Imaging Challenge #30 - Celestial Motion

[Grant]

The theme for the 30th challenge - September 2019 - is  Celestial Motion!

Start Date: 1st September 2019
End Date: 30th November 2019

Rules: The theme this time is Celestial Motion - we want to see star trails, time lapses, animations, comets, transits, planetary movement - anything that shows off the movement we see in the night skies. Images, animations, videos, sketches all welcome 😀

Prize: A personalised mug for 1st, 2nd and 3rd places featuring your image kindly provided by our sponsors FLO  and a virtual trophy for your signature.

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RULES

All data must be captured and processed by you (no collaborative entries). 
Data must be captured during the challenge start & end dates. 
Multiple entries are allowed but please start a new topic for each entry. 
Multiple submissions of the same image, processed differently, will not be accepted.

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To enter please start a new topic with your image in the ‘Imaging Challenge #30' forum (each challenge will have its own). Please post as much information as possible - when it was taken, how it was captured and processed, etc. The info won't necessarily be used for judging but will help fellow SGLers looking to learn and improve their knowledge and technique.

[Grant]

Sorry for the delayed start everyone - things have been very busy here lately so running a little behind.

[happy-kat]

Another nice challenge topic.

[MilwaukeeLion]

OMG OMG OMG 👯‍♂️

[Craney]

Most of my subs show a bit of celestial motion  !!!!... Does that count ???

[HunterHarling]

This is a great idea. I'll have to do some star trail shots.

@Grant, do you know when the October challenge will be announced?

[Grant]

2 minutes ago, HunterHarling said:

This is a great idea. I'll have to do some star trail shots.

@Grant, do you know when the October challenge will be announced?

I’ve been tied up doing star party stuff so not had time to look at this - you’re the first person to have mentioned it as well so I’m not sure how worthwhile the challenges are anymore - the effort to organise them doesn’t seem worth the amount of participation they’ve generated recently 😞

 

[Davey-T]

Sure there will be lots of solar transits of Mercury entries  Grant as long as the Sun shines 

Dave

[HunterHarling]

5 hours ago, Grant said:

I’ve been tied up doing star party stuff so not had time to look at this - you’re the first person to have mentioned it as well so I’m not sure how worthwhile the challenges are anymore - the effort to organise them doesn’t seem worth the amount of participation they’ve generated recently 😞

 

I very much enjoy them... and I know others do as well. Maybe we just need some new ideas for the challenges. 

[clarkpm4242]

Hi Grant

Thank you for all your time on this.

I suggest going down to seasonal challenges, four a year.  Hopefully the range of entrants would be broader.  Limit the number of submissions per entrant if the number to judge gets too high.

Cheers

Paul

 

[happy-kat]

The summer and clouds have limited it a bit this time of year for me.

Could try 6 challenges a year. I enjoy them and seeing what people enter and I like the variety of challenges as it keeps it open for all levels.

[davew]

16 hours ago, Grant said:

I’ve been tied up doing star party stuff so not had time to look at this - you’re the first person to have mentioned it as well so I’m not sure how worthwhile the challenges are anymore - the effort to organise them doesn’t seem worth the amount of participation they’ve generated recently 😞

 

I did notice the lack of October challenge but assumed, possibly correctly, that the Star Party was taking your time.

Is the bulk of the time taken with the voting system ? If so then try the challenges without votes maybe. Or would that just make them normal photo posts ?

I enjoy seeing how other people go about these themes and it would be a shame to stop but quite understandable. 

Dave.

[Grant]

6 minutes ago, davew said:

I did notice the lack of October challenge but assumed, possibly correctly, that the Star Party was taking your time.

Is the bulk of the time taken with the voting system ? If so then try the challenges without votes maybe. Or would that just make them normal photo posts ?

I enjoy seeing how other people go about these themes and it would be a shame to stop but quite understandable. 

Dave.

Hi Dave,

The bulk of the time is more the logistics of the whole thing - coming up with a challenge idea often takes some time and discussion, then sourcing suitable images for the banner and designing the banner and then creating the new area on SGL and setting up the permissions etc.. Then announcing the new challenge, create the banner announcement and publicising on Twitter and Facebook. Then once finished, collecting the votes from the mod team, announcing them and then organising the mugs to be ordered (although Scott helps with this) and then contacting the winners for address details and organising for the mugs to be sent out.

No single part is that time consuming but there are quite a few hours across all of them and as you guessed, the star party has been consuming much of my time this month.

I'll chat it over with the mod / admin team at Lucksall if we can and see if there is a way to share the load a bit more or rejig it to make it run smoother.

Cheers,

Grant

[HunterHarling]

Does anyone know when the winners of challenge 26 will be announced?

[happy-kat]

I keep being blighted by clouds, though I've planned what I was going to do.