Matariki (M45/Pleiades) is an important part of Maori culture. When it rises in June, it marks the start of the Maori calendar and is a time of celebration with family and friends, sharing in the bounty of harvest.
I have long wanted to take a picture of Matariki, despite it culminating at just 20 degrees altitude from my location. While it is not visible from my roll-off roof observatory due to trees, the deck at the back of my house does give me some relief from the trees. I can image Matariki for about 3 hours per night before it sinks into the Coronet/Brow Peak ridge about 12 degrees above the horizon from my place.
While I may not best in the best position on the planet to image Marariki (99.99% of the planet's population are, since they live further north), I am lucky in having a very dark northern horizon due to the mountains. Indeed this is precious little habitation north of where I live until you reach Vanuatu. [Where do you all live up there?]
So, I have started out on a project to capture Matariki over the coming spring and summer with my portable rig: a Canon 200mm f.28 lens and Star Adventurer mount.
The image here is the first night of the campaign - 2.5hours in total - for what I eventually hop will be 25hours of exposure. This image is not up to the wonderful
@Peter Shah image (which, in part, inspired it) but one does what one can from an airmass of 3 or greater.
I didn't expect to post this image at this stage, but I was surprised by what I was able to capture of Matariki and the larger molecular cloud complexes around it.
I also quite like the diffraction patterns on the stars caused by the blades of the lens diaphragm stopped down to f/4. Makes a change from the "fried egg" star effect from a refractor and an over-zealous deconvolution/HDR morphological transform that I specialise in.
Comments