| Is astrophotography a science, art or both? | |
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| Astrophotography is a science | |
| Astrophotography is an art | |
| Astrophotography is both a science and an art | |
| Login to vote and view results. |
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Is it art of science? It is neither. It is highly technical, but it is definitely NOT science as I recognise it - no testing of hypotheses, no quantitative assessment of significance of any discoveries made, inconsistent or no referencing of previous work. If technical qualified as science, then my car mechanic is a scientist. It is probably closer to art, but I am far less qualified to say. I might argue that the limited ability we have to compose our subject might fail some of the classic “is it art” tests. This probably applies less to landscape astrophotography than deep sky, but again it is debatable. [Frequently I liken myself to Andy Warhol, colorizing images of Marilyn Monroe. Now HE was an artist, I am just a copyist] But why should we be worried if it is neither of these things? In the three years I have been lucky enough to be part of this community, I have discovered that astrophotography is something far richer. It is educational, it is inspirational, it brings people together, it celebrates the natural environment. It is its own thing. And it is beautiful. |
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Brian Boyle: *** It was probably an il posed question from my end. I wasn't implying that astrophotographers are scientists or artists although some astrophotographers may be one or both in different capacities. I'm a scientist by profession working in healthcare. I'm also new to photography in general and im curious as to where the line is drawn between photography and art. Probably what I want to say was there is a fair bit of science/tech that underpins astrophotography and quite a bit of artistic license in creating the final image. As others have pointed out, there is scope for astrophotographers to do scientific work or at least contribute to scientific studies but I suspect most people are mostly interested in producing beautiful images. That is a very pleasing end in itself. It certainly movitivates me to learn more about cosmology, astrophysics and astronomy and I just enjoy the wonder and awe of it all. *** |
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| A telescope is an instrument is it not? |
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Brian Boyle: I think you are perfectly fine to pose the question. It actually comes up in these forum pretty often. One positive is that this indicates the number of new people joining AstroBin. If they still exist, you can peruse old threads. The other thing, is times change bringing up new challenges to this question. Example the role of A.I. in all this. I think on this site the needle bends much more in the tech side than the science side. If one searches, other groups concentrate more on doing science of various types in astronomy/astrophysics. BTW, I am trained a biochemist/molecular biologist and worked in pharma development. So welcome! |
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It is a good question to pose. My response was not meant to question the question, but rather to dignify the question by answering it. CS Brian |
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Brian Boyle: *** Thanks Brian! There are been some excellent responses on the post and appreciate your perspective. *** |
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Jerry Gerber:Die Launische Diva: *** That's an outstanding comment. Very eloquently put! *** |
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I also see astrophotography neither as art, nor science. As long as you don`t participate in a particular scientific project (like searching for asteroids/comets, tracking the brightness of novae or variable stars, counting meteor fall rates, etc.) your astrophotography is no science. And the above activities usually woun't result in any "pretty pictures" found on AB. One of the rare occasions where I see a pretty picture as science, is the discovery of a new deep sky object, like a PN (what Strottner-Drechsler are doing). Art is a very difficult topic, since there is an individually biased component what a person recognises as art and what not. Wikipedia defines art as "a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas". While this definition on Wikipedia could be understood in a way that concludes in "yes, astrophotography has all of that" - I disagree. Astrophotography requires technical skills, as well as creative talent - but would a beautiful result be automatically regarded as art? I rather see astrophotography as a craft, not art. Although, I would definitely recognise some iconic Hubble images as art right away... Enjoy those clear summer nights, everybody! Chris |
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Hi, Great Question. If I can do it, it isn't just art - for me. I take the approach of exploring space with the camera - discovering for myself a lot of things that professional astronomers already (at least 99.9% of it) know. I process and display my images to maximize my learning of what is going on. Sometimes this coincides with art, but often it doesn't yet I still learn from it. As a scientist, I am well versed in using images to discover what is going on - even when the subject matter isn't even light. There is definitely an art aspect to it too though. While I am not very good at it, I really appreciate when someone with more talent creates and awe-inspiring beautiful picture of something. This is no more or less valuable than what I do, so I answered "both" to your question. How you treat your data depends on what you are after. There are certain rules for quantitative analysis that require strict limits on what can be done for aesthetic reasons. Less so for mechanistic understanding. For art, the rules are meant to be broken - that's how impressionist painting or jazz music was born. The question - "is that what it really looks like?" I hear often. I don't think that is a sensible question. Dave |
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David Payne: *** Nice one Dave. I am always fascinated by: " is this real?..... " Afterall, often we capture images of objects that we could never see with the naked eye so personally I don't think it makes much sense to ask if they are real images or if the colour is real. *** |
