My buddy in Denver made me see old telescope photos differently

Was chatting with an old friend who works at a planetarium out in Denver last week. He was looking at my astrophotography shots on my phone and said something like, "You know, every single one of these is a time machine. That light left those stars before you were born." I never really stopped and thought about it that deep before. I just take pictures of pretty lights in the sky. But he made me realize every photo I take is literally ancient history hitting my sensor. Has anyone else had a simple comment like that change how you look at your own pictures?

2 comments

2 Comments

elliot_roberts7d ago

Realized the same thing applies to everything if you stop and think about it, like how the water in your tap fell as rain before dinosaurs existed or the air you're breathing was once in some Roman soldier's lungs. It's wild how we're all just walking around surrounded by ancient stuff every second but never notice because it looks normal. Makes you wonder what else we're missing just cause we're not looking at it the right way.

ramirez.vera7d ago

My buddy down in Texas told me something similar about his old film camera. He had this beat up Canon from the 80s with this scratched up lens and he said it's not about the lens condition but about capturing light that traveled billions of miles just to hit that scratched piece of glass. I never looked at his shots the same way after that. He's got this one of the Crab Nebula that suddenly felt way more intense to me.