Firmware and software updates: Canon and Adobe
Canon has released a new firmware update for the Canon 5DMKII. Most interesting to astrophotographers is that there is a noise reduction update for successive bulb exposures. I haven't had a chance to check this out, but it is definitely an update astrophotographers should get.
Canon 5DMKII firmware update link.
Adobe has updated Light Room to version 2.6 and Camera Raw 5.6 here. The Light Room is a free update to current 2.x customers. Enjoy.
A great night for shooting stars...
How does your weather forecast look for the night of Sunday December 13? If you have clear skies and moderate temperatures, it will be a great night to get out under the stars and take in the Geminid meteor shower. The predictions are for a very nice event with peak meteors around midnight EST. Darks skies could yield as many as 120 meteors per hour. It is a great event to practice some astronomical photography as well. One technique involves a motorized mount tracking the stars. Simply use a wide angle lens and open your shutter for 30 seconds or longer with the camera pointed to Gemini. You should capture the meteors originating from near the constellation and you can blend all of the images together at the end of the night for a presentation of how many meteors were present over an extended period of time. You can also simply point your camera in the direction of Gemini on a fixed tripod and expose as long as necessary until you capture that bright fireball! Enjoy the event and keep us updated if you get out. Unfortunately, our weather forecast isn't looking too good for Huntington, WV.
For more information please see Sky and Telescopes page on the shower.
San Juan River Gallery...almost there...
I just posted the San Juan River gallery on the website. I love the way the gallery is presented via squarespace's interface. The one thing I can't quite get to work is a simultaneous playing of an audio file while viewing the images. So the next best thing I can do is to provide a link to the music and simply play it in a separate window while you peruse the images. Here is the link to "Everlasting Light" and please enjoy the show. Don't forget to activate the "lightroom" mode by clicking on the first image in the gallery and then following the arrow prompts to progress through the show. Take care.
Dog art?
Yes... Conan just hosted a dog who's owner claimed he was an artist. The dog proceeded to bark incesantly and walk and bite a board with a paintable surface. Seriously... sure dogs are cute, but can't we all agree that they are not capable of being an artist. I can't believe i am even writing about this. The dog had just won a $100,000 art prize. Maybe I need to rethink my entire approach to creating art.
Btw there are new images in the smoky mountain gallery.
Influence of media presentation devices...
When I first began to study photography intensely over 8 years ago, my preferred image presentation was portrait orientation. I can't really explain why my eye preferred that orientation, I simply knew I had a bias toward the portrait orientation. Then I began to quickly learn about the powerful "near/far" composition where one can present a deep 3D image by presenting a very large depth of field spanning from a nearby rock or bush to the distant vista. Of course the Ansel Adams f64 group made this approach one of their cornerstones of image presentation. At that time, many images I was viewing were also in magazines where the preferred orientation is portrait.
During my first workshop with Alain Briot, one of the photographic exercises he emphasized was to capture an image with both a portrait as well as landscape orientation. Since that workshop I have made it a practice to do just that. At first I still preferred the portrait orientation, but recently I have noticed a significant change in my preference for landscape presentations. A significant majority, if not 100%, of the Smoky Mountain portfolio is going to be presented in landscape orientation. So i began to reflect on what might have led to the change in my bias.
The leading candidate is that the change in viewing devices has influenced my eye dramatically. The move from relatively square TVs and CRT monitors to the more elongated 16:9 HD TVs and LCD computer monitors has certainly influenced my eye's preference for landscape oriented images. Even the portrait oriented images I have now bother me just a touch when they are presented via my light box image viewer on the web pages. The only time I really like the presentation of the portrait images is when I flip my iPhone so that the image is presented in its full display.
Another factor is the relative newness of the "panoramic" presentation. I love this presentation and only web-based presentations on wide screen monitors or fine art prints can present the image as it is intended to be seen.
I don't know if this influence has made a major impact on all of photography, but it would certainly be interesting to study. My guess is that as we move away from magazine oriented photography to web-based photography, landscape presentations may become the preferred orientation for images. See if you can find any correlation to this hypothesis.
The Herschel 400 Astronomical League Project is underway
It’s not too late to join. We are about 30 objects into the Herschel 400. Hope to get another session in soon. Please subscribe to the YouTube channel so you get notifications on LIVE STREAMS.
Angels in Monoceros: The Monoceros M2 Complex
The Monoceros R2 molecular complex (often shortened to Mon R2) is a massive giant molecular cloud and one of the nearest active star-forming regions to Earth. It's a dynamic stellar nursery embedded in dense gas and dust, where new stars—particularly massive ones—are actively being born.
Key Facts
Location: Southwestern part of the constellation Monoceros (the Unicorn), near the border with Orion. It's part of the larger Orion-Monoceros cloud complex.
Distance: Approximately 2,400–2,700 light-years (around 830 parsecs).
Size and Structure: The main dense core is relatively compact (a few light-years across), but the overall molecular cloud and associated nebulae span a wide area—reflection nebulae alone stretch up to about 2° in the sky. It's situated well below the galactic plane, which makes it stand out in certain observations.
Age and Activity: Star formation here began roughly 6–10 million years ago. It hosts an OB association (young, hot, massive B- and A-type stars) that illuminates surrounding dust, creating prominent reflection nebulae with bluish hues. There's also significant emission from ionized gas (red glows) and dark nebulae that appear as shadowy silhouettes blocking background light.
Notable Features:
A central hub of massive star formation with embedded clusters, molecular outflows, and HII regions.
Infrared observations (like those from VISTA or 2MASS) penetrate the dust to reveal hidden young stars and protoplanetary disks.
It's a key site for studying early stellar evolution, variability in young stellar objects (YSOs), and the interplay between massive stars and their natal clouds.
The most famous and photogenic part of Mon R2 is the region around NGC 2170 (the Angel Nebula), a striking reflection nebula with wing-like dust structures, glowing blue from scattered starlight, mixed with red emission and dark lanes. Wider views of the complex reveal a richer tapestry of colorful gas, dust filaments, and star clusters.
Credit: GROK 2/28/26
Click on image for larger view.
New Astro Camera: OM-3
Join me for a LIVE conversation about this new astro camera coming to the market. Is this the best option for you? How does it compare to other options? https://www.earthandskyphoto.com Correction: when discussing Bulb mode with Canon, I incorrectly said it had a limit of 30”. I meant to say manual exposure has a max of 30”. In bulb, you need to use a remote control or app for exposure time control. The problem is you can’t set exposure time for stills in the camera menu. I was made aware that Olympus no longer owns the OM system. It is owned by Japanese industrial Partners, a private equity firm. For content on the OM-3 for astrophotography, please see Ben Chapell’s Narrow Band channel. https://youtube.com/@TheNarrowbandChannel?si=GcWY-BM9skG9LPhY
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