The material for this post was provided by Ray Keefe of Successful Endeavours who is an amateur astronomer and member of IceInSpace, the Australian Amateur Astronomy community. Australian astronomers are a surprisingly active group with some recent recognition on the world stage.
First there was Australian Astrographer, Colin Legg, who won the first prize in the David Malin Awards animation category to be covered in a future blog post.
And now Martin Pugh has been recognised in the Astronomy Photographer of the Year competition held by the Royal Observatory for his picture of the Whirlpool Galaxy.
IceInSpace run a monthly newsletter and have an extremely active forum allowing interaction between members on a wide range of topics. Typically a forum is more interaction than a blog and is a better format for a widely varying multi-way dialogue like this. You can check out the IceInSpace forums at http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/index.php.
A good example of the sort of news you get from them is the upcoming Solar Eclipse on 13th November which is visible in Australia just after dawn. If you are in Western Australia the sun will rise eclipsed!
It really is amazing how much you can do with a telescope and information about the night sky. I’ve recently added a camera adapter though I’m not yet at the level of Colin or Martin.
I only recently discovered Ice In Space and have been very impressed with the community. I recommend it to other amateur astronomers.
As someone who owns and runs a technology based company that design other peoples products for them, I can see that technology is making it easier for everyone to engage with interests like that that have traditionally been expensive hobbies.
Ray Keefe
Successful Endeavours Pty Ltd
Environment Future Award Winner 2012
Communications and Networking Future Award Winner 2012
Casey Business and Professional Services Award 2012
Award Winning Electronics Design and Embedded Software Development