days.

My route took me along a fairly busy road for a mile or so, then through the woods, round the back of Gatwick airport and back home along footpaths and small roads. I completed in 1hr 21mins and 2 secs. Very slow really, but the fastest 10k I have run to date. I would have been faster, but I managed to lose my way in the woods: following a path into someone’s back yard and having to re-trace my steps at one point. Still, it was great to be out in the woods at this time of year.

I faded badly in the last 3km – which just shows I need to vary my training from the constant 5km runs I have been doing. I am glad I ran with “fellow runners” all over the planet. I feel very much better for having done it. A perfect way to spend a perfect afternoon.