Cosmos Safari
The Cosmos Safari podcast co-hosts David Farina and Rob Webb take listeners on a journey to explore the depths of science's current understanding of the cosmos around us. The Universe is closer than you think!
Cosmos Safari
Astronomy Outreach with Kevin LeGore
Astronomy outreach is a powerful way to educate and inspire communities about their Cosmos. Kevin LeGore shares his extensive experience in making astronomy accessible through hands-on outreach and community engagement, emphasizing that anyone can get involved regardless of their expertise.
• Importance of community in fostering interest in astronomy
• How to get started with outreach, overcoming hesitations
• Kevin’s journey in astronomy and outreach
• Strategies for creating memorable experiences during events
• The role of technology in enhancing outreach effectiveness
• Fostering scientific literacy and critical thinking in society
Kevin's passion for the stars began with a humble telescope, a gift from his mother, and has since blossomed into a career dedicated to sharing the wonders of the cosmos through public and private events. Together, we discuss how anyone can overcome the initial hurdles of stargazing, emphasizing the importance of community and local astronomy clubs as gateways to unlocking the universe's mysteries.
Our conversation takes a reflective turn as we examine the interplay between personal growth and professional ambitions. We delve into the role of mentors, the inevitability of failure, and the resilience needed to push through. Kevin and I share anecdotes about balancing career aspirations with personal life, discussing the sacrifices sometimes necessary to excel in one area while nurturing another. Through these insights, we offer a candid look at setting realistic goals and maintaining balance amidst life's challenges.
As the episode unfolds, we unpack the logistics behind astronomy outreach events, from the educational to the corporate, offering practical tips for aspiring astronomers. We explore the excitement of using advanced technology like smart telescopes and the potential future augmented reality may play to enhance the stargazing experience.
With stories from our experiences under clear dark skies, we discuss the joy of sharing the universe with others and the innovative tools that make these events memorable. Whether you're a seasoned astronomer or a curious novice, this episode promises to ignite your passion for the stars and the surrounding community.
A Special Thanks to Will Young at https://www.deepskydude.com/ for the right to use his awesome music.
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Hello and welcome to the Cosmos Safari podcast. I'm your host, dave Farina. In today's episode, we're going to be talking all things astronomy outreach with my guest, kevin Lagore. Kevin is a pillar of our community. He has worked throughout the industry and many of the brands that you may have heard of, and he also has his own business called Focus Astronomy Outreach, where he brings the universe to the public for educational purposes as well as to private events as entertainment. So I'm really excited to bring Kevin on and to help you to understand how outreach is done, how to get involved and maybe do some of this stuff in your community. So enjoy as we talk to Kevin Lagore.
Speaker 1:Kevin, thank you so much for joining me today. I met you a few times at NEAF and it's great to have you here on the podcast. Yeah, thanks for having me. So, kevin, I know your background in telescopes is pretty vast. You guys probably know Kevin Lagore. He's a pretty prominent figure in the astronomy world. He's a pretty prominent figure in the astronomy world. What we hope to talk to Kevin about today is more about outreach and how. Sharing our love and our passion for astronomy is something that both Kevin and I have in common, but we have different experiences that we are coming from and hopefully, throughout our discussion today, you can glean some kind of takeaways from this in your own efforts to do outreach as well. So, kevin, could you just give us some background on kind of like what got you into astronomy in the first place?
Speaker 2:So my mom got me a small 50 millimeter refractor from the discovery store, which was owned by discovery channel um in 1999, um, on a whim, just was like hey, this might be cool, as I think a lot of parents do with a young kid. It's like what could I gift them? That's just different and it's not the same stuff. Um, so that's kind of where that started and it took a couple years for, I think, the interest to really click in. I still have that scope laying around somewhere in pieces, but the tube is around here somewhere.
Speaker 2:Is that because you took it apart to try to figure?
Speaker 1:out how it works.
Speaker 2:No, it's just I lost the mount and I lost as you do when you're a kid no, paying attention to anything, but so I started viewing the moon and then probably wasn't until a few years later, probably once I got into like middle school, we started talking about space, that my interest kind of peaked further and I wanted to start getting into the hobby on a heavier basis. So I started saving up to get a little six inch Newtonian and then got that, and then, you know, that's where it took off Got involved with the local astronomy group. They did events like I do, so I started jumping right in with outreach and it was really kind of like trial by fire in a way. Um, cause astronomy events will do that to you, where you just have to jump in and there's 50 people in line and they want to know what you're looking at. Um, and that's where my interest in outreach got started. Um, I started volunteering at a space museum that's unfortunately no longer in business out here and, uh, that's where I met the group I have been working with for a couple decades at this point.
Speaker 2:And then covid hit and, um, they decided to close up their business and and then I was already running Focus. Focus started in 2011. And when I lived out in LA working for Woodland Hills Camera and then eventually moving to Skywatcher, was doing my own stuff out there, and then, when I came back to Arizona in 2016, I started heavily trying to dig into the outreach areas out here. And then, like I said, then COVID hit. Everyone went on this hiatus and then my buddy never returned to doing events. He retired, and so I started picking them up and that's what I do now as a side gig. So I do outreach and corporate events, which are two different animals that we can dig into, but that's how I got started.
Speaker 1:That's awesome, yeah. So my background you know, I as a kid I remember wanting a telescope. I remember looking at it and you know, when they had the science stores in the mall where I could look at it through the window and be like, wow, that's an awesome telescope, my dad kind of talked about getting one. We never did Uh and kind of fell off my radar for a while and I actually started really getting into it in my twenties, which uh was directly related to my job, uh, running a planetarium. So that was like late in life and there was always astronomy there. Earth and space science was always there.
Speaker 1:But I ended up having to teach myself a lot of this stuff and, just like you, I ended up joining a local astronomy club. So you know, I think a lot of my, a lot of our audience here on Cosmos Safari podcasts are interested in astronomy and the degree to which their interest is, I think it ranges fairly, fairly wide. So you know, what would you say to people who are just starting to get interested that you know maybe you're starting with a telescope, they'd like to do outreach, but it's kind of scary.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that happens a lot. We have people all the time they're like do outreach, but it's kind of scary. Yeah, that happens a lot. We have people all the time they're like I have a telescope, this is kind of neat. They're just kind of looking for some way to get involved, and I remember being that way too.
Speaker 2:Astronomy is kind of a funny hobby where it seems so unobtainable but the minute that you crack the ice and realize, oh, there's clubs and stuff all over that like it's super easy to get involved in the community. But you got to find it and it's sure it's not one of those things that you know you hear about all the time. So yeah, I would say, find a local group and get involved. I would also say, if you're just getting started, it's very easy to shy away from doing events. I've had people show up.
Speaker 2:My team and myself we've been doing this for a couple of decades, so we're pretty entrenched with the gear that we have, and a lot of our gear is large and impressive stuff. And we get people who come out and they're like well, my scope's not going to be like yours, it doesn't have to be and quite honestly, I don't want you to have the same thing. There's something really refreshing about having someone who's just beginning out doing astronomy, because when you have people attending an event like, wow, the scope's amazing, how much is it? You know must cost a million dollars, you know the typical stuff, um, and yeah, there's a fair amount invested. I mean, we're not really there to talk money, but it's nice to have someone who's new, who's just getting started, because it shows to people how obtainable it is to get involved in.
Speaker 2:Maybe, hey, I only. I have one gentleman who comes out. He came to one of our telescope help classes that we do usually at the beginning of the year, had no idea what to get, came out to a class. We just did the basics of this as a Schmidt this is a reflector, this is a refractor Came in, took a bunch of notes and he ended up buying a Celestron 6SE, which is probably one of our most recommended scopes. Now he's out whenever he's available and, yeah, it's not the biggest most impressive scope.
Speaker 2:Yeah, they're everywhere and maybe it's not the biggest, most impressive scope we have on the field, but he's there, he's passionate, he's sharing his interests and the views are great and no one's complaining about it. So you don't have to have this big bad gear. You don't even have to know what you're really doing, and that's part of the good thing of coming out to these events and joining a team is. A lot of times we all didn't start that way either. I remember my first astronomy event vividly. My six inch Newtonian was on an equatorial mount. I had no idea which way to put an equatorial mount.
Speaker 2:I just popped it somewhere and they had to come in and show me how to manage it and I just stuck to a relatively simple target. They even gave me some pointers like here's something cool. It's this far and for two hours at an outreach event I just I don't remember what the target was. Maybe it was the ring or something easy. I just stood on that and talked about it and that ingrains it in your head and you do that over and over and over and you eventually get pretty good at it.
Speaker 1:So tell us a little bit more about what your company Focus Astronomy Outreach does.
