My first visit to New Mexico was in 1986 to see Comet Halley. I returned in subsequent years. While there I took some hand-guided piggyback astrophotographs. See Cygnus and The Milky Way.
Almost all(*) CCD images dated 1993, 1994, 1995, and early 1996 were taken from my driveway. In April 1996 I spent a week taking images in central New Mexico with other members of the LCAS. I used this time as an opportunity to image objects that are below my treeline to the south. In my driveway, the southernmost point I can reliably see is about -6 degrees, which is just low enough to see M42 and the planets. I also used the dark skies to image some fainter northern objects.
Nature giveth; Nature taketh away. The nights in New Mexico were clear, dark, and dry. Perfect, except that there were wind and dust storms during the day, and constant breezes at night. Even removal of the (unnecessary) dew shield did not prevent the breezes from causing vibrations in the telescope. These vibrations made my images look even more out of focus than usual. The dark rings around some of the stars in the New Mexico images are a side effect of my efforts to sharpen the images.
I took additional images during a trip in April, 1999.
(*): In 1994 I was able to do some imaging from the Star Hill Inn.
This page last updated on May 1, 1999