Re: [APML] New Mexico and Provia 400F

["Garth Buckles" <garbuck@worldnet.att.net>]

Jon,

A very nice image! I think you're right though. On my monitor it looks like
it could use a touch of green.
Otherwise, a really nice deep shot. It sure verifies 400F's capabilities.
Looks like the trip was definitely worth it.

Got any more?

Garth


----- Original Message -----
From: Jon Kolb <jkolb@datawest.net>
To: 'Discussion of Film Astrophotography' <astro-photo@seds.org>
Sent: Monday, June 09, 2003 8:50 PM
Subject: [APML] New Mexico and Provia 400F


> The New Mexico adventure yielded one night's worth of clear sky out of
> two I'd hoped for.  The public lands out near the VLA west of Socorro
> were dry, hot, and windy by day, as was the town of Socorro.  At 97F in
> town, I suspect it was unseanably hot even for that area.  Actually, and
> with all respect to anyone on the list who may live in Socorro, I found
> no compelling reason to be outside during the daylight hours unless I
> was travelling to some place else.  One positive note was that the Rio
> Grande looked quite a bit healthier and higher than in April of last
> year.  The forest roads north of US 60 that I'd hoped to try out were
> closed off, but after seeing the land they traversed, I wasn't
> disappointed.
>
> That said, the mountain areas west of town offered some superb places to
> nap during the day, in high canyons with magnificent tall fir and
> Ponderosa, even some Aspen at the highest elevations, cool and with
> light shady breezes.  The VLA itself covered a LOT more area than I had
> pictured in my mind - it's truly enormous in scale, but of course it was
> humbling to think that even this large a complex is almost unmeasurably
> small in cosmic terms.  I even drove down one of the legs a few miles,
> since the land wasn't posted otherwise, and my maps said it was BLM - I
> went right under a couple of dishes on one back trail, and was tempted
> to set up there for the night.   However, having not checked with the
> VLA folks, I figured I'd get run out just about the time I'd finished
> two hours of setup, so I went into the Cibola National Forest south and
> slightly west of the VLA complex.
>
> The sight I chose, at about 7500 feet and with an excellent low southern
> horizon, was still in Pinion and juniper, with sage and some deciduous
> species I was unfamiliar with (relatively low, crabapple-like, but no
> thorns I noticed).  Lots of noisy locusts and other bugs during the
> daylight hours.  Ah, but at night this was one of the darkest, if not
> THE darkest site I have ever used.  Good structure visible in the Milky
> Way, with plenty of light star clouds visible just east of the Antares
> region while not yet over into Sagittarius, and the stem of the Pipe
> Nebula clearly visible to the naked eye - first time I'd ever really
> noticed it that clearly, even though I can just make it out while
> squinting from my usual site at 9000 feet in Colorado.  Definitely a
> dark, clear place for that one night.  Not quite as transparent as the
> 12000 foot site at Cottonwood Pass in CO, but really flipping dark by
> any measure.  M33 wasn't up while I was out, so I couldn't use that
> measure of darkness, but M13 I thought I could just detect a smudge of
> without my glasses. Seeing was so-so early on, but improved after about
> 0100 hours.
>
> Anyway, here's the first shot I've processed, and of course it's good
> old M8 and M20, but this time with the TMB152, for 60 minutes at f/7.9
> on 120 Provia 400F in the Pentax 67, pushed one stop.  I don't know if
> this will help answer Bobby's question about pushing the 400F to boost
> the red response, but on bright targets like this, I can't complain a
> bit.  Look at the good blue and red response in the NGC6559 region -
> that's definitely the best I've ever captured in this area.  It came out
> a little greenish in the shadows on my first pass, and I'm not sure I
> didn't take out too much green on this attempt, so let me know what you
> think.  As it stands, I think this might be the best astrophoto I've
> made.
> http://home.datawest.net/jkolb/M8-M20_TMB152.htm
>
> Sincerely,
> Jon Kolb
> Adventures in Astrophotography
> http://home.datawest.net/jkolb/
> jkolb@datawest.net
>
>
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