Several weeks ago, I was talking with an extremely experienced and accomplished practitioner of our craft. I made the statement above that every image has value. He was very dismissive of that and said that when people don't spend "enough time" on an image, it has no value.
I think this attitude is counterproductive to our cause and is related to other things I've seen on Astrobin where, on a few occasions, people have been hypercritical of images that have received recognition. When delivered in a hyperbolic or inappropriate way, these criticisms come off as petty jealousies. Contests like IOTD are bound to engender some of that. It's human nature. Truly constructive criticism can be extremely helpful. But the one thing in all this that definitely has no value is tactlessly insulting someone else's efforts. This subject also came up on the Masters of PixInsight forum, so I'm going to borrow from what I said there.
My whole take on this starts with the fact that astrophotography is not cheap--not in money, not in time, and not in dedication. It's a very expensive way to spend those treasures. And in the grand scheme of things, it's also very rare.
If you're young, and you manage to scrape together a few thousand dollars to buy some gear, and then you devote enough time to it to produce an image, that's pretty special. And you're building a skill and entering an avocation that can serve you well for the rest of your life. That's incredible!
If you're old, and have worked for a lifetime to be able to afford this hobby and you go after it, that's pretty special, too. If you're like me, and you want to build some kind of legacy that may have a chance of living on after you, it's an opportunity to try to make that happen. Also incredible!
If you're of any age and you spend hours upon hours tinkering with hardware made by a dozen different manufacturers and you actually get it to work, holy shit--that's amazing! And if you spend hours upon hours outside freezing your globular clusters off, or serving as a happy meal for the most dangerous creatures on earth (that is, mosquitos), then you're showing something special.
If you figure out how to fully automate a rig, you cart it to some far-off place, you make it work night after night, and you go back there again and again to fix stuff that breaks, you've done something special.
No matter how you slice it, getting a recognizable picture of something beyond low earth orbit (or hell, even something in low earth orbit), is something that in all of human history, only a handful of people have been able to do. If you don't think that has some intrinsic value, you need catch a ride to Denver and get some gummies.
Astrophotography gives the world a dose of reality in a fascinating, engaging way. And if there's something this world needs, it's a dose of reality. So the more people doing this, the better. We stand on very tall shoulders--the scientists, engineers, creative people, and even business people who made all this possible. Our work proves, time after time, image after image, that science works, that the reality it expresses is true, and that we can reach it if we try.
So be kind. Be thoughtful. There is beauty in every image. It may not always come through in the pixels. But it's there in the beating heart of the fellow human who created it.
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I couldn't agree more, very well said…
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Interesting topic you bring up. 2 things I want to add:
1. If you spend too much time on what other people think about you or what you do, you will not get anywhere happy. Not worth getting upset about.
2. I have also noticed a bit of a downward trend of the way how people treat each other here on astrobin. Hopefully it's just a phase…
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Yes, EVERY astro image has value! I view myself as a minority on AstroBin as my images were mostly taken with standard camera gear. Sometimes, I wondered whether I should continue to post images seeing all of those spectacular images taken with specialized equipment. Are my white light solar images too boring to post? Is it worth it to post short-exposure images? But I learned going off the beaten path has its rewards. For example, with short-exposures, I was able to bring out star colours very well. And the images matched pretty well with what I saw visually. Also, it gave me the idea to make star charts out of some of them.
An astro image doesn't have to be magazine cover material to post. No disrespect intended towards fellow imagers, but how many times have we seen beautiful pictures of the Orion Nebula and Andromeda Galaxy? But a pixelated image of a faraway quasar or the spectrum of an 11th magnitude red giant star or something else off the beaten path I find more interesting.
My 2 cents.
Steven
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Amen brother! I’ve also learned to stop focusing on negative remarks, and embrace the truly helpful critiques.
I know I can’t make everyone happy with my images, but I can make myself happy with what I’ve accomplished, because to your point, I know all it took to get there.
It can be intimidating posting our works, especially with some of the incredible images out there, and we make ourselves vulnerable in doing so to those who forgot where they came from and came from a different place than others started.
Keep encouraging others to share, because we all grow and learn when freedom to express is not oppressed!
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Hard to disagree with what was posted before. But I'd like to expand the point a bit, I don't think that every image has value but rather that also every attempt to get an image. Mistakes are great oppportunities to learn and sharing your failure may prevent other from making them or give them idea on how to fix their issue. Sometimes image that aren't magazine cover worthy can still be incredible source of learning for others.
