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Old 11-07-2019, 08:15 PM
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David Malin Awards Shortlisted images 2019

Delighted to be shortlisted in Australia’s premier contest for Astrophotographers - in fine company here on IIS ��

https://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/new...019_shortlist/

Team IIS is represented well with images from Phil Hart, Peter Ward, Peter Rejto, Luke Tscharke, Troy Casswell, Neil Creek & more.
Off to Parkes in a fortnight for the 50th Anniversary of Apollo 11 celebrations at the Dish!
We might get to meet Aussie Astronaut Andy Thomas, tour the Dish itself & watch a special screening with the actors in the movie followed by unseen footage of the moon landing itself- looking forward to getting our Moon on with my astro buddy Paul Milvain!

Last edited by Andy01; 11-07-2019 at 10:09 PM. Reason: Typo
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Old 11-07-2019, 09:24 PM
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Good on you guys. Go get 'em

Best
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Old 12-07-2019, 07:19 AM
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Congrats Andy!
Looks like you will represent the ASV this year as Phil may not be able to make it to Parkes and I can't see any others shortlisted.
I haven't produced anything good enough this past year - too busy making rather than using telescopes.

PS: Actually I just realized that Neil Creek, also shortlisted, is an ASV member. Go ASV!

Last edited by Stefan Buda; 12-07-2019 at 08:49 AM.
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Old 12-07-2019, 09:49 AM
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Well done Andy.

It is nice to see some new names in the mix as well.

As to how the dice fall again in 2019...I wouldn't like to guess....DM will no doubt be his inscrutable self as usual!
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Old 12-07-2019, 01:19 PM
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Well done to all the finalists, good luck in the competition! I must admit, I doubt I'll waste my time with the Malin Awards anymore. Taking absolutely nothing away from the really high standard of entries, it's painfully obvious that for Solar System objects, David has very narrow tastes. He is only interested in "Colours of the Moon" or "Narrowband Sun" shots, and if you're lucky, a few eclipses (look at the archives too, it's remarkable!). While they're nice, I find it hard to believe in 2019 that there aren't great planetary images being submitted from the good number of excellent imagers here and elsewhere. 2018 was the best year in all our lifetimes for combined altitude and closeness of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, yet nobody matched two extremely similar Moon shots from Eddie, or a widefield Earth shot?? And hardly any planets have been finalists in the past decade?

It's David's competition of course, and he's an absolute legend for deep sky imaging and a really lovely guy, but the DMA is not the place to submit your planetary pics! [and yes, full disclosure - I did submit a couple, so i know it sounds like sour grapes... but based on the archive, you could accurately predict the shortlisted image types before they came out]. Its a weakness of a competition with a single judge.

I hope Phil takes out the Solar System prize though - gorgeous corona shot!
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Old 12-07-2019, 02:20 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by andyc View Post
Well done to all the finalists, good luck in the competition! I must admit, I doubt I'll waste my time with the Malin Awards anymore. Taking absolutely nothing away from the really high standard of entries, it's painfully obvious that for Solar System objects, David has very narrow tastes. He is only interested in "Colours of the Moon" or "Narrowband Sun" shots, and if you're lucky, a few eclipses (look at the archives too, it's remarkable!). While they're nice, I find it hard to believe in 2019 that there aren't great planetary images being submitted from the good number of excellent imagers here and elsewhere. 2018 was the best year in all our lifetimes for combined altitude and closeness of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, yet nobody matched two extremely similar Moon shots from Eddie, or a widefield Earth shot?? And hardly any planets have been finalists in the past decade?

It's David's competition of course, and he's an absolute legend for deep sky imaging and a really lovely guy, but the DMA is not the place to submit your planetary pics! [and yes, full disclosure - I did submit a couple, so i know it sounds like sour grapes... but based on the archive, you could accurately predict the shortlisted image types before they came out]. Its a weakness of a competition with a single judge.

I hope Phil takes out the Solar System prize though - gorgeous corona shot!
I hear what you are saying. I have mixed feelings about the "nightscape" section...which begs the question is this a landscape competition? or astrophotography? Many of these images are stunningly beautiful, and can tick both boxes...but sometimes DM's choices have me scratching my head.

