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Southern California meansmany things to many people.For amateur astronomers, it is amixed bag: a place known forglitzy lifestyles and rampant light pollu-tion but also a region whose astropho-tographers produce some of the mostspectacular images of the night sky. Whoare these astro-artisans, and where aretheir secluded stomping grounds? Aswell see, Southern Californias best as-trophotography sites are as varied as theskygazers who frequent them.

Mount PinosIf one name could symbolize the pinna-cle of amateur astrophotography, MountPinos would be it. Observers and as-trophotographers have been coming tothis temple in the sky since the 1950s. Itslocated in the Los Padres National Forestnear the community of Frazier Park,roughly halfway between Los Angelesand Bakersfield. Topping out at 8,831feet (2,692 meters), the mountain is thehighest point in a region where theTransverse, Tehachapi, and Coast rangescoalesce. While the true summit is acces-sible via a rough dirt road, most ob-servers opt to set up in the parking lotlocated about 500 feet below the summit.

The weather here is frequently superbfor astrophotography. The air is typicallybone dry with very little haze or air pol-lution. These conditions greatly mini-mize the scattering of light from nearbyLos Angeles, 65 miles (105 kilometers) tothe southeast. Most if not all of the haze,

The State of AstrophotographyAway from the glitz and glamour, savvy amateur astronomers in and around Southern California know where to

find dark, transparent skies. By Chris Cook

astro imaging

Sky & Telescope August 2000 129

The allure of dark, pollution-free skies has drawn Southern Californias astro-photographers to Mount Pinos for fivedecades. During new Moon the paved park-ing area below the summit bustles with ac-tivity all night. Unless otherwise noted,images with this article are by the author.

smog, and smoke found in the lower ele-vations around Los Angeles is trappedbelow 5,000 feet because of the regionsever-present inversion layer. Another im-portant yet often overlooked meteoro-logical attribute is the dominant west-to-east airflow. It pushes pollution createdby the larger cities away from the moun-tain (no major cities lie to the west).Then there is the parking lot a clean,low-dust environment for equipment.The pavement probably creates some aircurrents during the night due to radiat-ing heat, but these do not seem to de-grade the seeing conditions.

While all these factors can greatly af-fect the sky quality at Mount Pinos, thecoastal marine layer found along the Cal-ifornia seashore is the most influential.Caused by relatively warm, moist aircondensing as it flows over the coolercoastal waters, the marine layer oftenblankets the coastal cites including LosAngeles, San Diego, Santa Barbara, andVentura with thick, low clouds and fog.This can totally extinguish their bubblesof light pollution. The marine layer ismost common during the spring andsummer months, and it also influencesother astrophoto sites in the regions sur-rounding mountains and deserts.

The astrophotographers who oftentake advantage of this terrific site havecome to be known as the Mount PinosRat Pack. Among them are Tony andDaphne Hallas, who have created someof the most awe-inspiring cosmic por-traits of our time. Although their workhas employed a veritable arsenal of dif-ferent telescopes, they are currently usinga custom-built 14.5-inch f/8 astrographicCassegrain with both 35-mm and 120film formats.

According to Tony, the couple first be-came interested in astrophotography in1987, about a year after delving into theworld of amateur astronomy. WithTonys background in professional pho-tography and Daphnes experience as aphoto-lab technician, they both thoughtastrophotography would be easy. Accord-ing to Tony, however, We took our firstimages and got nothing on the negativesexcept some squiggles. At that point,they knew astrophotography would be achallenging hobby.

In the late 1980s Tony and Daphnebegan using a sandwich technique thatuses two negatives of the same object(S&T: August 1989, page 216; and No-vember 1998, page 130). In the resulting

130 August 2000 Sky & Telescope

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Michael Stecker is familiar to many readers as a frequent contributer to the Gallery department. Hisview of the well-known Horsehead Nebula is a digital composite of three 50-minute exposures on120-format Kodak Pro 400 PPF film made with an Astro-Physics 130 f/6 refractor at Mount Pinos.

prints, they found that faint nebulae thathad barely shown in earlier images nowstood out in bold, color-saturated con-trast. Tony and Daphne now scan theirnegatives, composite them digitally usingPicture Window, and add final enhance-ments with Adobe Photoshop. As theirstunning results demonstrate, Team Hal-las has come a long way since those ini-tial squiggles.