Speaker 2:So Focus started as a volunteer program, which I would say that's where you got to start. So I'm not a big fan of astronomy clubs and it has nothing to do with the club, it's just. I find that what I want to do is just outreach. I want to go out and share, and there's a lot of clubs that do that, but a lot of times it can get political and be like, well, we're going to do this and we're going to do that. So I didn't need anybody dictating what I wanted to do. I had a vision and that's what I wanted to execute.
Speaker 2:So, um so my focus no pun intended was that um so focus started as a volunteer program, um, which was basically just me and whoever wanted to come out and share stuff. There wasn't any money involved, nothing, it was just my own whim. And you start doing a bunch of events and building them up and over time, a few years ago it got to the point where I had to make a decision on which direction focus was going to go, and I've seen this happen with a couple different groups. Because at some point, if you want to keep doing outreach, whether it's schools or whatever, you're going to have to start carrying liability insurance, which most schools and most resorts. That's $2 million plus policy to set foot. Now you're not paying 2 million, but that's what you have to carry. That's a few grand out of your pocket. So a lot of astronomy clubs have that. So that's kind of the benefit of being under a club is someone else is taking care of the insurance. I think.
Speaker 2:NASA, solar system ambassadors are the same way they're under this umbrella policy with NASA, I believe.
Speaker 1:Correct.
Speaker 2:Um, which is great, and but if you're doing your own thing you have to go through all the work yourself. So I'm out of pocket. We'll just say almost three grand right at the beginning of the year. I can't carry that. So sure.
Speaker 2:That's where I had to make a decision. It's like am I going to become a nonprofit and raise money to pay this stuff or do I become a business? And I had to talk to a few financial experts some friends of mine are attorneys and financial people and they pointed me in the direction of doing business. And the reason I chose a business was I could pick and choose which events I was going to charge and which I weren't. And I could say this is a volunteer event and there's no money transferred, or it's a paid event. And we've gotten flack before.
Speaker 2:I did an episode on our what's up webcast for sky watcher about this topic and we get some flack that, oh, you're charging for astronomy events. That's a very capitalistic approach. It's like, well, yes and no, because for a long time I was very like you shouldn't trade money for events. But over time it becomes pretty prominent that if you want to grow your program and offer cool new things and do literally anything, you have to have money to back it. And is that money going to come from donations? Is it going to come from charging events? Where's the money coming from?
Speaker 2:Because a lot of us, including myself, could probably say I don't have that kind of income that I could just throw thousands of dollars to the side to keep this going. So at some point you become big enough to where you have to make the decision of OK, I have to have insurance to go to a school or whatever. I can't keep doing this because you're hitting the ceiling. You have to make that decision of how am I going to do this Because an insurance company, when you approach them, they're not just going to be like oh you're a person, we'll insure you.
Speaker 1:They're like well, what are you? You need to be a business. That's kind of where Cosmos Safari got to. So I was teaching primarily. It was the main way I got into it. I joined the local astronomy club. I did six years as president of the local astronomy club. We did tons of outreach events. I very much enjoyed it. I got lots of experience and lots of education from my group that I worked with. I owe everything to them.
Speaker 1:But you know, I have a small family or a growing family now, and at that point, you know, six years ago now, I had to make that decision. Do I want to continue to do the outreach, neglecting my responsibilities as a parent? This is pre-COVID and do I want to do all of this outreach for nothing, or do I just start a YouTube channel? I didn't even think about money, I just thought do I start a YouTube channel and hopefully impact, you know, approximately the same number of people when I do my outreach? It's just digital outreach.
Speaker 1:Uh, and it became a thing and it wasn't planned, it certainly wasn't ever meant to be a business until it, kind of you said, got to the point where I started to realize, like, if I want to keep doing this, there are some things that I need to be able to handle financially, like the podcast, right like we're on right now. I'm funded by our patreon patrons, so I'll put that plug right there. You know, that's what keeps the lights on um and allows us to talk with you today, because what software we use to do the podcasting isn't free, and so absolutely completely get this um and I appreciate all of the effort that you put into what you do, because that's why we're talking today, because you stand out from the crowd.
Speaker 1:And I think the work that you do is awesome and I'm interested to learn from you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I've had a lot of people. There's a lot of people that still help me today that you'll never see on a webcast episode. That's just not their style Right. They don't get nearly the praise that they've done. But I have a whole second family that has helped me over the years and still helps me, and I try to give back to them as much as possible. But I could not be where I'm at without the people in front of me. I think it was even I I think it's Isaac Newton's quote where you have to stand on the shoulders of giants to get where you're going, and that's how I feel about a lot of these people. Even when I was younger, I never gravitated to people my age. I gravitated to older people just because I resonated more with them. Maybe it's the old soul kind of thing, just because I resonated more with them. Maybe it's the old soul kind of thing All my friends are older than I am and that's what.
Speaker 2:I've always known. Maybe it's kept me out of trouble. At the same time, I can't do the same about that. But yeah, I have a lot of people to thank Every day.
Speaker 1:they're out helping or doing, supporting me in whatever way, shape and form, form, so kind of in that same thread. You know you said you have people that are your support system in the background. Um, I think it's important for people who are kind of like where you're at, where you're, you know you're, you're very much a pillar of the community. At this point. When have you experienced failure? How have you learned about it, and can you give us some examples of where that failure occurred and you had to figure out how to kind of push through it and what that looks like? Because I think a lot of people are probably, as they're getting started, feeling that learning curve. I know, I felt it and it's sometimes difficult and I even get it now. You know it's not even necessarily just a learning curve. That's for newbies. It's a learning curve for people just to maintain and keep up because it's moving so fast. So you just give us some examples of where you you failed and how you came about getting through it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I think one of the biggest. I was watching a podcast yesterday I don't even know who it was, but it was like a psychologist or something like that where I think in their terms it was just a random thing on YouTube, but their terms they were talking about like addiction, but it kind of resonated on a like you're saying with failure, where if you try to overcome whatever the issue was as a whole, you'll never get it done. So you need to. He talks about reducing, lowering the bar, and not in a negative way, but you have to lower it to where it's achievable for you. And then you it's just stair steps where you hit this gold and this gold and this gold and this goal, and it just progresses.
Speaker 2:Um failure, though you got to be willing to take no as an answer, and you're going to get a lot of people that say no, and I learned that early on, and my internal motto is the worst thing they're going to say is no. So if you need someone to back, you ask. Some of these companies are willing to back people and maybe donate equipment if they're in the position, but be highly aware that they're probably going to tell you no. So those are like little failures at that point. What are?
Speaker 1:some other failures.
Speaker 2:They, you're saying like people who you're looking to do outreach with, or oh no, this is when I was early on, I had visions of what I wanted to do and I needed the equipment to do it.
Speaker 1:Got it.
Speaker 2:So I needed to go ask companies to support me with equipment and a lot of them said no, because they're going to. You're going to being on the other side of it. Now, if you ask us, we need like a resume or a portfolio of why are we going to cut money and give you equipment and I need to make sure you're not just going to flip it and do all that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2:So right when you're getting started, a lot of people are going to tell you no, um, so that's, uh, an early failure kind of a thing is you have to be willing to just accept no and then go find another place and keep trying um, I will say, getting to where I am going on a more personal level, which I haven't actually talked about in depth publicly other than within the people who know me, but eventually you put so much effort into something that it can take away from other important things in your life, from other important things in your life.
Speaker 2:Um, so I got divorced in 2022 and, looking back, it wasn't smooth sailing, but it could have been way worse. At the same time, um, and there's a lot that came from that and you have to reflect on it's a two way street with something like that, and you kind of have to take inventory of, like, what did I do to get myself here and maybe I focused too much on doing this. There was a lot of other things that happened which I'm not going to get into details about, but I could see where it's like. Maybe I put too much effort into this career and I wasn't present and this, this and this, and because you have to remember when you're out doing events. That's your time. You are making a decision to put time into this, but what other things could you be doing with that time? Are you a parent that your kids needed to be there? Does your spouse need you to be there?
Speaker 2:You're investing your time and that comes at a price somewhere, so maybe you're retired and you've got tons of time, but so, failure wise, I think that I don't know if I would make that a full failure, but I could see bits and pieces where I spent a lot of time hyper-focused on a particular goal and maybe I wasn't present to where I needed to be present in certain aspects of my personal life at that point and I think that happens with a lot of people who are very driven and targeted on what they're trying to achieve is sometimes you can't rattle yourself loose from that, and I think I think I can say this with some level of confidence that that this particular hobby tends to be attractive to people who have similar personalities to what you're describing, right, Like I think a lot of us are very hyper focused on on that, and perfectionism is a thing that we all struggle with Maybe not all of us, but I certainly do, and I have the same same kind of things.
