Jackie Orozco

Down to Earth: How Astrophotos Are made

Dr. Steve Smith

3/11/2021

Summary:

Throughout the prerecorded zoom, Dr. Steve Smith talks about how astrophotos came to

be and how it's made. First, he talks about a Histogram, which is a graph of all the pixels in the

image. There are two types of Histograms: a colorful Histogram and a black-and-white

histogram. The colorful histogram shows all the colors in the picture there are. The black and

white histogram also shows all the colors but only in the shade from black to white; in fact, it has

its own name it is called luminosity. Next Dr. Steve Smith talks about how the light from the

camera can be affected by different things like Astrophotography filters. Astrophotography

filters are like a filter but only allows specific colors of light into the picture. The filters help

block any other color from entering the camera. But with those filters and photoshopping

instead of having a black-and-white picture you will have a colorful picture of outer space.

Reflection:

Throughout the prerecorded zoom it was cool to see how Astrophotos are made/ taken.

I’ve been liking outer space for some time and was interested to see how the photos are made.

It was cool to learn how pictures I have seen on social media can be and how long it takes to

make them look how they look. It was interesting to see and learn how much time is probably

put into making a black-and-white picture look like that.

Hannah Devian

2/14/20

Telescope capture most detailed pictures yet of the sun

The Guardian, adapted by Newsela staff on 2/14/20

The article talked about “Columns Of Plasma Show Up As Bright Spots” which is gas that

is heated to almost 10,800 degrees Fahrenheit and can be cooled to predict the sun’s activity

cycle. The article also takes about “Heat Intense Enough To Melt Metal” when temperature

change causes air that could ruin an image quality and the heat rapidly melts metal at the

mirror’s focal point. Lastly, the article talks about “Resolving Long-Standing Mysteries About

The Sun” observations can help find things out like the Cona or the Sun’s Atmosphere is heated

to millions of degrees.