You will usually find the newest mem-bers of the Rat Pack, Bob and JaniceFera, set up next to the Hallases. Livingin Calabasas, California, Bob is an infor-mation-systems manager and Janice a

sales engineer. Bob first took up astro-photography in the 1970s, when he trav-eled to the Los Angeles AstronomicalSocietys star parties in Lockwood Valley,near Mount Pinos. But his interest reallywas piqued around 1990. I was brows-ing through a magazine rack and cameacross Sky & Telescope, Bob recalls. Isaw the photographs that the Hallasesand others were taking, and I couldntbelieve my eyes. So I decided to get atelescope and give it a try again. Thesedays the Feras ply the skies with a Celes-tron 11-inch Schmidt-Cassegrain tele-scope (used at f/10) on an Astro-Physics

1200 mount, though theyre awaiting de-livery of a 12.5-inch f/9 Cassegrain beingbuilt by Parallax Instruments. They em-ploy imaging techniques much like theHallases.

Bill and Sally Fletcher of Malibu, Cali-fornia, have opted to take a slightly dif-ferent route in capturing and processingtheir images. Instead of color film, theyuse the tricolor method. That is, theyshoot three black-and-white images of thesame object through red, green, and bluefilters using gas-hypersensitized KodakTechnical Pan film. The negatives are thenscanned and assembled with a Macintoshcomputer. Since attempting their first as-trophotos back in 1985, the Fletchershave used 8- and 16-inch f/4.5 Newtoni-ans and an 8-inch Schmidt camera, alongwith medium-format, wide-angle lenseswith a diffusion filter to create uniqueportraits of the constellations.

Another Mount Pinos regular is Mi-chael Stecker. A radiologist by day,Stecker can be found every new-Moonperiod photographing the heavens. Hav-ing always had an interest in photog-raphy, he first became intrigued by as-tronomy during the 1986 apparition ofHalleys Comet. He then blended thetwo interests and began taking his firstastrophotos with a Celestron CometCatcher, a 200-mm lens, and a Super Po-laris mount. Although he owns a Taka-hashi E200 hyperbolic astrograph as wellas a Celestron C11 and a C14, he cur-rently prefers using telephoto lenses and


Among its many appealing qualities, the Mount Pinos observing site features a large pavedarea, which keeps dust to a minimum. Mount Pinos offers remarkably dark skies despite beingjust 65 miles northwest of Los Angeles.

Left: Michael Stecker, another regular atop Mount Pinos, often tracks unusual and offbeat objects with his 8-inch f/4 Takahashi E200 hyperbolic

astrograph. Right: Most of the prime photography sites in Southern California are nestled in the mountains and valleys northeast of San Diego.

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his Astro-Physics refractors for photog-raphy.

Stecker seems to relish tracking downlesser-known objects, some of which can-not be found on todays popular charts, aswell as astrophysical targets like theCygnus X-1 region. For films, he prefersblack-and-white over color and professesthat some of his best work has been donewith gas-hypered Kodak Technical Panfilm. If you plan a trip to Mount Pinos onany given new-Moon weekend, you aresure to meet up with Stecker alongwith other Rat Pack regulars James Foster,Kim Zussman, and Martin Germano.

Orange County AstronomersAnza SiteTraveling well south and east fromMount Pinos across the Los Angelesbasin, we reach the San Jacinto Moun-tains of Riverside County. Althoughsome of these peaks exceed 10,000 feet inelevation, most of the summits fall be-tween 3,000 and 6,000 feet. Its in theselower ranges that the largest astronomyclub in the United States, the OrangeCounty Astronomers (OCA), developeda 20-acre observing site near the town ofAnza off State Highway 371. Located just12 miles northeast of Palomar Observato-ry, the site is home to the clubs observa-tory, its 22-inch f/8 Cassegrain reflector,and numerous pads and observatories be-longing to OCA members. At an elevationof 4,300 feet (1,310 meters), the site is in aregion generally classified as Mediter-ranean: not a true desert, with significantprecipitation as both rain and snow. Buthumidity is generally low, and the seeingcan border on exceptional.