But, the CWAS/Malins are not alone here. Royal Greenwich also heavily feature "Kodak moments" in their prize pool.

Sure, if it was my train set, I'd organise things a little differently. But, given it does provide a national showcase for some pretty amazing images, the CWAS/Mailns is unsurpassed (in Oz) by putting Astrphotography into the public eye.
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Old 12-07-2019, 08:18 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by andyc View Post
Well done to all the finalists, good luck in the competition! I must admit, I doubt I'll waste my time with the Malin Awards anymore. Taking absolutely nothing away from the really high standard of entries, it's painfully obvious that for Solar System objects, David has very narrow tastes. He is only interested in "Colours of the Moon" or "Narrowband Sun" shots, and if you're lucky, a few eclipses (look at the archives too, it's remarkable!). While they're nice, I find it hard to believe in 2019 that there aren't great planetary images being submitted from the good number of excellent imagers here and elsewhere. 2018 was the best year in all our lifetimes for combined altitude and closeness of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn, yet nobody matched two extremely similar Moon shots from Eddie, or a widefield Earth shot?? And hardly any planets have been finalists in the past decade?

It's David's competition of course, and he's an absolute legend for deep sky imaging and a really lovely guy, but the DMA is not the place to submit your planetary pics! [and yes, full disclosure - I did submit a couple, so i know it sounds like sour grapes... but based on the archive, you could accurately predict the shortlisted image types before they came out]. Its a weakness of a competition with a single judge.

I hope Phil takes out the Solar System prize though - gorgeous corona shot!

I have submitted images every year in the solar system section since 2008. Most years I have won a HM at the minimum. Saturn has won a lot of awards and so too has Jupiter for me, so I don't think your observation is entirely accurate. This year I submitted the best Saturn I have ever taken and never got a HM (see attached image). It's a good image but I have no illusions about why it is did not get up this year. I figure this is due to the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 and David wanting to focus on that event and images that show the moon. This makes sense to me. David always surprises people with his choices and your words echo mine quite a few years back when I was struggling to understand why he made the choices he does.

For my pick I reckon I know the Deep Sky winning image already. I know for the fact that David's favourite object is M42 and that image is the sharpest one I have seen for a while (aside from mine in 2014 ). As to the overall winner I cannot imagine who that might be because I always get that wrong, even the year I won with M42 (Dust and Gas). He always manages to surprise us all and the image will be a wonderful image.

I reckon just keep on submitting and you will get there eventually. The planetary section is a tough section to win any award in and I reckon the more people who enter that section the better the competition will be.
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Old 12-07-2019, 09:21 PM
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Congratulations Andy, Peter, Phil and all the others who were shortlisted!

Some amazing images again this year - from year to year there are often big steps up in the standard of images and to me it's most noticeable this year in Widefield (perhaps because it's a category that I entered - I'm not surprised my entry in Widefield didn't make the cut after seeing the finalists).

I managed a gong this year in the open themed section so will also be heading out to Parkes next weekend and I'm looking forward to catching up with other IISers. Funnily enough my shortlisted image was my least favourite amongst all those I entered (including two others taken during the same lunar eclipse). I guess David sometimes sees something we don't?

Commiserations Andyc and Paul - your planetary images are absolutely brilliant and clearly deserving of recognition - such are the vagaries of a multi-category competition I guess.
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Old 12-07-2019, 09:45 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Peter Ward View Post
I hear what you are saying. I have mixed feelings about the "nightscape" section...which begs the question is this a landscape competition? or astrophotography? Many of these images are stunningly beautiful, and can tick both boxes...but sometimes DM's choices have me scratching my head.

But, the CWAS/Malins are not alone here. Royal Greenwich also heavily feature "Kodak moments" in their prize pool.

Sure, if it was my train set, I'd organise things a little differently. But, given it does provide a national showcase for some pretty amazing images, the CWAS/Mailns is unsurpassed (in Oz) by putting Astrphotography into the public eye.
I would hazard a guess there is a commercial/marketing element - the public (and Canon / News Corp) may relate more to nightscape images than DSOs.

Must pull my finger out and throw my hat in the ring for 2020.