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About a year ago, I was invited by the art center of a national university in Taiwan to talk about astrophotography, and my talk title was "art and science in astrophotography." Later the same year I was invited by the astronomical society of Taiwan to give a plenary talk in the annual meeting on the same topic. The annual meeting is full of science talks. Mine is the only nonscientific talk there. (Some of you on Astrobin got my request to use your pictures in the talks as examples/highlights.) Below I give a condensed version of the ideas that I tried to convey. The art part is tricky, as art has many forms and some of them are hard to define. An example I used in my talk is this exhibition some 10 years ago in Bates College: Starstruck: the fine art of astrophotography. So I think it's quite arguable that astrophotography can be a fine art. If regular photography can be accepted as a form a fine art, there is no reason why astrophotography can't. Then there are numerous examples of astrophotography used as material for other kinds of modern arts. So I think itself can be an art, and can be combined with other art creations as well. As for science, most astrophotography is not used for serious scientific analyses. (Some are, indeed. Very few, but non-zero.) However, I think the Astrobin community should be very familiar with the fact that astrophotography can lead to discovery of new astronomical objects/phenomena. It can be also used in science education and communication. So even if it's not of the most strict form of scientific research, it's an indispensable part of the astronomical science. And because of this, many of us (not necessarily all) insist that astrophotography, while pursuing beauty, should be faithful to the nature of the subjects to some degree. It doesn't have to be accurate, but it should not deviate too far. I think for most of us, astrophotography is just a hobby, art/science or not. But for those who dare to go beyond the boundary, astrophotography can be art, and science as well. |
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It's obvious that astronomy is a science and astrophotography is not. Science is the systematic study of the structure and behaviour of the physical and natural world through observation, experimentation, and the testing of theories against the evidence obtained. Astrophotography is an important tool that can be used in astronomy for observation to collect data that aids in testing new research questions or confirming theories. This is very much the area of professional telescopes like james webb, where professional astronomers compete with research proposals to get access to imaging time with professional telescopes to collect data to answer their research questions. There may be some citizen science projects you can contribute to by sharing your data or observations from your backyard... However, most of us here on astrobin do not use it for scientific purposes, we are just night sky lovers who love to share our knowledge and results about our wonderful astrophotography hobby. You could define AP as art, which is the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. |
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Wido's AstroForum: I agree that astrophotography is far more of an art than a science. At the same time, the more the general public is exposed to images of deep space objects, the more likely at least some people will be motivated to think about our place in the scheme of things. Astrophotography also might act as a catalyst that inspires a young person to choose astronomy as a career, it might help to awaken in people a kind of curiosity that only a career in science can satisfy. This is where philosophy comes in, kind of a bridge between art and science. If astrophotography is offering people a perspective on reality that helps us to put our lives in context to the vastness of time and space, perhaps that will humble us, make us a bit kinder to one another, and help us to appreciate the awesome beauty that astrophotographs attempt to represent. A well-executed astrophotograph can awaken in people a sense of mystery and awe and that in itself is worth something. |
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Wido's AstroForum: Interesting perspective, but I have to respectfully disagree. I believe you have a very formal, academic, and theoretical view of science. As an amateur astronomer that I use astrophotography as my investigative instrument (like a geophysicist uses seismic, or an astrophysicist uses a spectrometer/spectrogram (or whatever that grid lens is called). Astrophotography is just the tool I use to do astronomy -ie. try and figure out what's going on. I have never had to "compete" with other proposals to gain access my telescope (but that isn't a requirement of science), I have had to compete for capital. My home telescope had to compete for capital with, say, a new set of patio furniture. So that cannot be a requirement to call something a science or not. As a applied scientist (engineer) by trade, I certainly qualify as a "professional scientist", but I am definitely an amateur astronomer. So being a professional or amateur can't have anything to do with it (ie. whether one gets paid for it). As for citizen science - I will do it if I also get enjoyment from it. So much of science, as with any endeavour, has its pitfalls. I just know that if it is too much calibration, data entry, etc. it ceases to give me the pleasure I demand in my retirement time - if I am going to do this for no pay, I will stere the research where I want it to go. At the same time, the fact that it gives me pleasure to do this hobby, doesn't mean it isn't a science either. The fact that it is a hobby doesn't disqualify it as a science either. Einstein was employed as a clerk while he was doing science as a hobby. Where I think you nailed the question is your remark about "who love to share our knowledge and results". That's what makes it science AND art. At least I like to call my images science, yet the "art" description is likely less defensible. |
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Wei-Hao Wang: +1. Falsely represented artistic renditions of real physical processes may be beautiful to some, but for others of us, a more fulfilling beauty comes from learning to understand and replicate (via our telescopes/camera captures) what scientists think they know about the visual spectrum and underlying chemical and physical processes in the universe. Fortunately or unfortunately, the hobby is a melting pot of artists and scientists (real and armchair wannabees) at every level in the learning spectrum. No amount of persuasion or logic will steer artists or realists in the hobby toward consensus of how the heavens should be represented (or why). When I see galaxies colored green, purple or intensely blue, with overwhelming saturation, I cringe just a bit, much as how I imagine artists might cringe when they see my boring, color calibrated, low saturation representations of the same targets. Some people just love pretty pictures, regardless of whether those images even attempt to be accurate to the underlying chemistry, physics, or visual spectrum. To each their own.... it's never going to change. In the end, what we create (or recreate) only needs to make ourselves happy. For some that will be literally nothing more than a pretty picture, and for others, it will need to be as near to "real" as our gear & post-processing skill will let us get. Enjoy the chase. |