While the climatic conditions are quitegood, the same cannot be said for thedarkness of the sky. The large towns ofTemecula and Palm Springs loom just 25

miles away, and light pollution from nu-merous housing and business develop-ments in the adjacent Temecula Valleyhave brightened the sites sky noticeablywithin the past five years. Only on rareoccasions, when a thick layer of coastalclouds blocks the lights below, do thenight skies revert back to the quality ofdays long gone.

When acquired in the early 1980s, theAnza property was nothing more than agraded swath of earth. But the OCA mo-bilized its members to develop the site,and Anza Observatory was dedicated inSeptember 1984. Sporting all the comfortsof home, including a warming room, mi-crowave, refrigerator, restroom, and show-er, the observatory has proved very useful


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Innovative astrophotographers Bill and SallyFletcher are often found among the MountPinos Rat Pack.

Unimproved observing sites near Desert Center, California, and campgrounds in neighboringJoshua Tree National Park are gaining popularity among the regions diehard observers.

After much experimentation with exposure times and diffusion filters, Bill and Sally Fletcherperfected constellation photography, represented by this image of Orion that enhances thevisibility and color of the brightest stars.

during several of my own astrophotogra-phy sessions.

The encroaching light pollution hasnot hampered everyone at Anza. One ofthe worlds most successful amateur su-pernova hunters, Wayne Johnson, hasused the clubs big reflector and a custom-built CCD camera to discover six super-novae in the last eight years. Mr. Galaxybecame an OCA member in 1982 aftermoving to California from Arizona.

When I asked what drives him toimage all those galaxies night after nightin search of supernovae, Johnson replied,I suppose its the fact that I like to seedynamic activity in something that ordi-narily doesnt appear to change becauseit is so large and far away. It takes a gal-axy the size of our own Milky Way some200 million years to rotate, so to seesome activity in an apparently static ob-ject is very interesting. The adrenalinerush is a feeling that everyone should ex-perience. There is no way to describe it.

Beyond his supernova work, Johnsonhelps organize, promote, and run thepopular AstroImage seminars, which drawsome of todays most advanced astro-photographers and imagers. He has alsoserved as OCA president, vice chairmanof the annual Riverside Telescope MakersConference, vice chairman of the West-ern Amateur Astronomers, and a regionalchairman of the Astronomical League among others! Even though he recentlymoved back to Arizona, where he worksin Tucson as an aerospace engineer, John-son remains very active in the SouthernCalifornia astronomy scene.

Joshua Tree and Desert CenterContinuing east from Anza Observatory,over the towering peaks of the San Jac-into and Santa Rosa ranges, past PalmSprings and Indio, we arrive in one ofthe most beautiful parts of the Califor-nia desert. Named after a picturesquetree found in this region, Joshua TreeNational Park has been a favorite site ofSouthern California astrophotographersfor decades.

Joshua Tree is a unique area. Two of thegreat deserts in North America thehigh, cool, wet Mojave and the lower, hot-ter, drier Colorado converge here. Alti-tudes in the park generally range between2,000 and 4,000 feet, though some of thehigher peaks top 5,000 feet. One of themost popular campgrounds for astropho-tographers is Cottonwood Spring, nearthe parks south entrance, which offers an


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elevation of 2,600 feet (790 meters), easyaccess from Interstate 10, and dark skies.Its little wonder this spot has become sopopular.

One frequent observer is Allen Hwang,a physician and member of the RiversideAstronomical Society, who has been re-cording the night sky since 1986. Heprefers shooting wide-field color images,a task made easier since acquiring a 6-inch Astro-Physics refractor and a Pentax6 7 camera for prime-focus photogra-phy. Nebulae are favorite targets, Hwangsays, and he also enjoys capturing themany colors of background stars and theMilky Ways dark nebulae.