Speaker 1:Mrs cosmos safari is in the background right now. Uh, yeah, somewhere with my kids, uh, making sure that we can do this here today. So here's my plug. Thank you, uh, for that. Like it's, it does take away time and but, but we believe in what we're doing here and that's why we're so passionate about it. Um, so I thank you for sharing that, though I mean, that's a. It's very meaningful to the podcast that we can be so open. We had talked a little bit about. You know, when you are trying to organize outreach outreach right, you said the very different animals between public and like educational type of star watches versus these corporate events that you do. Can you kind of like I'd like to steer mostly on the side of the education stuff today? Yeah, could you just touch on that other aspect of it too, because it's foreign to me? The outreach part for the education is where I'm kind of comfortable with, but I just like to hear about how do you prepare?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so usually I'll, you know, I'll get an email from someone. I don't throw my phone number out there, I just like having a digital track of everything. Once I've got connected with whoever I'm going to work with, then I'm not secretive about my phone number, about it. It's just I like to have that initial hey, let's look back and see what we were talking about kind of thing track records. So normally I'll get an email from somebody, whether it be an educator or an event planner or whatever. They start out pretty much the same way. It's an event request and usually it's like hey, I heard from an event planner, or we saw you at this event or whatever. Somehow they found us. And then from there usually it's okay, what dates are you looking for? What time of year? Usually we're trying to figure out how the big things that you want to figure out when organizing an event are how many people Roughly, the date and times and maybe what the goals are, and a lot of times with, like a school or something like that, more public, it's a little bit more loose.
Speaker 2:So it's like, ok, I'll look at the calendar, being like, well, we'd like something in march. Okay, fine, um, well, let's do something. On this day I try to pick a little bit of a moon for the public because it's it just looks good, um, and then I'll tell them what the available best times for viewing are and then ask if that works. Sometimes they approach you and they've got a lot more structure, like science nights at a school or a museum. There's more structure that's laid down like hey, we start at this time, we end at this time, and you just kind of insert inside of the framework they've already built and then from there I kind of figure out what do we need to bring for equipment?
Speaker 2:Usually I figure out we've kind of figured over the years that you need about one scope per 50 people. That way you're not waiting in lines all this time. But it also depends is there other activities going on? Like a museum? It's like, oh, we have this activity and we have this and this. So they're not all just around the telescopes. Some events they are. You're the lead portion of that, but every event is a little bit different. But yeah, that's usually it.
Speaker 1:And then there are other people that you work with for these events generally, or is it mostly just yourself?
Speaker 2:I organize everything with whatever the venue is, whether it's an outreach event or corporate event, whatever I organize it all. I have equipment to cover most of these events, but I do have three other people for every now and again or more. Um, but I have three people on my team who helped me routinely. And then we have like our outer orbit group which, when they're available, they they come and volunteer their time. So, but, yeah, uh, so that's how that usually works, but having a team of people that can assist is helpful. Um, I don't ask. I do ask. It's like, hey, we're doing this. A lot of people do it, like myself and I got started. We just do it because we love doing it.
Speaker 2:Now, the corporate side of things, or the private events organized, is very similar, except now you're dealing with an event planner and they are usually really structured. You know the venue, you know the time, you know the place, you know how many people are going to be there. Those events are the moneymakers, because you're not getting hired to be educational. That's a plus that comes with it. You're getting hired as entertainment, something cool and unique that an event planner can pull out of their toolbox and like a DJ or like a palm reader, which we've had before. Whatever unique experience, it is those you want to approach as your entertainment, and that's where more of the income comes in from those events.
Speaker 1:You're in Arizona, correct?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we take advantage of the weather and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:How far have you traveled to do this stuff?
Speaker 2:like that. How far have you traveled to do this stuff? Uh, the furthest ones I've done under my own banner for focus are two to three hours. One way, um, for corporate, like we did one for lamborghini earlier this year in the fall in sedona at a really high-end resort um, and yeah, you had the structure, you had the place, you knew when to be there, but yeah, you're just there as entertainment. But usually with an event like that, um, I haven't figured out.
Speaker 1:Now you're cheating because you get way too many clear nights and I always have to plan up a backup plan. That's what I'm gonna do if I don't have a clear sky? So how many? How often is it like not usable from like a sky perspective?
Speaker 2:we did 30 events this year and I didn't have to cancel one wow so we take.
Speaker 2:we take advantage of it. I have some. I have another friend of mine in Sedona. He has a contract with most of the resorts up there. He's booked every night of the year. Okay yeah, he makes bank doing this stuff, but his personal life is a lot different than mine. He has the time availability to do it, but he is out almost every night. Now we do have backup plans. If I had to cancel one, maybe we did have to cancel one this year, I don't remember.
Speaker 2:Some of them just fall off the calendar because it doesn't follow through, for whatever the reason is Um, maybe one or two we've had to postpone or cancel. Um, if we can postpone and move the date, then we'll do that. If that's not possible, then we'll just cancel it. And if it's a corporate event and they've paid ahead of time, then they just get a refund. We do have a cancellation policy we have in place if weather affects it. I do have a meteorite display that we can bring out as an alternative, which is really popular for, like, education events, but for corporate stuff not as much.
Speaker 2:Um so you, you offer what you have.
Speaker 1:And my coloring activities. My coloring activities probably won't fly at a corporate event. No, you know, from like an education time.
Speaker 2:Oh, here's some coloring activities to do, you know, and uh, sometimes they still want you to come out because it's just interesting and maybe you'll get something we try to work with or I try to work.
Speaker 2:If I know the weather's looking sketchy, I will tell them about 48 hours in advance, being like, hey, it's not looking great. Because normally by the time we're in a 48-hour window you can kind of figure what the weather for the most part is going to look like the night before, unless it's a weird weather system and we'll work with them and be like, hey, it's not looking great, what do you want to do? And we'll let them decide what they want to do. It's a lot easier to deal with cloudy situations on an educational event because, like I said, oh, we can still come out, we'll bring meteorites, we can still make it fun and interesting for the attendees corporate stuff if they can't see a lot of times, they'll just scrap us and we'll go on to the next thing so you're gonna have to, like, come up with some sort of uh, you know singing career, that kind of interlaces it right, you can sing astronomy-based songs or something and make up when you can't see what's going through your telescope Exactly.
Speaker 1:That's kind of interesting, because I have the opposite. I think I probably have 30 events and maybe one of them actually works up here in Pennsylvania. That's been tough, you know it's hard, and what we found, at least with the outreach stuff to the public, is like people still show up. It'll be like raining outside and they'll show up.
Speaker 1:So we found we can't cancel. Oh, with like, with little notice, we can't cancel because they're going to show up. And then they're like well, where are you guys? You know, where are you have to show up anyway. And so what we had to do is we've had to find places. My astronomy club that I went with for six years, we had to find a place that had an indoor facility, that had a place where you could sit, you know, um, and close enough to the public, uh, that you know they're going to actually come. So it's not ideal sky conditions. You know you're in light pollution, yeah, and you know it's great to want to go to the darkest skies and in the middle of nowhere, but nobody's going to show up. So it's, it's challenging when you're doing public outreach to just get that perfect.
Speaker 2:You know experience to preface that with people before, where it's like, well, I want to come out. It's like, OK, what I need you to understand, especially because I've had people ask about starting their own business, like focuses. I have to remind people. It's like you're not there for you right.
Speaker 2:You're there for other people and, like you said, you're not there for you. Right, you're there for other people and, like you said, you're not in good skies. Very rarely are you in good skies and you can't show up whether it's education or especially corporate events and be like, well, the sky sucks, so we're not going to do anything. It's like, no, we hired you to come here to do this and you figure it out. It's like, well, the skies are terrible. Ok, there's the moon, there's some planets, there's some bright stars. You just stick with your guns and work with it and if you just happen to get to a good sky, hooray.
Speaker 1:That's why I don't run a channel based on purely astrophotography. It's like I don't have the time, and when I do have the clear skies, it's like, uh well, I've got something else going on tonight and it never works out, or maybe I want to just enjoy it for myself for a night. Um, it's difficult when you we start to overlap hobbies and businesses. And yeah, I mentioned to you right before we got on here that you know things were starting to feel like here on the podcast, just a lot of effort going towards preparation instead of just enjoying it. So you know it's important if you're ever thinking about, as you're listening to kevin and uh, talk about this. Stuff like this takes effort and it's not always, um, you know, as fun as just going out and doing it.
Speaker 2:So there's some days where you did like you. You've done the podcast, I mean, you've been to Neve and interviewed people. I'm I do our webcast on skywatch. But there's some days that you're just not on, where it's like I'm not feeling, whatever's going on. Maybe you're tired, maybe you're just not in the mood, but there's some days where it's like I, where it's like I'm just not, and then you're out in front of people.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're on, you've got to be on.
Speaker 2:I've talked to my buddy, trevor Jones at Astro Backyard about this. People just kind of expect you to be on all the time and if you're not, they're like, well, what's his problem? It's like, dude, I'm a person too. I can't always, I can't tell you every day like why I'm not feeling it, but some days you're just not in the pocket that you need to be in and it's. You're just a person.
