Bluespeck.ca is a personal photography project.
As a novice astrophotographer I still have a lot to learn about both the stars and the equipment used to image them. This site is primarily intended for personal use as a means to document and reflect on my journey. It will no doubt include both good and perhaps some not so good images of the night sky but will hopefully over time show improvement in knowledge, technique and artistic quality.
Working within the limitations of my equipment and experience, the images posted on this site are all wide-field images except as otherwise noted.
Equipment can be daunting. There are many different choices aimed at a wide range of interests, skills and budgets. Like most astro-imagers I have a long wish list of more robust equipment and while some may eventually find its way into my kit, for now I am happy to explore the night sky with what I have. Unless otherwise specified, images on this site have been photographed using the following equipment.
• Nikon D750 and D7100 cameras
• William Optics Zenithstar 61ii APO Refractor Telescope
• Sigma 24-70mm & 70mm-200mm lenses
• Skywatcher HEQ5 Pro & Star Adventurer Equatorial Mounts
• Optolong L-Pro Light Pollution Broadband Filter
Location is important when shooting the night sky. Access to wide open dark skies is every star-watchers dream, but we often have to make do with the conditions in and around our own backyards. Mine is a fairly light-polluted suburban sky (Bortle Scale 5) and is further obscured by large trees and buildings. It is not ideal, but it somehow works.
Unless otherwise specified, all images were captured under my Bortle 5 backyard sky.
The name Bluespeck.ca was inspired by the famous photograph of planet Earth taken by the Voyager 1 space probe on February 14, 1990.
Title: Pale Blue Dot | Image credit: NASA, Source: Voyager 1, First published: June 6, 1990, Data acquired: June 6, 1990
Launched by NASA in September 1977 Voyager 1 had completed its primary mission by early 1990 and having already travelled past the planet Neptune, it was set to leave the solar system and head out towards interstellar space. Influenced by the highly respected astronomer and author Carl Sagan, NASA commanded the space probe to turn its camera around and take one last photograph of planet Earth looking back across the great expanse of space.
Photographed from a distance of about 6 billion kilometres (3.7 billion miles), this photograph would become known as the Pale Blue Dot. The iconic image shows Earth within a scattered ray of sunlight. Voyager 1 was so far away that from its vantage point the planet Earth was just a point of light about the size of a single pixel.
The image and the story have stayed with me over the years and have often served to remind me of just how tiny and insignificant our little blue speck is against the great expanse of space and time. It is most humbling indeed.