Joshua Tree National Park does haveone drawback, Hwang notes. It seems tobe directly in the flight path of everythingflying into Southern California. Its notunusual to see a dozen airplanes at anyparticular time, and I seem to capture oneon every other exposure. He and othermembers of the Riverside AstronomicalSociety have explored open-desert siteseast of the park, near the town of Desert

Center, which are gaining popularity fortheir even darker skies. One in particular,just south of Interstate 10 along RedCloud Road, shows great promise.

Anza-Borrego Desert State ParkCalifornias deserts are so vast and beau-tiful that youd think it would be hardfor one region to stand out above therest. But in many observers eyes, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park is just thatplace. Located 55 miles (90 km) east ofSan Diego, this sprawling, 600,000-acrepreserve is truly a land of extremes. Ele-vations within the park range from 6,193feet near its western border in the SanYsidro Mountains to just 15 feet at theeastern end near the Salton Sea. Snowsometimes caps the highest mountainpeaks during winter, while summer tem-peratures in low-lying valleys can exceed120 Fahrenheit. Annual rainfall averagesjust over 6 inches.

Anza-Borrego features numerous camp-grounds, both primitive and developed,so finding a place to set up for a night ofastrophotography is quite easy. Some ofthe more popular ones are Culp Valley,Arroyo Salado, Blair Valley, and Dos Ca-bezas. While these are open year round,the best time to visit the park is duringthe coolest months of October to May.If developed campgrounds are not yourstyle, the hundreds of miles of ruggeddirt roads that run though the back-country offer true solitude for astronom-ical pursuits.

Sky conditions are generally quitegood within the park but can become ex-ceptional when a cloudy marine layersnuffs out the lights of urban San Diego.At such times detail in the Milky Way isvery apparent, with starclouds and darknebulae etching its soft glow. The lightpollution from San Diego and nearby Es-condido is generally minimized by thedry air that usually blankets this region.

Among the talented astrophotogra-phers lured to the sites in Anza-Borregois David Churchill. Originally from Eng-land, Churchill has been interested in as-tronomy since the age of eight. Hemoved to Aliso Viejo six years ago in anattempt to escape the ever-present cloudcover found over the British Isles, andhes now a director for a computer-soft-ware company in Orange County.

Since arriving in Southern California,Churchill has enjoyed much success incapturing beautiful images of the nightsky. Using two Astro-Physics refractors, a


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As this all-sky view demonstrates, light pollution from Los Angeles and San Diego dominatesthe western skyline at Anza-Borrego Desert State Park. But when those cities are cloakedunder coastal clouds, the sky darkens dramatically.

At Tierra del Sol, just north of the Mexicanborder, members of the San Diego Astro-nomical Association have the luxury of con-crete set-up pads and power outlets for theirobserving equipment.

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6-inch f/7 and a 4-inch f/5.8, he enjoysshooting wide-field images on 120-formatcolor emulsions. Churchill was among thefirst to use the UMAX PowerLook 3000scanner on astronomical negatives. Whennot enjoying the remoteness of Anza-Borrego, he can usually be found in hisbackyard imaging the Moon and planets.

The Border: Tierra del Sol If the southern globular cluster OmegaCentauri (NGC 5139) is on your list ofimaging targets, you may want to visitthe observing site maintained by the SanDiego Astronomy Association (SDAA)near the hamlet of Tierra del Sol. Thissite is about as far south as you can getin the state of California. Located 50miles (80 km) east of San Diego and amile north of the U.S.-Mexican border at32 37 north latitude, Tierra del Sol sits


Author Chris Cook regards the observing site near Tierra del Sol, California, one of his fa-vorites even though the weather conditions are somewhat unpredictable. There he capturedthis view of IC 2118 (the Witch Head Nebula) in Eridanus. For this final rendition Cook com-bined two 60-minute exposures taken through a Tele Vue 85-mm refractor used at f/7.8.