Speaker 1:So you drift in and out of it pocket. Yeah, it's a relative term, yep. So one last thing with, like, the preparation. You've got two very, very different telescopes that you use, so can you just tell us, like, what those two telescopes are and and and why? I was in, we had a Facebook conversation about this Like why in the world do you have these two very different telescopes and how do you know which one you're going to use at a particular place for night?
Speaker 2:Yeah, those are just the two that are on.
Speaker 1:Or, by the way, sorry to interrupt, gear problems are a later thing. That starts to happen when you've got too many things to choose from. So don't let that be scary to you. Kevin's got some really cool gear. I'm interested to know why he chooses to use what he uses.
Speaker 2:A lot of stuff, but I work for Skywatcher too, so telescopes kind of accumulate after a while, whether I buy them or they come from work or something we're working on. We obtain stuff for different things, but then the benefit is I get to use them at my disposal. But yeah, the two main telescopes that are currently used in rotation are the 28-inch F3.3 DAWB, which was custom built specifically for outreach. Its nickname is the large aperture outreach telescope that I've.
Speaker 2:Long time ago I was at a star party and there was a gentleman his name's Peter I don't Argonzano. He's amazing observer. I don't know where Peter went and if he's watching this. Thanks Peter. He was so open with his 25 inch obsession. We were at a star party. I was this kid with a 10 inch daub and got to look at Orion through it and it was burned a hole in the back of my head. So that's where the aperture addiction kicked in. But I've noticed over the years that everyone who's ever had a really big daub A you remember the image because it's burned in the back of your head and B they're so open and welcoming with their stuff, like they want to share it. It's their pride and joy. They want to share it, and I've always wanted to be able to give back on that level too, because when you look through a telescope it's an experience. Well, I want that experience to stick with you and the best way I have found is to burn it into the back of your head with as much light as possible.
Speaker 2:So I like using the big, bad equipment, and it does get costly, but they're investments. To me, they're tools and they are not something that I just obtained overnight. It's built up and the collection has rotated all the time. So the 28-inch is the big one and that took five years to make, three years to do the mirror. My buddy, scott at Star Arizona, designed and helped me build all that. It was crowdfunded. I did sell some of my own stuff to help fund it, worked with some of my friends' nonprofits to get pieces donated. It was a big puzzle to make it happen. So now that's an active rotation. It doesn't come out to every event, especially like the corporate events where alcohol can be involved, and six foot ladders in the dark with alcohol is not a great combination and I don't want to test my liability insurance, so I have to kind of read the room on which events that scope goes to. So that's the biggest one and probably will always remain the biggest.
Speaker 1:Anything bigger is there was a lot of thought that went into making that portable and usable the next run in a trailer, correct, like you have a trailer that you pull it all with it has a five by eight box trailer which, if you're getting a big job, that's part of the expense that you need to pay attention to, is how you move it.
Speaker 2:but I started with a 10 inch jobW for DAWs and then I got saved up and got a 16. And that was like my scope for years. And then a buddy of mine was selling his 20 inch obsession locally, so I jumped from 16 to 20. I actually kept the two of them together, found I wasn't using the 16, but use the 20. And then, once I had the 20 for about a year or two that's when it's like I think it's time to make the jump. I finally had a house and stuff, so I had the foundation to house a scope like that, and that's where I started searching for glass and came across the 28-inch blank, thanks to Mike Lockwood, and a lot of things fell into place. But it was a labor of love to make that thing possible and I do not want to do it again because it was a process.
Speaker 1:So that's the big guy. We had Scott from Starzono on a previous podcast just recently and he's a great guy yeah, scott's awesome, very quiet.
Speaker 2:He's funny when you get to pry him open a bit. So yeah, so if you haven't heard that podcast.
Speaker 1:You definitely check that one out, because the amazing conversations that kind of just arise from talking to these people that have been doing this for so many years and like just the deep, the depth of experience that they have is unbelievable scott's incredible with his knowledge of optics and design and the things he comes up with.
Speaker 2:So Scott is a wealth of information, um, and he's a great optician as well. So he did a great job on the mirror. I mean it's it was the biggest mirror he's done to date. Uh, it's F 3.3. It's a cellular mirror, so it was a very different animal and he got it to one seventh of a wave across the whole primary, which is very nice.
Speaker 2:So that's the big scope. The second one that's an active rotation usually. So I have. I have a lot of little scopes like six inch down, and but there's two my two most impressive ones that are used for events with the 28 and then the Stellar View 180 triplet APO that replaced the Esprit 150, which I've had. I still have it. It hasn't seen light in a while but yeah, the seven inch worked out. Got one of those from Vic. Thing is a frickin powerhouse of a telescope. There is no arguing with a seven inch triplet, especially one of stellar views, and that comes out to most of the events because it's convenient. I really like refractors because they're convenient, they're low maintenance, I don't have to deal with collimation and they're fairly easy to lug around. The 180 is pushing it Uh pushing it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's 45 pound tube, um, but it it's never a slouch. It's impressive. It looks like a telescope.
Speaker 1:It draws people in it's on a.
Speaker 2:UAR H from skywatcher Uh currently, for the love of God, if someone could come out with a strain wave mount big enough to hold that thing counterweights, I would. The EQ eights are amazing, but at the end of the night it's like I don't want to lug 60 pounds of counterweights in a 50 pound head.
Speaker 1:And that's kind of where I'm getting to man, and it's. I actually just talked to vick because I have the 130, um, the svx 130, and I had, uh, my previous job when I had an observatory, I had the 152 from stellar view and I can't believe you're you're doing star watches with a 180, like it's, you're you're saying how convenient and portable it is and I'm thinking, holy moly, I guess compared to the 28,. That's pretty small.
Speaker 2:Yeah, the 28, I think, is easier in a way because the 28 is usually loaded and ready. By the way, if you ever want to come over here, the 28 is under lock and key inside an armed garage with cameras so you're not just going to roll up to my house and pull the trailer away.
Speaker 2:It's, it's there's. I've had the trailer robbed once from an event that was left overnight. The 28 wasn't taken or hurt, but they took about 20 grand worth of other stuff out of there. Oh my um. So that's another thing. When you're doing events, you want to be strategic about your equipment, and it's special. I get very if I'm doing an event where we're staying overnight somewhere, I have to be very aware and cautious about how that's being stored, and so there's security that's been gone, gone through now to make sure the investments of all these tools are protected. But you want to be careful with that.
Speaker 1:Unfortunate that that's a requirement. But I completely understand and you know I've worked with equipment over the years that wasn't even mine, you know working as a teacher and I'm trying to make sure that things don't walk off.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And it's, it's, it's, it's a lot to manage on top of trying to do the outreach, uh, on top of it.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, that's, that's crazy um but those are the two main scopes. Like I said, I have other smaller instruments. Like there's a little takahashi 60 down on the floor, usually that doesn't come out on its own Um. I usually have smaller telescopes paired with the larger ones to compliment them Um. So, like on the stellar view one 80, I don't run a finder scope but I do have a Takahashi 76 piggybacked on that Um, which is way overkill. But the reason I have theahashi's is I've always wanted a takahashi, so I was finally in a position where I could get one and it kind of just accumulated. But the takahashi fluorite doublets are my favorite because they're incredibly sharp but they're incredibly lightweight. I think the 76 is like six pounds. So I like them because they're convenient and they just work well, Did you?
Speaker 1:do the eclipse? Yes, is that what you used, or did you use a solar?
Speaker 2:No, the eclipse was a work event for Skywatcher, so we were out there with a lot of our own Skywatcher gear. I shot this year's eclipse with the Esprit 150. That was actually the last time it was out in April. The Esprit 150 with the reducer, I think, is what I shot that with. But we had to truck a ton of stuff out there because it's a Skywatcher event, so we were flying all Skywatcher gear at that point which are no slouch either.
Speaker 1:So yeah, I shot, I did visual observations with Celestron Evo eight and I did uh, most of everything else was done with, like a camera and lens, um, with just my, with my DSLR or my mirrorless, I guess. Um, but man, what a, what a great event. Yeah, you guys have good, clear skies for that we lucked out.
Speaker 2:It wasn't perfectly clear in the portion of texas that we were in, but it was clear enough to enjoy the whole thing. Um, I'm glad we were able to do it. But we skirted by clouds and stuff like that, but we lucked out majorly.
Speaker 1:Um, on that it was here, mr People in Texas right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yes, um, if you were much further South from us like we're talking 30 minute drive, nothing they were done, um, so we really lucked out on that one. But yeah, that was all Skywatcher gear, because I have to represent the money making brand for me, so Kind of changing pace here a little bit.
