Last night in Dunsink we were treated to a fabulous talk by Dave MacDonald on his asteroid hunting work. Prior to the talk, Prof Mike Redfern of NUI Galway dressed as Galileo outlined the plans for IYA2009. I took this shot of him as he admired the 12" Grubb refractor located in the South dome at Dunsink.

Very nice Martin, you are so lucky to have a chance to do that kind of shot. Aren't telephoto lenses great. Really nice compositions on those shots, a bit more saturation in post processing would really make them come alive and make the greens and browns jump out at you, give it a bash. Winter light is never the easiest to work in and it sometimes needs all the help it can get. Sorry if I'm over stepping the mark here but I took the liberty of tweaking one of your images to show the effect of a little bit of extra saturation, and reducing the brightness a tad.

I'll get me coat if you like......

Looks like a Piper Alpha alright.

Oh pity...
The Irish Air Corps used to have a couple of these. The company I used to work for back in 1994 was the Supplier for Eurocopter and I used to occasionally drop parts out to the base in Baldonnel. One day I did get a quick spin in one. Woah does it move in directions you just don't expect.
We also covered the CASA CN235 aircraft and the ancient Alouette III copter. The Alouettes were already 30 years old when I joined the company and were only retired last year (talk about getting your moneys worth - 45 years of active service).

Thanks John - got it sorted now. OpenDNS was blocking photobucket and tinypics, it wasn't my firewall config after all.

Nice shots - really like the first one the proximity to the ground makes it all the more interesting.

I think that French copter is a Eurocopter Dauphin EC135. Now a spin in that  and you missed it - Doh!.

John,

Can't seem to see any of your photos, not even your avatar, in any of your posts. Can you let me know the url of the host so I can add it to the whitelist on my firewall, just in case thats the issue?

Nice work Martin - sorry did I say work? I'll bet you had fun. I'd love to try something like that.
As you say a clear, sunny day would make all the difference, but they're beaut shots as it stands.

This is typical weather when out for a nights viewing in Dublin.
Make the most of it and keep the camera to hand. Shots taken before the snow in January.

Wicklow Mountains near the Sugarloaf looking towards Dublin City. Taken at 22:35, too dark to focus properly. Canon 350D 50mm @ F2.8 ISO100 8 sec exposure.


Shot in pitch darkness at 21:43, too dark to focus.. Canon 350D 50mm @ F2.0 ISO800 8 sec exposure.

Carl,
Love the Avatar, looks just like you

Hi all,

I see many familiar names on this site, so I don't feel like such a newbie. Thanks Paul for the invitation to join in the discussions on this forum. I hadn't realised that all photography (not just astro) was the order of the day - sounds good to me.