Houston, we have a problem. There may not be enough space to walk on the moon. I was driving near the Sri Gombak Mosque yesterday when I spotted a bird on the crescent above the dome. By the time I parked and walked around for an ideal angle, there were no more birds. So I waited for about 30 minutes and 5 of them flew in. A little patience is usually required for a moon landing shot 🙂
Mission Control: First I desaturated the picture (made it black and white). Then I inverted the colours to turn it into a negative image. This made the white sky became black. I then added a yellow hue. Finally, a lens flare was added to simulate the sun, as seen in space.
Venus, the tiny black dot, crosses the sun on 6th June 2012. I photographed it from Kuala Selangor. It took 4 x ND8 filters to rein in the very bright sun. The next Transit of Venus will be in another 105 years in 2117. I was lucky to have witnessed and photographed this rare alignment twice this century.
My fascination with heavenly bodies began back in Form 4 or Form 5. I can’t remember exactly but it was during the time I joined my school’s astronomy club. Armed with a telescope and a tattered constellation chart, we made regular outings to Lake Gardens and other dark places.
For many of the boys, the principal objective was to get close to the gamma virginis. Somehow, there was something appealing in a Form 6 girl who had just graduated from full pinafore to a skirt and starched shirt.
As always, there were a few nerds who were actually into planets and other celestial objects. The guy who can pick out Venus or memorised the names of the Greek Gods was appointed Geek God.
Good Moon Hunting With Samsung Galaxy S
But who needs a constellation chart these days? With Google Sky Map installed on a Android phone, you can identify any planetary object in any weather, with pin-point accuracy.
The program is able to do this because it calculates the view based on your GPS-detected location. It also makes use of the phone’s 3-axis accelerometer and compass to change the sky view as you move the phone about.
During the full moon earlier tonight, I knew exactly where the shy moon was hiding. All I had to do was to point the camera in its direction and wait for the clouds to clear (as in pic above). By the way, Gamma Virginis is a star in the constellation Virgo.