Speaker 1:You know we're talking about preparation, we're talking about gear. How do you and you said the moon is something that you try to focus on for the education, because it's easy to see you- know, and you can guarantee that they're going to see something that they can recognize and be like.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's what I'm looking at. But when you're doing a corporate event especially, you want to make sure that the objects you're trying to show people are very obvious to them. At some level, I would imagine you know your benefit of being in arizona cannot be dismissed, especially, you know, in darker areas. But like, how do you choose an object? What's the criteria that you kind of put in place for yourself?
Speaker 2:It's just kind of happened over the years of doing outreach that you kind of figure out, especially by season, which targets tend to work best in the worst locations. Because right now, as a lot of us know, the springtime sucks because there's no bright deep sky targets and there's no planets that are generally visible right now in the spring to early summer. Those events get a little hard. So when it comes to targets, it's just sticking to the bright, well-known stuff, stuff, usually the brightest Messier objects like M13, m31, m15 this time of year, and if we're in dark enough location, we'll do Andromeda, m81 and 82. You know the big stuff like that. If there's a cool star, something that's some cool, like Alberio, is a good one. We'll do Polaris occasionally. T Lira is one of my favorites cause it's a carbon star, something that's got a little bit of an interest to it.
Speaker 1:We'll stick to um, but if the planets and the moon are up, then your goal you let the objects I mean speak for themselves, like what are you saying doing to keep it entertaining? I don't know, is there a big difference between what you would be talking about with an educational versus a more corporate or public or private? I should say Starwatch.
Speaker 2:Usually educational events will do a star tour ahead of time with the laser pointers. If it's clear enough and it's organized that way, I will say, if you're doing outreach events, that's a great time to organize your group and go over safety in the dark as well, because a lot of people are like well, they're just going to touch my telescope and they're going to move it. Well, we've never really had that problem. I mean, people grab stuff but it's not, you're not like well, they're just going to touch my telescope and they're going to move it. Well, we've never really had that problem. I mean, people grab stuff, but it's not, you're not going to break it. They're usually afraid of even touching the scopes. But doing a presentation where I've seen people do PowerPoints, I try to just keep it straight sky, laser pointer kind of thing, pointing out here's the basic constellations, here's how we become acquainted with the night sky, here's where some things we're going to see tonight are. So you're kind of laying the foundation of what they can expect when they come to the telescopes and then before being released to the scopes, because usually when we're doing the talk, our team is also finalizing alignments and collimation and're doing all the pre-prep for their scopes, to make sure we're ready to go. This is usually on a larger public event scale, but during those presentations ahead of time where you can talk about who you are, what's up in the sky, what to expect, then you can go into. Well, why do we use red lights and why do you have glow tape on the ladders and how do you navigate through the star field of the telescopes safely? And after that they're like oh okay, so all of your ladders have glow tape. Only put your hands where the glow tape is. If you touch the telescope, you're going to move it, which will mean more time in line, and then it's going to take more time for going to move it, which will mean you know more time in line, and then it's going to take more time for you to see it. And you know you can go over and educate people about why.
Speaker 2:I hate going to an event and you just hear someone from the group tear someone apart because you touch my telescope or you turned a white light on. You're not discovering supernovas or some distant spectra. You're downtown with your C8, calmed down. You're here for them, but they need to respect that. This is your gear, this is your time. But if you make the effort a couple minutes to just go over safety protocol when you go to Disneyland, you hear it over the intercom like, please keep your hands and arms inside, or on a plane. You know, here, here, here, it's the same thing. They're new, they don't know. And if they turn on a white light, god forbid, it's a public event. They don't know. But now, just instead of ridiculing someone, you're there to teach and educate. So that's your time to be like, hey, next time turn the flash off. Or hey, maybe keep the light down, because if you get the light up it makes it harder for you to see. That's an education moment where you can bring them higher up into your level. It's like, oh cool, bring them higher up into your level. It's like, oh cool.
Speaker 2:And we've had people show up from other groups that are like we went there and they just yelled at us and that's happened a lot, which doesn't do our little tiny hobby any good, because you're scaring people. We already have crappy telescopes scaring people away. And then you get that and you go to an event. You scare people away because you're not warm and welcoming, and I, I think a lot of us. At times we forget what it's like to be a beginner. Um, you get jaded. Being in it, so I try to keep that in the back of my mind is like we have to remember that they don't.
Speaker 2:There was a time that none of us knew why you needed a red flashlight or why you should keep your flashlight down. But we have to be realistic to that. They're not going to come prepared with everything. So doing a small presentation ahead of your event gives your team time to get ready, gives you time for them to get to know who you are and then gives you time to educate them on the safety protocols of being around the telescopes and your event goes so much more smoothly with doing that.
Speaker 2:Corporate events are a little bit harder because you don't have that a lot of times, so you have to go out of your way to be mark everything, like we have. Right now is a great time if you want to buy them. I bought strands of red Christmas lights, just straight red lights. They're on the electrical cord reels and that's another thing that we offer where it's like well, we have safety lighting that we can bring out for our events and we can mark trip hazards and scopes have red lights on them, so we've taken a lot of that. Sorry, I'm segwaying off of what you were asking.
Speaker 1:No, no, it's fine, it's. This is. This is how we get into conversations that we didn't plan on.
Speaker 2:That end up being the best so yeah, but over the years we've kind of learned how to keep people safe. So we have like 24 hour military glow tape on the tripods. Some of us have it on the counterweights, trip points, you know places.
Speaker 1:These are all failures, by the way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you find out.
Speaker 1:What you're describing is all things that you've failed at and realized you need solutions for so it's absolutely relevant to this conversation.
Speaker 2:Little points. But over the years we've found out like, hey, I need to keep an extra hand controller in the box Because when you're out doing I mean, I have 10 events next month booked right now, so that's more than some people get out in a year. So the equipment's getting used a lot and we try to maintain it, but you should have a backup hand controller or cable. If that dies, Mark your trip points on your tripod Cables are terrible.
Speaker 2:Avoid Wi-Fi devices, because you've got a bunch of phones around. They're jamming everything. All my ladders have 24 hour glow tape on them to mark where you can put your hands, and we use a big, powerful blacklight flashlight to charge it before an event. It just makes it easier. It's like just put your hands where the glow tape is Done, no conversations further. And then if we're in a really dark location, like I have, one resort makes it easier where it's like just put your hands where the glow tape is done, no conversations further. And then if we're in a really dark location, like I, have one resort that we're on contract with.
Speaker 2:It's very dark out there. We mark where the trip hazards are. We make a path with the light so you know where to go and how to be safe. They're all red, but yeah, that's just been. Hey, next time we are out here, it might be nice if we have this or this. And, like you said, they're all little failure points where you start to refine it and that's how your gear builds up over the years. You're like well, how do you have, why do you have this telescope to go up on a you know third story balcony to do an event.
Speaker 1:It's like cause and now we're equipped to do it. So there are all those little failure points that over time have built up. Yeah, rooftop, uh venue is probably not where you're bringing the 28.
Speaker 2:No uh, we, I had a resort that we did in sedona earlier this fall and that's what they asked. They're like hey, we want you to up on top of this roof and there's a spiral staircase to get up there. Okay, um, most of my gear is heavy and large. So this is right when the skywatcher wave strain, wave mounts are coming out. So I got my sample just in time. It was like, oh my God, this saved the day, cause I can get it up there.
Speaker 2:But you have to work with people if they're requesting certain gear from you, because I list the equipment on the websites, uh, for me if you want to pick what's coming. But we also have to be like hey, if it's a rooftop, we're limited to these things. I can't get the big guys up there because there's no way I'm hauling this up a little staircase. Oh, you were asking originally, sorry. You were asking like how do we deal with the conversation around the telescopes? Though there's an astronomer at every telescope, it's usually their own gear. Occasionally I'll have someone run one of my scopes if it's for whatever reason, but 90% of the time it's their own equipment. I just kind of let everyone do their own thing, but we tell you what the object is and how far it is and some cool things about it.
Speaker 2:At a large event, you don't have as much time with your guests. It At a large event, you don't have as much time with your guests. I do find you do get little groups You've probably seen this who are like really into it and they kind of grasp onto you and want to know more and then we'll start diving deeper into the conversations. If it's a more advanced group like we're working with adults and not so much kids and we're on a star, I'll talk to them about how elements are formed inside of a star and starting to get deeper into the science of it and folklore and they love that stuff.
Speaker 2:But it's very you kind of have to read the room on how your group is interacting with you. If they're really interested, go down the rabbit holes, you know. Show them what's up in the sky, talk about the folklore. They love all that. If they're just kind of they're doing their thing and they don't care, then just move on to the next person in line. Yeah, it's pretty much the same for both events. It's just you kind of have to ratchet down what you're talking about, depending on the age and interest of your group.
