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Michael A. Stecker
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Janice and I grew up in the San Fernando Valley area of Los Angeles. We are both graduates of UCLA, Janice with a degree in Linguistics-Computer Science and I with a degree in Math-Computer Science. We married in 1985 and settled in Woodland Hills, CA. Several years later we moved to nearby Calabasas, in the hills near Malibu. In 2003, soon after Alex was born, we left Southern California and began the process of building our current home in Foresthill. Our new place, with its requisite observatory, was completed in January 2005, and we are thrilled to be living in a quiet small town atmosphere with beautifully dark skies right out our front door. My interest in astronomy began when I was quite young, and I acquired my first telescope, a 6” f/8 Optical Craftsman Newtonian, at age 12. I even tried my hand, unsuccessfully, at astrophotography around that time. My enthusiasm faded for several years, but was rekindled in 1990 when I saw published photographs taken by the likes of Tony and Daphne Hallas, Bill and Sally Fletcher, and others. I decided I had to try my hand at astrophotography again. A couple of years later we began traveling to the dark skies of Mt. Pinos, where I was fortunate to meet, become friends with and learn from some of the best astrophotographers in the world. In 1994, after exploring a few different instrument configurations, I finally settled on a Celestron C-11 and an Astro-Physics 1200 mount, a setup which served me well for several years of film imaging. In 1999 I upgraded to a 1200GTO mount, and in 2000 I replaced the C-11 with a 12.5” f/9 Ritchey Chretien Cassegrain built by Parallax Instruments. In 2003 I entered the digital age with an SBIG ST-10 CCD camera, and in 2005 acquired a Yankee Robotics 6303. I enjoy
taking high-resolution color images of deep-sky objects. Making the switch
from film to CCD has been a challenge, but it has also been great fun. I
am continually amazed at how much technology has improved over the years
and at the unbelievable quality of the photographs being produced by my
fellow imagers. Both provide great motivation to keep learning and trying
to improve my skills.
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