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'Catchers of the Light' is the Website devoted to Astrophotography and its History
It is often easy to forget the pioneers of astrophotography that have made the images on this site possible. Nowadays we take the cameras, telescopes and software available to us for granted, without much thought as to how they came about or who was responsible. If you have a problem with your equipment, or don’t know how to do something, what do you do; you ask a friend, another member of your astronomy club, contact the manufacturer, or search the internet. You can find out, it is easy. Can you imagine what it was like when nobody knew how to take a picture of an astronomical object, because it hadn’t been done before? You had No Internet, No GOTO scope, No CCD camera, No Adaptive Optics, No MAXIM DL, No PHOTOSHOP and No ArtdeCiel. You were alone – a Pioneer! Catchers of the Light has on online database of these pioneers, which can be searched by Name, Nationality and Achievement. For each of the pioneers, information is provided on their Birth, Death, Nationality and Achievement, as well as thumbnail image of them. A link to further details is also provided; here you can find a short biography and a larger image of the pioneer.
	Isaac Roberts	Warren De La Rue
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(All Pioneers) Amédée Mouchez Andrew Ainslie Common Angelo Secchi Armand Hippolyte Fizeau Bernhard Schmidt Charles Dillon Perrine David Gill Edward Emerson Barnard Edwin Hubble Frederick Scott Archer George Phillips Bond George Willis Ritchey Henri Jacques Chretien Henry Brothers Henry Draper Hermann Carl Vogel Isaac Roberts James Clerk Maxwell James Edward Keeler Jean Bernhard Foucault John Adams Whipple John Herschel John William Draper Joseph Bancroft Reade Joseph Nicephore Niepce Julius Scheiner Lewis Morris Rutherfurd Louis Jacques Daguerre Milton Lasell Humason Moritz Loewy Paul Henry Pierre Henri Puiseux Pierre Jules Cesar Janssen Prosper Henry Richard Leach Maddox Thomas Wedgwood Warren de La Rue William Cranch Bond William Edward Wilson William Henry Fox Talbot William Henry Pickering William Huggins William Parsons Williamina Paton Stevens Fleming (All Nationalities) Belgium Denmark England France Germany Greece Italy Netherlands Poland Russian Sweden USA (All Claims to Fame) Angstrom Unit of Wavelength Big Bang Theory of Universe Bode's Law Cassini's Division Celestial Mechanics Comet Hunter Copernican System Deep Space Object Catalogues Discovery of Neptune Discovery of Uranus Distances of Galaxies Double Star Catalogues First to Measure Distance of a Star Galilean Satellites Greenwich Meridian Halley's Comet Hubble Space Telescope Hubble's Law Kepler's Laws of Planetary Motion Kirkwood Gaps Law of Gravity Map of Moon Maunder Cycle Nautical Almanac New Constellations Nutation Period Luminosity Relationship Popularizer of Astronomy Ptolemaic System Solar Physics Spectral Classification Spectroscopy Star Catalogues Steady State Theory of Universe Stellar Aberration Stellar Parallax Structure of Stars Theory of Relativity Tychonic System Wave Theory of Light White Dwarf Stars
Image Full Name Born Died Nationality Fame Details Amédée Mouchez 24th August 1821; Madrid, Spain 29th June 1892;Wissous, Seine-et-Oise, France France Carte du Ciel, an ill fated photographic atlas of the heavens. It showed however the importance of photography in surveying the heavens and gaining valuable astrophysical and astrometric data. More... Andrew Ainslie Common 7th August 1841; Newcastle-upon-Tyne, England, United Kingdom 2nd June 1903; Ealing, London, United Kingdom. England A beautiful and detailed Orion Nebula Photograph of 1883. Importance of stable telescopic mount and need for accurate motor drive in Asrophotography. More... Angelo Secchi 29th June 1818; Regio Emilia, Italy. 26th February 1878; Rome, Italy. Italy Used Photography to capture the Spectra of Stars. He also took some of the earliest pictures of Solar Eclipses in 1851. Introduced first system of Stellar Classification based on a Star's Spectra. More... Armand Hippolyte Fizeau 23rd September 1819; Paris, France. 18th September 1896; Venteuil, Marne, France France Early Daguerrotypes of Sun with Jean Foucault in 1844. Developed with Foucault new method to determine Speed of Light. In 1848 discovered Doppler Effect with Electromagnetic Waves; Doppler discovered the effect with Sound Waves in 1842. More... Bernhard Schmidt 30th March 1879; Naisaar, Tallinn, Estonia. 1st December 1935; Hamburg, Germany. Estonia Invention in 1930 of a telescope (Schmidt Telescope) which corrected for spherical aberration, coma, and astigmatism, making it possible to construct very large, wide angled cameras for astronomical research. More... Charles Dillon Perrine 28th July 1867; Steubenville, Ohio, USA 21st June 1951; Cordoba, Argentina. Argentina Assistant to James Edward Keeler at Lick Observatory; after Keeler's premature death in 1900, Perrine continued his programme of Deep Space Astrophotography. More... David Gill 12th June 1843; Aberdeen, Scotland, United Kingdom. 24th January 1914; London, England, United Kingdom. Scotland Cape Photographic Durchmusterung (1896-1900). Active participant in the Carte du Ciel project with Amedee Mouchez and the Henry brothers, Paul and Prosper. More... Edward Emerson Barnard 16th December 1857, Nashville, Tennessee 6th February 1923,Williams Bay, Wisconsin USA Leading Pioneer of long guided exposure wide field Astrophotography. Photographs of Milky Way, Catalogue of Dark Nebula, Discovery of Barnard's Star. More... Edwin Hubble 29th November 1889; Marshfield, Missouri, United States. 28th September 1953; San Marino, California, United States. USA Best known for the Space Telescope named after him. First Measured Distances of Galaxies. Discovered that amount of Red Shift in a Galaxy's spectrum increased in proportion to its Distance, this became known as Hubble's Law. More... Frederick Scott Archer 1813; Bishops Stortford, Hertfordshire, England 2nd May 1857; London, England England Inventor of the Wet Collodion Photographic Process in 1851. More... George Phillips Bond 20th May, 1825; Dorchester, Boston, Massachusetts, United States. 17th February, 1865; Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. USA Son of William Cranch Bond. First Image of Double Star Zeta Ursa Majoris - Mizar & Alcor in 1857. More... George Willis Ritchey 31st December 1864; Tuppers Plains, Ohio, USA. 4th November 1945; Azusa, California, USA USA Designed new type of Cassegrain Reflecting telescope with Henri Chretien, now known as the Ritchey-Chretien Telescope system, which provided wider fields of view with greater definition. More... Henri Jacques Chretien 1st February 1879; Paris, France. 6th February 1956; Washington, United States. France Co-inventor of Ritchey-Chretien telescope with George Willis Ritchey, revised design of the Cassegrain Telescope, much used by astro-imagers, providing wider fields of view with greater definition. More... 1 2 3 4 'Catchers of the Light' Our Astrophotography Blog Our Book Shop Our Astrophotography Site Buy the Book - from the 'Catchers of the Light' shop with special editions from $0.00 - YES FREE (conditions apply) As Bought By the New Metropolitan Museum of Art, other Museums, Libraries, Astrophotographers, Astronomers, Fine Art Dealers, Photographers and the General Public