The Skyentist 35 - Astrophotography gear

In this episode of The Skyentists astronomers, Ángel López-Sánchez and Kirsten Banks talk about the basics of astrophotography: what is the equipment you need for getting stunning photos of the sky, what other tricks do you have to use, and what you should consider if you want to start doing astrophotography.

It is not the same taking photos of the Moon and the planets than getting deep-sky objects! Ángel is very excited about all of this as he got his new equipment working well, resulting in obtaining some nice Astro images from his backyard!

For "Space News" Kirsten announces that a couple of stars and an exoplanet have officially received Australian Aboriginal names by the IAU (International Astronomical Union).

Ángel brings 3 short topics for "Space News": the status of Betelgeuse, the "hibernation" of the famous "SETI@home" citizen science project, and "Radio Galaxy Zoo: LOFAR", a new citizen science project.

For "What's Up!" they recommend observing the open cluster M 46, that hosts the planetary nebula NGC 2438, for testing the knowledge and experience we got with our Astro gear.

Kirsten Banks

Kirsten Banks is a proud Wiradjuri woman, astrophysicist and science communicator. She’s always had her eyes on the skies and loves to share her passion for space and astronomy. Kirsten jumps at almost every opportunity to share the wonders of the Universe with a wide range of people, from speaking to students at schools to sharing her love for space on national television programs such as ABC’s Q&A. In the years to come, Kirsten looks forward to completing a Ph.D. and becoming Dr. Kirsten Banks. 

Dr. Ángel López-Sánchez

Dr. Ángel López-Sánchez is an astronomer and science communicator at the Australian Astronomical Optics and the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the Macquarie University. He studies how the gas is converted into stars in nearby galaxies and how this affects galaxy evolution. He also provides support for visiting astronomers to the Anglo-Australian Telescope. He is a globally-recognised science communicator, with visibility in Spanish and Australian printed, broadcast, and social media (one of the Top-100 most-followed astrophysicists on Twitter). His stunning astronomy timelapse videos have received 1/4 million views on YouTube and have been used by ABC (Australia), BBC (UK), TVE (Spain) and in Science Museums worldwide. He is very active in social media, his Twitter feed is @El_Lobo_Rayado.

This podcast is syndicated with permissions.