As evening approaches atop Mount Pinos,author Chris Cook is ready for action with aTele Vue 85-mm refractor piggybacked atophis 8-inch Celestron telescope.

on a high, rolling plain 3,720 feet (1,134meters) in elevation. Its climate is classi-fied as high desert or possibly evenMediterranean, with an average annualprecipitation of around 10 inches. Ex-tending over Baja California, the south-ern horizon is very dark and ideal forshooting those southern showpiecesyouve always wanted to capture.

The sky over Tierra del Sol can be un-predictable. Lacking any mountain rangesto its west to block the moist airflow offthe Pacific Ocean, the site sometimes ex-periences severe ground fog and dew.While this can create excellent seeing forlunar and planetary work, it can be disas-trous for deep-sky photography. (Unfor-tunately I have experienced this situationmore than once.) But if wind conditionsare reversed, with a slight breeze comingoff the desert, the conditions are extreme-

ly dry with good transparency.The site has an observatory that hous-

es a 22-inch f/7.5 Ritchey-Chrtien tele-scope, numerous private pads and small-er installations, and a general observingfield with concrete slabs where clubmembers set up their own equipment.Power is available for anyone runningcomputers or CCD cameras.

One person very familiar with theTierra del Sol site is the current SDAApresident, John Laborde. One of thefounding members of the 32-year-oldclub, Laborde oversaw the mechanicaldesign and construction of the clubs bigtelescope. He photographs the heavensfrom Tierra del Sol with a variety ofhomemade telescopes, including a 10-inch f/5.6 Newtonian and a 8.7-inchf/3.6 Wright-Schmidt, guiding the expo-sures manually. Laborde finds astropho-tography rewarding and satisfying, es-pecially when he gets good results. Ieven find the time I spend guiding onunknown 6th- to 8th-magnitude guidestars relaxing, he adds, and Ive spentcountless hours doing that!

After a night of manually guided pho-tography, Laborde turns to his computer,first to scan his negatives, then to en-hance them using Picture Window andAdobe Photoshop.

The Laguna MountainsSome 15 to 20 miles northwest of Tierradel Sol is a mountain range that manyconsider to have the best astronomicalconditions in North America. The Lagu-

na Mountains, part of the Cleveland Na-tional Forest in eastern San Diego Coun-ty, generally exceed 5,000 feet in eleva-tion, with some peaks reaching 6,000feet. Combine this height with a highpercentage of clear nights, low humidity,excellent seeing, and dark skies, and youhave what many astrophotographerswould call paradise.

In fact, the sites many attributes havedrawn the attention of professional andamateur astronomers alike. It is alreadythe home of San Diego State UniversitysMount Laguna Observatory, which some-day may boast a proposed 100-inch tele-scope. Atmospheric seeing conditions atthe observatory are frequently between 1and 2 arcseconds, with certain regions onthe mountain averaging less than 1 arc-second.

A Mount Laguna site popular amongobservers is Laguna Meadow Loop camp-ground, off Sunrise Highway. Surroundedby beautiful mountain pines at an eleva-tion of 5,500 feet, this enclave providesboth an ideal location for astrophotogra-phy and a wonderful place for daytimeactivities such as hiking or bird watching.During my expeditions to the mountain,I have found that the dark, dry, andsteady skies, coupled with the clean freshsmell of verdant mountain pines, make acombination that is hard to beat.

Southern California is a huge geo-graphic region, diverse in both landscapeand people. Like the pioneer explorers ofold, the regions astrophotographers areconstantly looking for new sites. Besidesthe selection of terrific astrophotographysites discussed here, Death Valley Nation-al Park, Mojave National Preserve, andRed Rock Canyon State Park also offerexquisite conditions for photography.Other sites may be known to only a fewdedicated observers, and still more likelyawait discovery along a previously unex-plored trail, atop some remote moun-tain, or down one of the countless dirtroads that crisscross the vast Californiadeserts. Wherever these outposts exist,talented astrophotographers will un-doubtedly find them in their continuingquest for the best sites and the mostspectacular images on Earth.

Always searching for the perfect astrophotog-raphy site, software engineer Chris Cookoften leaves his home in Laguna Niguel, Cali-fornia, on forays into the regions deserts andmountains. His astronomical images can beviewed at www.abmedia.com/astro/.


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