Absolutely gorgeous shots. Made my day.
When I saw it, there were narratives about the people behind the shots which made it extra special.
Yes, but these days I have to wonder whether AI was involved, and I hate having that thought because of the massive time, expertise, equipment, and luck that it takes for the real photos to be created.
The unique thing about astrophotography is that the subject that we are imaging is (relatively speaking) static. Any slight deviation, even the smallest detail, that is not structurally accurate is PAINFULLY obvious.
As an aside, we do use traditional neural networks for certain processing steps. Deconvolution and noise reduction are very common. However, these are only helping in correcting errors caused by viewing conditions. They are not the "imaginative" AI that you are dreading.
I would actually be more worried about a knowledgeable human engaging in clever Photoshop alterations, or pasting different images together. Is this an issue in astrophotography? Are there ways to easily detect this?
The area in this photo -- the Caineville Mesa, Factory Butte, "Long Dong Silver" (I'm not aware of a more polite name) -- is some of the strangest land in America. It really is that lunar blue gray. The Temples of the Sun and Moon (enormous natural sandcastles) are also nearby, and are similarly eerie in the evening.
The closest I've ever felt to being in space. Recommend!
Factory Butte: https://www.instagram.com/tripodtales/p/C6gg-wpS-tr/
"Long Dong Silver": https://www.instagram.com/tripodtales/p/C-yLCskOGiC/
https://www.rmg.co.uk/whats-on/astronomy-photographer-year/e...
I blame that dark/night photography is an impossible task. The tricks like long exposure, ISO boost and noise cleanup, saturation, hdr or whatever you throw at it, just wont be like your eyes. Photographers gets carried away in post and boost too much, and I understand why.
Northern lights - are awesome. I encourage you to see it if you havent. Go this winter! And take photos and you’ll know what I meen. The colors wont pop like these popular photos, but standing outside on a freezing winter night holding back your frost breath from blocking the view of the green lights moving like firely beams of across the sky. Hopefully you’re somewhere quiet with no light pollution. There is nothing like it - watching the reflections of the armor of the valkyrene as they march on valhal
Boosting colors/saturation that is already there is no different from what most people do with images on their phones. I also have no issues when people use a SII or H-alpha filters and give them a false color.
But your framing it as what is actually going on, just with better sensors than our eyes have, makes me appreciate the art more.
Think someone who only ever saw waterfalls in long-time exposure shots, these frozen, milky streams that look nothing like actual water, while still being pretty to look at. Would you say that person has an understanding of what a waterfall actually looks like? No. But do they see something that is there, but others wouldn’t be able to sense in reality? Also no, as long as we use a subjective experience of time as the baseline.
Your premise is just too out there. Someone only ever having seen long exposure of a waterfall is just so preposterous, and is more guilty of making shit up than the GP’s concern over faking imagery by pushing contrast/saturation in images. Yours is just totally made up nonsense trying to make a point while the other is just enhancing real data.
You seem to be arguing from a perspective that photography is an opportunity to use technology to show humans what's impossible to see, be it because our eyes don't register the low light (thus needing long exposures or composites), or because we experience time differently than a long exposure photograph shows it.
Meanwhile, the parent is arguing from the perspective that photography should reflect only what our eyeballs can see, without embellishing (or at least as much). Capturing the moment, as it were.
You can both be right, and (I would argue) are. There's room for both (and many more) perspectives in art.
The fact that humans can over come their limited abilities from their natural senses to be able to experience real world in wider gamuts is a very cool thing. These types of astro images are real world data. It’s not some genAI made up from thin air. People are not rendering things in some 3d software and passing it off as real, or making obviously impossible comps. These are just presenting data that exists that we can’t “see” without help.
Again, I’m all for managing expectations. Every time I let someone look through my telescope, I remind them it is not going to be what they’ve seen from Hubble or anything else online.
Hey if I wanted to see strawmen, I'd watch The Wizard of Oz instead of trying to have this conversation.
Actually, I'm unsure why you're arguing with me. I literally said you were both right. Unless your stance is that GP's definition of art is incorrect? If so, that's a far more slippery slope than I wish to go down and I bid ye adieu.
Frequently after I would have dreams where wild displays of light (sometimes nebulae) covering the entire night sky, hanging over me — making me feel so small compared to the universe.
I've told my daughters to travel where they have to so that they see them at least once in their lifetime. And I mean the full on blazing in the night sky: crossfading, the colors....
I think I might rank them higher than seeing a full eclipse.
I know it's partly because of the color pallette, but still
Are the "geometric buildings" real or just something she put up for the picture?
https://subsites.chinadaily.com.cn/ezhejiang/lishui/2025-01/...
How did they do solar eruption? Must be some filters as Sun doesn't look like this to naked eye. I mean this image:
https://www.rmg.co.uk/sites/default/files/styles/large/publi...
https://spacemath.gsfc.nasa.gov/SMBooks/AstrophotographyV1.p...
If you’re coming to London please spend a day in Greenwich, you won’t regret it, take in the museums, the small markets, the observatory, stroll round the park, grab a photo of the best view in London (imo) https://www.rmg.co.uk/royal-observatory/attractions/enjoy-be... - then take a walk along the Thames, once you’re done you can hop on an Uber boat and head into central London.
aredox•6mo ago
Thanks for destroying trust, AI researchers and companies. On top of everything else.
olddustytrail•6mo ago
vjvjvjvjghv•6mo ago
ethan_smith•6mo ago
foxglacier•6mo ago
Even if they are real, does it really matter when the camera is doing superhuman work with things like a 27 km zoomed in picture of a building or composite of 300 separate exposures. If you get to combine exposures, why not just expose a moon separately from a building and combine them in the computer?