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Hey fellow astrophotographer ;) I think you’re absolutely right. I spend almost as much time fending off people who tell me how astrophotos have to look as I do actually being out under the sky taking pictures. I’m not an (astro)physicist, but I often hear that physics is supposedly in an “alarming” state because there isn’t much groundbreaking stuff happening anymore. I can’t say if that’s true, but I do know that if you want to make big discoveries, a „qualitative“ approach is often what lays the foundation. Most astrophotographers seem to use a very „quantitative“ way of producing their pictures, which is totally fine. The problem is when some of them start bashing everyone who doesn’t process their images according to those rigid rules. What’s the point? Doing the same thing over and over will always produce the same old picture—the same perspective. I really like your images, @Timothy Martin , and a lot of that comes down to how you process and handle your data. I remember some people talking trash about how you set your black point “wrong” in one of your IOTDs, but honestly, you’re a thousand times more likely to stumble onto something groundbreaking with your approach than all the folks who just follow the rules. cs andi
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Anderl:
I really like your images That's very kind of you, Andi. Thank you. I wasn't specifically referring to that incident, although I'd be lying if I said it wasn't on my mind. Perhaps you'll recall that in that particular barrage, there were some very unkind things said about others' images as well--those others being some of the most expert and creative astrophotographers on the planet. It would have been easy for those people to throw stones at the glass house containing the attacker, but they didn't, which made me respect them even more.
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Médéric Hébert:
But I'd like to expand the point a bit, I don't think that every image has value but rather that also every attempt to get an image Absolutely true!; we've all had many nights burned away with laborious tasks that resulted in nothing notable image wise BUT still strengthened our resolve!
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Hear hear @Timothy Martin. Our community really is something special and everyone's achievements, be they IOTD quality or not, are worthy of praise. I am in the category of taking up the pastime in later life having always had a passion for the cosmos since watching the Apollo missions and Moon landings as a child. As a scientist I appreciate every single part of what makes this hobby so special. Congratulations to anyone who captures enough photons to make an image 👏👏👏
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Really well said, Tim! I agree with you totally! I think we need more kindness, respect and acceptance in this community!
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That's it exactly! We are all trying in our own way to achieve the best possible result from the knowledge we each possess. Thanks Tim.
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It's a hobby. Its value is measured by joy and happiness you experience by pursuing your hobby. That's honestly all that really matters.
Not everything needs to have monetary or scientific value to be pursued.
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Tim, Your comments and perspective are spot on! I fall into the camp of a retired person who has time and resources to devote to this fascinating hobby. It's a journey of learning that would be exceedingly more difficult without access to Astrobin, YouTube, etc. I am also greatly impressed by the level of collaboration and giving among most astrophotographers. While still relatively early in my learning curve (5 years), I find that every imaging outing and post-processing effort is another chance to learn more. I am amazed at the progress I have made in a few short years. The biggest challenge is to balance developing my skills before making the jump to more complex and expensive setups. Many thanks.
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Very well said, Timothy! I also have to agree with what others here are saying. This is supposed to be a fun thing for us to do. I personally enjoy my time spent setting up, imaging, and processing. It puts me into a different state of mind when I am doing any one of those things (although my old bones aren't loving the cold like they once did). I love browsing Astrobin for new images of things I haven't taken pictures of yet. I post my images good or bad (although I may lock those away) because it reminds me of my own growth in this hobby. I don't do it for likes or follows, although I do have to smile every time someone likes one of my images. It means that I've brought someone else some level of happiness hopefully.
I think part of the problem with negativity comes from the relative anonymity that comes with being on the internet. We forget how to provide constructive criticism and feedback in ways that aren't mean spirited. I highly doubt that anyone here doesn't have at least one "horrible" image that they took and processed. None of us were born experts at anything, everything we do is a learning experience.
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I only joined Astrobin minutes ago after hearing about it on a page I was reading for some knowledge. Logged in and scrolled down a bit and this was the first post that caught my attention. I am 41 yrs old and just recently became amazed by our universe and everything in it. Lol. I know it's been there this whole time but I spent many years of my early life making poor decisions and being consumed by the consequences of said decisions. I never looked through a telescope or stargazed for length of time. So when I finally dove into it and started learning about our vast universe I was truly amazed and hooked! All because I started to see these amazing and breathtaking images people were getting from just a light polluted back yard. So I decided I wanted to give it a try and share it with others. I'm still in the long and expensive process of piecing together some sort of resemblance of an astro rig. So I guess what I want to say is thanks to everyone in the hobby for their contributions and a huge thanks to Timothy for this post. Who knows how long it would have taken me to show my first image when I get one. Hearing this is a huge boost of confidence to do so and I can't wait to share it because just starting in this hobby has taken huge amount of grinding just to get a crumb of the knowledge it will take to get there. Timothy, thank you good sir!!!
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Hi Tim, agree with about all of what you have written so well said. It is difficult to imagine a hobby less suited to competition than astrophotography. I do enjoy looking at some of the superb IOTD images that folk put up –today's Jupiter image is amazing - but of course it all depends on equipment, location and opportunity - as well as knowledge and skill. We all aim to improve our knowledge and skill – so in some ways you could say that rather than the good it is all of those poor images that have been the most valuable since they are the ones that you learn most from. Constructive feedback here has been very useful for me anyway. Folk have so many different takes on the hobby – some enjoy the engineering challenge of making it all work optimally (which I agree is quite a thing) - others are more artists - and for me it's a sort of adjunct to my interests in improving my (small) understanding of different aspects of astrophysics and cosmology. So when I image something it then brings it alive and stimulates me to dig in and read more about what it really is – but we are all different. Tim
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