Speaker 1:So when, from what you've talked about, you're doing mostly visible visual observations, but I know you have cameras though, though, so you do have cameras, yeah, so how? How is astrophotography, and more in more particular, like the more outreach, focused slash, consumer grade smart telescopes how do you see that kind of like working its way, or already is working its way, into what you're doing for these events and, um, how do you think that's gonna play out?
Speaker 2:yeah, so I got seriously into astrophotography. Right around the time I moved back to arizona from la because I realized that I think we all know the writing's on the wall astrophotography is like the king of astronomy right now. That's where all the interest is. So, from our sky watchers perspective, it's like I need to start investing my time and understanding on you know how do I make this work and why is this camera, this? And so I got into astrophotography. And then from there, it's like well, how can I utilize this for events? So I'd say about 2017, late, yeah, 2017, somewhere in there, I started incorporating astrophotography into outreach events, particularly under highly light, polluted locations.
Speaker 2:I would use one of our little Skywatcher 80 EDs and a monochrome camera and three nanometer imaging filters and cut through the light pollution. We were just doing live stacking, which I just called live imaging. That's how it started and that worked really well and it still does and an H alpha filter and a monochrome camera just cuts straight through all of that. But at the time we were using a paramount mighty. We had to have the batteries for that. I had to have power for the monitors, so we had a generator out there and it all works really well. It's great.
Speaker 2:It's a lot of freaking work to lug all that out there, um, and there's been some events in the past couple of years where we've gotten paid for a corporate event to bring this stuff out. You'd be amazed how many people don't care. It's just well, I see it on a screen, I see Hubble, I see James Webb. They just they're like well, where do I look? And it's like, well, it's on the screen. They just glaze over and walk away. They want to look through it.
Speaker 2:Now I know some other groups out here that basically make their living off of live imaging and you kind of just have to figure out what your signature is and what works for you, um, and that's only something you can answer and what is going to benefit you, um. But I've started pushing away from live imaging because a it's a ton of work and, as we talked about earlier, so many things can go wrong. It's normally the cable, um, but so many things will go wrong and I just kind of shelved a lot of that because I even charged more for it, like a lot more, because of the headache and the amount of failure that could happen with an imaging system. It's like, if you think it's complicated, to go in your backyard and try imaging, try setting up that whole rig and being ready to go by like 7 o'clock for an event and then running for two hours and then tearing the whole thing down and leaving. No, thank you, it's a lot of work, so we kind of shelved it unless it was very special specific events.
Speaker 2:There's an event we've done before called Camp with a Ramp up in northern Arizona, which is for kids who have spinal cord injuries, so they're wheelchair bound or paralyzed Right. So the cameras were highly beneficial. So, for special stuff, the cameras make sense. For special stuff, the cameras make sense. However, in the last couple of years there's smart telescopes have started to take over that area. So I got a Seastar, an S50, from ZWO, and was like well, this is really cool. And for some of those special needs events, the Seastar now our team I I think, has like three or four of them Um, they're not mine. A lot of us have our own C stars Um, they've been great because it makes it super convenient. They're nowhere near the performance of our big monochrome cameras and everything, but to be able to just pop it out, turn it on and go to work is very, very helpful for special need groups personally did both, and both on the same exact object too, because then you can be like your eyes aren't going to see all of this.
Speaker 1:That's what you're looking at and this is the detail that you, you know can can get with a camera and the color you know that you can pull, know can can get with a camera and the color you know that you can pull out of these deep sky objects with a camera that your eyes are never going to see. This is what you're looking at through the telescope and I think it provides the imagination for these people who don't know what these things look like, the ability to like, maybe see it better, or even just fill in the blanks like, yeah, allow them to see it better. You know because, for example, I was looking at mars, at opposition during covid, and it was one of the closest Mars oppositions that we were going to see in our life.
Speaker 1:It was awesome and I was looking at Mars and I was like, no way, really, am I seeing what I think I'm seeing? Am I seeing a polar ice cap? I had to look at it on my phone and I'm like, holy crap, I am, because I looked at it on my app. I looked at it on SkySafari, like, yes, I am looking at the polarized cops of mars and I wasn't sure. And I'm, you know, an informed background. This is what I do every day type of person, not some person who's looking through a telescope for the first time. So I I really think it's important for them to get that like secondary confirmation that what they're looking at is what they're actually supposed to be looking at.
Speaker 2:You know I'm doing both. Let's them see both sides of the spectrum where it's like this is visual, this is imaging, and this is what the difference is. And to be able to see that, I think, engages people.
Speaker 1:But the ease of use, like you said, is like, is so important because I've done the hard way and you know I'm actually doing some work, just volunteering my time to some of my former colleagues working with some of the equipment from my previous job and I'm going to give them the same advice you know, like let's go to those more smart telescope type things for the purpose of imaging and let's stick to the visual observation in the big scope so that you can get that dual experience and that the level of complexity that I was able to achieve isn't necessary for them to continue to operate, because it took years for me to get there. They need to work tomorrow and that's what these new scopes are gonna provide. And it's really cool when you can say to somebody like hey, you know, that's a 350 piece of equipment that can get you that same exact thing on your ipad yeah, people are blown away with it.
Speaker 2:It's right like we'll have the 28 inch out. I've got military night vision. That goes on. That thing. It's phenomenal.
Speaker 2:Obviously, I have to follow the government restrictions on using night vision so it does not come out all the time. If you're going to buy one, please be aware of what I tar restrictions are. Um, and we'll have the little, stupid little C star next to my. It's a $50,000 system, if you were to price it all out.
Speaker 2:And the C-Star is like no problem, it's this dinky little camcorder looking thing and it plows right through it and people are like, whoa well, how much does this little thing cost? Like 500 bucks, yep, what? And now they have the S30, which is coming out for three. We have one on order because it's like why not? We have eye pieces that are more expensive than this thing and but it engages people and it gets people in the hobby. And it's hard because I work for Skywatcher but I also run my own outreach program. You have to play both sides of the fence there for me, where it's like I have to represent the brand. But we can't turn our eye away from the amazing advancement that our competitor has brought out and bravo, it pushes the whole industry forward.
Speaker 1:It does really needs to exist.
Speaker 2:um, now, very recently, I finally got my hands on an Origin from Celestron. The one issue I have with Seastar is they're not very impressive instruments to see. Yes, they're just like. It looks like a camcorder if half our generation even knows what a camcorder is at this point. But yeah, for a school, no problem. Corporate events it's not impressive. I mean, it's impressive to see what it does, but it's not physically impressive. And Origin, on the other hand, is a very impressive piece of kit. It looks like a telescope, it's a thing.
Speaker 1:If I showed up as a wedding videographer with my phone, you know, it probably would be like whoa, where's your gear?
Speaker 2:You know, yeah, yeah, you know it probably would be like whoa, where's your gear? You know, yeah, yeah. So Origin is a very nice instrument and if you're an organization or an educator on a serious level, the Origin is a pretty interesting piece of equipment to have. They are pricey and I do have a hard time wrestling with. Is Origin or Seastar a better fit?
Speaker 2:I'm probably gonna get in trouble for saying some of this, but they're just different price brackets for different people. They both perform well, but the Origin is a more impressive piece of instrument for us to use. So I could bring that to a corporate event and be like, wow, that was cool. But moving forward, origin has become our default smart scope because of that reason. Now we do have the C-Stars available. Those are more for our special need groups. But I have no plans unless you really need the highest resolution we're able to produce on bringing the old live stack set up back with the paramount or the ASI air. The origin does all of it and I just have to flip a dumb little switch. Yep, um.
Speaker 1:I haven't tried casting it to a larger monitor yet but I have, and I have a video that's on my channel here that you could watch and um, you know I've worked previously with celestron, with origin um, just to to kind of look over it and uh, it is, as you said, a flip of a switch, it turns on, it, finds everything, just as so to see star, um. But you know, I was able to come down here to my studio, put it on my tv, um, look at it on the tv, mess with everything, just just from my ipad just right to my tv. Uh, it was fairly seamless, um the.
Speaker 1:The thing I think I like about this overseas star over some of these unistellars and things like that, is that it is upgradable.
Speaker 1:The camera can be removed and put a new camera in as technology advances. I'm sure there's other components that are going to have to be replaced and such, but you know the ability to take advantage of optical design um is important like any. Any lenses you know are for like a camera. For example, I can buy a set of lenses and put a brand new camera body on the back of it in 10 years and it's going to perform just as well optically, you know, for the most part, and that, to me, is what you're buying with that system, is you're buying the quality of the optics, whereas you could probably, over that same time period, buy a number of sea stars to kind of get to the newest of technology and bring yourself up in a different way, and so in the end end, it's just what do you feel is probably achievable now, and you know how important is it to you to kind of maintain that same upgradeability over time, which is a reality when you're talking about astrophotography.
