About
Astrophotography is hard. As astrophotographers, we have to focus on something that is anywhere from 200 to 200 million light years away. Then we have to track it across the sky, canceling out the earth's rotation, with a precision tighter than 3.76 microns. To get a single image, we usually have to do that night after night after night dodging clouds (not to mention the moon) and troubleshooting unruly hardware—all while battling the heat or the cold. And we have to do all this with equipment we can actually afford.
But astrophotography is also incredibly rewarding. We explore more distant reaches than any captain in a wooden ship ever dreamed of. We learn things no one knew 1,000, 100, or even one year ago. And we get to share that newfound knowledge and wonder with family, friends, and anyone else we can engage. It's a chance to inject a small amount of reality and beauty into the more immediate world around us.
In this site I've attemped to arrange things in a way that makes it easy to find what you're looking for, both in general with categorized galleries, and also specifically with a standard search function. But some of the galleries stem from my own personal desire to capture all the objects in the Messier, Sharpless, and van den Bergh catalogues and present them in one place. I also expended considerable effort incorporating the open source OpenSeaDragon deep-zoom image viewer into the site. This allows me to share images at their full, unaltered resolution while providing rapid download speeds and maximum responsiveness to zooming and panning.
I owe many people gratitude for all they have done to make this possible. My long-suffering wife Christi has put up with so much—carrying heavy gear, sleepless nights, packing gear in the RV, scheduling around times of activity, and waiting for me to emerge from my cave. My buddy Nic Patridge, who braved many a skeeter-filled night with me in the back yard and literally did all the heavy lifting in those first few months. Ron Brecher, the Astrodoc, has been a tremendous mentor and friend and has taught me how to maneuver through the complex software we use in this avocation. He's also helped me troubleshoot gear issues on numerous occasions. If you're just starting out in astrophotography or would simply like to improve your skills, contact Ron. He can save you years of frustrating effort trying to do it on your own. The folks at Deep Sky West have also been tremendous assets, keeping my scopes safe and in working order. And finally, the people at S9 Consulting went far above and beyonf the call of duty migrating the site to a new, more capable platform, incorporating OpenSeaDragon into the site, and providing me with custom software to manage it all.
In closing, I could spend some digital ink here sharing my personal story, explaining why I'm interested in astronomy, detailing the (first world) trials and tribulations of shooting the sky, and telling you why you should care. But I won't. Instead, to quote the late, great Duane Thomas, "I'll do my talkin' on the field." Enjoy the pictures.
Timothy Martin
Dallas, Texas
August 2025