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Doug Summers:Wei-Hao Wang: Charles Bracken, in his classic book The Deep Sky Imaging Primer, Adam Block, master astrophotographer and Russ Croman have all alluded to both the scientific basis for color in astrophotography as well as the incredible wide degree of "inaccuracy" due to limitations of our vision, the way our brains perceive color, the limitations of the atmosphere and the use of imperfect digital sensors, filters and choice of processing techniques and own own subjective taste. There is such thing as good taste and poor taste in astrophotography, just as there is in any artistic medium. If there is such thing as perfectly accurate color in astrophotographs, I suppose it would require us to have vision that can see into the infra-red and ultra-violet, perhaps even beyond. Subjectivity in the sciences is an oxymoron while subjectivity in the arts is what it's all about. "The sky's the limit" when it comes to what's possible. And the sky's also the limit when it comes to what's impossible! |
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| Astrophotography may be science and it may be art but what is evident is that there is a science to the art of astrophotography. I'll go count electrons in the corner now. |
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Thank you, @Christian Koll , for pointing out that astrophotography is a craft. If I recall correctly, another member of AB who has an arts background also made the same suggestion. Although anyone can claim to be an artist, external validation from observers such as other artists, museum curators, gallerists, or art collectors is essential for recognizing an artwork as art. Without such validation, it may be necessary for the creator to put in more effort to integrate his/her work into a proper conceptual framework. |
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This is my personal opinion, astrophotography is a synthesis of science and art, which makes it impossible to perceive astrophotography only as science or art. The main reason for this is that astrophotography combines the science of astronomy and the peculiar art of photography. I remember we had a whole year of astronomy at school, even though we were not given complex information, but it was easy to understand that astronomy is a science. For me, astronomy was not some fairy tale about planets and stars (as for some of my classmates), so at the beginning we studied basic information, but in the second semester we were already discussing the latest research and it was incredibly interesting. I even tried my hand at a research paper, which was not a research, but rather a review of existing research on the topic, but it was great to feel like a "scientist"))) It was a bit difficult for me at the time, so I had help from https://ca.edubirdie.com/write-my-essay-for-me, but this experience was quite useful for me. The thesis of photography as an art also caused a lot of controversy in its time, because in fact it is the creation of an image of reality at a certain point in time, but let's remember that there is a style of realism in drawing and many are its founders, but this style reproduce reality as it is and it still remains art? Photography is also a kind of painting in the style of realism, but the tools are completely different, the photographer shows how he/she sees the world. Therefore, astrophotography for me is both a science and an art. Astrophotography is not just pictures with stars in the sky, it is an opportunity to see what our eyes cannot, to be surprised by all the colors of such a dark space as it seems to us from the ground, we see not just the quality of objects or phenomena in space, they are all special with their own atmosphere, satellites, etc. I've said a lot... but this is too philosophical a question |
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It's art because we can make it what we want and display it. It's science because we can make it what we want and shout it. It's education because we can make it what we want and teach it.🤣 |
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| I am not sure if astrophotography is science or art. I think neither. It's related to astronomy because we photograph the cosmos but not in a scientific way. I use a telescope to capture interesting things to make beautiful photos, but I also use that same telescope as a citizen scientist to help determine orbits of Trans Neptunian Objects. There's a big difference. Calling astrophotography an art doesn't seem right either. In fact, if someone says my photo is fine-art astrophotography, I'm not sure how to take that. I work hard to make sure my photos don't look like a painting! Then there are different kinds of astrophotography. There are deep sky photos as in the majority here on Astrobin and there are also nightscapes with terrestrial elements. Is deep sky considered closer to science and nightscapes closer to art? Perhaps how far we take it with blending, composites, etc, etc. determines how far in the art/creative world it is. People have been manipulating their photography since the beginning of photography. The Orion Nebula has been imaged millions of times and to present it different light requires a creative mind, but art, maybe not. Doing astrophotography is an endeavour that means something different and personal to each one of us. |
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Debra Ceravolo: Hi, Photography can be a form of fine art (a rather modern form). Being a fine art doesn't imply looking like painting. |
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Well technically speaking isn't a telescope an instrument used to capture information which is then processed by you through interpretation? "Observing the shades Interpreting signs Reporting the patterns Row by line" -MJK It is art and there is some "science" involved as it is in any other form of art. Wanting to find out what materials a star or nebula is made of via spectroscopy and representing the materials with color is science. |
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Wei-Hao Wang:Debra Ceravolo: Thank you for your reply here. I wasn't sure, I guess it is a knee jerk reaction to comparing an astrophoto to a painting. My critical husband tells me when one of my photo looks too much like a painting, I take offense and think I went too far. I bet others experience this too. |
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Hello everyone, my contribution is that astrophotography is an applied technique, like computing, it can be used to do science or to make beautiful images, nothing more. Everything will depend on the results you want to obtain and which differ from the way we take the samples. |