Speaker 1:Things are going to change and um, yeah this is the least quality we're going to get moving forward.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that blows my mind right every time I say it, you know I'd say if you're in the market for live imaging or a smart telescope and you're trying to do on a serious level, either corporate or outreach events, the origin is the must-have scope and for all those reasons it it's easily serviceable. So if a camera goes down, you can replace the camera. Battery goes down, you can take care of that. If a C star goes down, what do you do? If the chip dies, what do you do?
Speaker 1:And I.
Speaker 2:Yeah, which I get. They're only 500 bucks, but I mean now I got to replace the whole thing. Or yeah, oh, origins got a new camera. Oh, awesome, I can just upgrade what I've got. So, and that's a big thing, if you're doing events as much as a lot of us out here doing, you wear the gear down a lot faster than other people might. So, being able to service equipment easily, like when we go into monsoon season late summer here, just like the professional observatories, that's when my team will stop.
Speaker 2:We're not doing events. It's too hot, it's raining, it's whatever. That's our maintenance time. So I'll take the telescopes apart. That's where you clean them, do everything you need, re-grease the gears, whatever you got to do. But with Origin, that's something that is nice to be able to do is I can take the camera off, I can clean it, I can upgrade the cameras, I can switch filters out, whatever. Um C star is a nice, fun thing to have in the toolbox, but it is not the main live imaging setup. Um and for all the reasons I just listed, uh, fantastic piece of kit to have. I'm glad we have them, but they are not the main tool that comes out to the events because origin, I mean I already have people in my group that are looking to get one or two, so we'll probably have a couple of them here in the near future because they're just convenient on all those levels.
Speaker 1:I've. I've had conversations with people at multiple companies about some ideas, because I've come to the realization that if my ideas are in my brain and don't get out there to this community, that's not going to go anywhere. I'm not going to be a manufacturer anytime soon, and so one of the things that I've been hard, you know, pressed to kind of get out there is we need to incorporate ar into some of this equipment and the optical um. You know, the unistellar has the optical eyepiece and pegasus now has the optical eyepiece.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1:And it kind of blends both worlds. Uh, and I I kind of feel like the really hardcore visual astronomers are still not going to be okay with it. But I think for the rest of us and you're kind of in that category and this is why I want to know your opinion as a visual astronomer is that achieving some semblance of a blended experience, or, yeah, I think, new?
Speaker 2:um, the new smart eye that uh pegasus is on. I got to use the prototype. They brought it out to star fest up in Canada in August. I mean we saw it at Neve, but I mean it was just a thing at Neve where star fest. We got to see it on a scope and use it and it's a little. I had mixed feelings about it and I'm really good for my. One of my best friends is working on it. It's a different experience from a visual, both imaging and a visual person. For visual, you don't have that immediate response. If you move the telescope you can see it. You can see it move when this it's a camera, it's taking pictures, and for imaging it's weird because you know, looking through an eyepiece. So it really does blend both of those worlds. Um, but I'm excited to get a hold of one at some point because we have a lot of nice, yeah, somewhere in there.
Speaker 2:um, it has a higher resolution sensor than anything on the market. With the 533 in there, which is nice, we have a lot of nice telescopes already in the inventory for events, so you know, I'd like to just pop it on.
Speaker 2:I can't imagine what that thing could do on the 28 from a dark sky. Can't imagine what that thing could do on the 28 from a dark sky, um, but yeah it's. I think that will be a big tool to have in the case where it's like, well, I don't want to buy a zwo and I don't want to buy an origin, because I just don't know if I want to commit to a whole system when you're done, just pop it out and put your eye. Yeah, you can like it.
Speaker 1:You can switch it out and put the next one in Right Not a screw on or anything, just right in like a normal eye piece. Close that down, lock it down and look through it. I'm excited to see. I can imagine looking at the moon and having it identify the craters.
Speaker 2:That would be really cool.
Speaker 1:Looking at the stars and and you ask it a question and it pops up a little bubble and a little blurb like how many light years away it is what the names of the stars are. You see in the field, like point out where the ring nebula is here. It's pointing right at it and then it pops up a little blurb and gives you an image of what it you know would look like.
Speaker 2:Yeah, of what it would look like in the Hubble. Like you said earlier, you're doing the augmented reality on there a little bit the potential there. There's a lot of potential with SmartEye and there's a lot of really smart people working on that thing to where I think we'll see a lot more come from that vision. I'm curious to see where they're going to go with it, because there's a lot of capability that could come out of that.
Speaker 1:So unistellar has come out with a binocular that's doing that too, which is oh, I saw those.
Speaker 2:I haven't played with them, but I saw that yeah, those are really because I mean, how many times do you see people with, like you know, the apps? They're looking up at the sky and stuff? You're already getting augmented reality through that, in a way, on a digital format. I forgot about the unistellar binoculars, um, but yeah, those would be going.
Speaker 2:That's where I really people, it's just like well, what is that it's like, unless you have someone there to tell you which at an event? Yeah, maybe you do, but sometimes you don't, or they're busy doing something. It's kind of cool that you can explore and learn for yourself, but I think that augmented stuff would be kind of neat to see more of.
Speaker 1:It's just an education tool, so right, right, and have you know some suggested content? Maybe even that you know relates to it? So maybe the Cosmos Safari video on how to find M13 that you know relates to it. So maybe the cosmos safari video on how to find m13, the you know, it's amazing, they just once, as soon as you connect the telescope to the internet and to just this, this whole ar experience.
Speaker 1:I don't know vr is ever going to catch on. I personally don't find it super exciting, but like to me, um, just picking and choosing when I want to use this kind of technology, this is one of the things I think for outreach. I would really love to see it in my kit, you know, and just play with it. Even so, excellent. We are at about an hour and 18 minutes already. So I want to kind of start to wrap this up minutes already. So I want to kind of start to wrap this up. So I just kind of want to just go over some of the things that we've talked about.
Speaker 1:So, you know, in terms of corporate events and private events, compared to your outreach that you do to the public, you know, I'm finding that the themes are, you know, just tell the story right and give people an experience that is an educational one, whether that be how to hold onto a ladder properly or whether that be what the star is made of and how it forms elements Right. The other thing I'm hearing a lot of is like things change and you need to. You need to kind of be adaptive and understanding that this is a moving target. Is there a message that you would like to share with the community that you feel would be helpful and maybe inspiring to them to share their passion if they're kind of on, as we discussed at the beginning, on that kind of cusp of? I'm not really sure I'm kind of new at this.
Speaker 2:I have a telescope, maybe I'd like to do outreach, but I don't feel comfortable quite yet like yeah, just get involved, find a group nearby there's got to be one somewhere and just get involved and get your feet wet and if, if it's like, hey, I really like this, and you start to take off with it, then see how much you can push within your group on like, hey, I want to do this and I want to do that. But don't be afraid to go out there and don't be and spend some time learning. Like if you're going to go to an outreach event, you know, this weekend, for example, you're like well, I'm new, well, this, maybe research like two objects, before you go out for that night, that are up right now. So it's like, well, saturn's up right now and my little telescope will just say you've got like a C, six or something like that, my telescope can see that.
Speaker 2:Or, and then maybe pick a D and, if there's no planets, pick a deep sky object and learn where it's at, maybe learn the constellation a little bit, go out in the backyard, mess up a few times, but just learn maybe two to three objects that you have as your main middle and backup target and roll with it. So on top of that, you're learning the sky, you're learning about your object. And then when you get out there you've got some foundation so you're prepped on it and you just keep doing that and eventually you start learning all these objects in your head of where they're at and how far it is. I can't tell you how many times I've showed people m13 at the grand canyon star party. Hundreds of people have looked through the the big dob at that object and when people are like, how do you know so much? It's like when you repeat it 300 times a night for five nights in a row.
Speaker 2:It is burned into the back of your head so it's like it's 25 000 light years away, 175 light years in diameter. It's like it's 25,000 light years away, 175 light years in diameter. It's about a million stars. It's up here in the area of Hercules. Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Speaker 2:It's because it's been ingrained so many times, but there was one time. There's a lot of times where I'm on a new object, I have to pull up my phone and look up Sky Safari and just be like, okay, if it's an object, I don't look at much and it's like, well, okay, we'll pick this. I always have my phone and Sky Safari open, sky Safari Pro. I like using that because it's got the most data in it. But I usually look up how far it is, if there is a diameter, and see if there's a couple interesting facts. And sometimes you just have to do it on a whim and be ready to go and because we try to make sure at events that each telescope is on something different so you're not getting repeats. I've seen a lot of clubs where you go and it's like four telescopes out of six are on the moon or saturn or something like that.
Speaker 1:It's like yes, expand the same object over and over, and I saw that on that telescope five seconds ago.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it just gets boring for people. And obviously on large events maybe you have more equipment than you have realistically available targets, like if we're in a big event and the moon's up. We usually have one telescope. A friend of mine is very good at doing eyepiece photography of the moon, so he takes your phone and takes a picture through the telescope. People love that, yes, so learn how to do that. But if it's a really busy event and we have enough inventory for equipment, we'll have one do the photography on the moon.
Speaker 2:You can also look if you want, and the other one's just to look. That way we can get more people through in less time. But if you don't have that, try to make sure each tele work as a team. Like, okay, you have the big scope, so you're going to go after Andromeda tonight and you have a little scope over here, but it's a wide field scope, so you're going to go after the Pleiades tonight and we try to work with each other. And if someone we had a friend of mine who loved the moon, was into Apollo, that's how he got. So we're like, okay, steve likes the moon and he's great with it, so you're just going to be the moon scope, because you know so much about it. So if you know someone who's really good at one thing, maybe let them have that, but work as a team to look at.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, work as a team to make sure all your telescopes aren't just pointed to the same thing, because, again, you're not there for you, you're there for them, and that's what I would tell serious people who have been in this for a while. It's like I want to start doing outreach. Okay, just remember who you're here for. It's not really a social get together to hang out with your buddy and ignore the another 20 people waiting to look. But if you're new, just do a little bit of research on a few targets. You know. Maybe download an app, learn some stuff.
Speaker 2:Go in the backyard, learn your scope. Run it into the ground a few times We've all done that but don't be afraid to go out there and just give it your best shot and eventually, over time, it'll start to really sink in. But if you've already got a telescope and you're interested in going out there and you're nervous about it, and you're interested in going out there and you're nervous about it 99% of the people who are coming to your event. You are already way ahead of them. You've invested in it, you have the interest and you have the drive. They will love to hear whatever you have to share with them.
Speaker 1:This is my 17th year as a high school teacher, and one of the things that I think I have personally found is the most powerful thing.
Speaker 1:I can do is just say when I don't know something, because then everything I'm saying I'm telling you I understand and know, because if I try to just be the prophet of knowing everything, it gets me personal satisfaction maybe, but when I can say I have no idea, and that people realize, like there's a finite amount of information, that even I know about this as somebody who's an expert on it. And I will say that I am an expert on this is what I've been doing for 17 years and I still don't know everything. And that's what I think a lot of people coming into this really feel like they have to be an expert on everything and there's nobody who is.
Speaker 2:And if they try to tell you.
Speaker 1:if they try to tell you that they are there, they're doing it for their own personal satisfaction. Yeah, I've seen this a lot.
Speaker 2:Maybe you saw this during COVID. Particularly in the Instagram side of things, there's a lot of people that kind of came to astronomy with this egotistical approach that I'm going to be famous by being a famous astrophotographer and they've all diminished and phased out. Because why the heck would you come here to make a ton of money or be known for something, or be known for something?
Speaker 1:It's like the bar is so low here that it's like dude if you're in it for money, you picked the wrong place.
Speaker 2:If you're passionate enough, eventually it's like it kind of just as you found, it kind of just comes to you and you should stop working so hard and just enjoy what you're doing and eventually it just happens. But yeah, like you were saying earlier, you just you can't know everything and it's more powerful to be like you know what. That's a really good question. I have no idea. Let me look it up really quick, or let's look it up together, right. Yeah, let's look it up together what does a good source look like?
Speaker 1:Okay, this is a great source, this is a great source of information. Um, can, uh, can we close with something that's kind of like I know important to you, because I've seen some of your posts online. Why is now such an important time? You know, we have people who are, um, have people who are seeking out information. They want to know their world, they want to understand. We always have had people who are interested in their surroundings and scientifically minded. I'm thinking young people, old people, everybody. Why is it so important that we are doing this outreach? Because I know you're pretty passionate about it. What? Why do you think that matters?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I now more than ever. And that brings back a Carl Sagan quote where we live in a time where our society is built on science and technology, yet yet so few people know about science and technology. I mean, how many people know how this became a real thing? You know, we've become so jaded with oh, I just have this and oh, I can just send them. It's like there was a time where you couldn't how does it all work?
Speaker 1:I don't know that even some of the experts that work on these devices even know how they work from start to finish. I'd like to know that person who can tell me how every step in the manufacturing process and every step in the development of software that makes your iPhone run happens. I don't think there's a single person on earth who can do all of that, and that's scary to know that, and especially with AI and all the things that are coming around the bend here, where there's this information is at your fingertips.
Speaker 1:How to differentiate between reality and what you're looking at is coming from a relevant source that makes sense and is backed by scientific research and understanding, and it is important to be able to think through problems still and understand things in your own brain, and not everything can be, and should be, a looking it up online or asking AI question.
Speaker 1:In fact, if you can have a lot of information up here and you have the aid of AI, now we're talking. Now we've got that synergistic effect, where the fact that people who are and I think this is the case once again there's always going to be the people in our world who are motivated, who are interested, who want to learn and know things and it's very easy to let you go down the doom scrolling right, yeah, of how bad this could go and I think, if we do the right decisions here as a society, including our little bit, which is to teach people about their universe, that this opens up so many doors, and for people who are, especially for young people who are trying to take this technology that's going to be in their hands, and to incorporate that within what they understand about their universe in their own minds, and to ask those good questions and to know those good resources, I think is important. So I appreciate you, I appreciate the work you're doing. I want to thank you for coming on uh to the podcast guys.
Speaker 1:Kevin Lagore, you, you are doing amazing work. My friend uh focus astronomy outreach um just an awesome organization, so thank you.
Speaker 2:Yeah, thanks for having me on and yeah, I like what you said there. Just to wrap that whole thing up, where astronomy for me has taught me a lot of things about life, where it's like number one, you should be willing to question things. Critical thinking is important. Don't be afraid to ask questions, and the biggest thing for astronomy for me is it puts you in your place. It shows you how small and insignificant we are here on our little planet. And when you just see all this garbage online people making up stories it's like you just don't want to take the time to understand your place and so we just make up stuff. And if we could just take a step back because I'm sure you've probably seen this at events, you could take people from all different walks of life, all different faiths, um backgrounds, and you could put them under the night sky. I don't care what political affiliation you are, that completely disintegrates when you put people under the night sky and they're like wow.
Speaker 2:So there's like this seed in our head that people are just like you know. I should ask more. It just you start thinking on this very deep rooted thing in the human brain that I'm curious.
Speaker 1:I'm located near Lancaster, pennsylvania, and we have a very large Amish community and when I was doing outreach, I was doing it in Lancaster and we had some Amish people show up to our events and, man, they asked some of the most amazing questions.
Speaker 1:You know they're coming from a background that is, you know, basically no cars, no phones, no technology. They're using horses and buggies still no cars, no phones, no technology. They're using horses and buggies still. And yet they look through an eyepiece and they ask questions that I think are more meaningful from, like, a time spent on this planet trying to understand what you're looking at, Not even faith-based, just questions. And they were open to everything. And it blew my mind because, you know, I had my caricature, living here my whole life, of what these people were like, um, but, like you said, it disintegrated, it was gone. They wanted to know, like, what do we know? What do we know? What is science telling us? I was like, wow, these people are really a lot more open to this uh, scientific understanding of their universe than we might think.
Speaker 2:Well, they don't have all the the noise of the world buzzing around, that they know what's there, but they like cut that layer out. There's so much crap in the world now, like with AI, and you know this is fake news and they're wrong and it's just a constant like finger pointing. Whatever.
Speaker 2:It's just a constant like finger pointing whatever it is. It's like if you just would shut up, stop talking and just bring it down. That's what I like the night. The night is calm, it's quiet, the world is at peace, finally, and now we can just be like, hey, what's your political affiliate? I don't care, I don't even know what you look like, you're just some voice in the dark. So everyone looks the same. In the dark I can't see you.
Speaker 1:And I'm just thinking about climbing up that ladder, that 28, looking in the eyepiece still, that's never going to get old. That's never going to get old.
Speaker 2:That's a thing that's never going to get old. That's never going to get old. That's a thing, that's a place. If we had the technology, we could go there and think about all the like. It really falls away when you start looking into space and it's like think of what we could do if we just focused on this and tried to, you know, get ourselves out into the deepest waters we've ever imagined. But we're too busy being like, well, it's their fault.
Speaker 1:Kevin, I think we need to have you back on the podcast at some point.
Speaker 1:There's a whole other hour and a half conversation we could talk about hours and hours worth of these things, so I'm going to call it a win here. So thank you and everybody, please keep looking up. Yeah, thanks a lot. If you're still listening and like this podcast, please consider becoming one of our Patreon patrons. Memberships start as low as $3 per month, with benefits including opportunities to ask questions of our guests. Also, please consider liking, subscribing and sharing this podcast to help us bring the universe even closer than you think.