DT
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Old 13-07-2019, 08:22 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Paul Haese View Post
For my pick I reckon I know the Deep Sky winning image already. I know for the fact that David's favourite object is M42 and that image is the sharpest one I have seen for a while...
You may well be on the money, as Peter's is a very fine M42. However, David's choices for previous deep sky winning subjects being...

2018 Dragons
2017 Witch head
2016 Carina
2015 Dragons
2014 M42
2013 Galaxy 3718
2012 ic5067
2011 Horse head
2010 Rho Ophiuchi

Guess we'll all just have to wait & see

Last edited by Andy01; 13-07-2019 at 10:28 AM.
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Old 13-07-2019, 12:17 PM
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Originally Posted by Paul Haese View Post
................This year I submitted the best Saturn I have ever taken and never got a HM (see attached image). It's a good image but I have no illusions about why it is did not get up this year. I figure this is due to the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11 and David wanting to focus on that event and images that show the moon. ................ the more people who enter that section the better the competition will be.
That's a absolute ripper of a Saturn image....I would have found it hard to go past.

I have no doubt more lavish sponsorship would entice more entries. Given around 200,000 people view the subsequent exhibition Canon's ROI is not too shabby at all....but I'd wager raising the stakes and profile of the event would generate way more interest and entries.
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Old 13-07-2019, 04:05 PM
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Congratulations Andy and everyone shortlisted
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Old 13-07-2019, 07:38 PM
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Stunning images ,, I like the simple message of "lunar generations" .
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Old 14-07-2019, 10:58 AM
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Love some of the images. Those widefield images from Troy in particular and a couple of stunning nightscapes.

There are different categories and some require massive effort and skill and some require just a bit of planning and effort. Seems a bit unbalanced at times in that regard. A good deep sky image can take hugely expensive gear, lots of travel and time and lots of processing skill. 50 things to get right as opposed to a few things to get right.

A good landscape requires knowledge of exposure and lenses and mostly planning and good framing and subjects. The point is 1 hour versus 50 hours. Not to diminish their creative efforts but its more the time and difficulty factors are nowhere near equal.

Perhaps more categories for the deep sky would be good for the competition.

Deep sky can be Nebulae, Galaxies, Star clusters, narrowband.

Widefield could be broadened as well. FSQ type images for example, narrowband as its own category. At the moment I think FSQ images would be competing with lens DSLR type images.


Greg.
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Old 14-07-2019, 04:21 PM
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Interesting points everyone. The 'category blur' is tricky, with widefield this year crossing over with deep sky, last year it seemed to be Solar System, Nightscapes and wide field. And yeah, there's a huge difference between the tech/effort across some categories. The pretty snapshots (like APY) are disproportionately represented, but probably understandably for what's ultimately a pretty photo comp! In Deep sky, it seems clear that David like sumptuous nebula shots as his favourites, with very few galaxies. I guess in the long run I think they perhaps could look at broadening their judging pool?

Paul, though you've had a fair few finalists and wins over the years, it's still the case that the narrowband Sun and 'colours of the Moon' have dominated recent finalists (>40% of all finalists in past 5 years, all winners since 2015, and 6/8 winners since 2011). It's most notable in the past 5 years when hi-res Solar System imaging has moved to another level of quality and accessibility over the same time period, with quite a number of superb imagers around Aus now. In that time, just a few Saturns and one superb Mars from Stefan made it through.

Much as David's preference in deep sky is nebulae (maybe not surprising!), I think his strong preference in the Solar System is Sun and Moon, and with Apollo 50, it seems it was hardly worth entering a non-Moon shot. All Solar System finalists can be related closely to a theme of 'journey to the Moon', rather than the very best images of the Solar System - otherwise yours should be there as well. [My humble entries were comparable to yours - though the Saturn wasn't my very best possible in terms of processing, it was a good look at the big storm, and a couple of decent Jupiters. I threw the Saturn in because I'd seen his preferences, but as you show, he was not looking at all in that direction this year! Maybe I'll put in a 'colours of the Moon' next year for fun ].

That 'Lunar generations' shot is tremendous - great inventiveness and opportunism.
Anyway, it's all good in the end, and best of luck to everyone this week!

Last edited by andyc; 14-07-2019 at 04:37 PM.
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Old 14-07-2019, 07:45 PM
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Interesting comments everyone.
Regarding the colours of the Moon entries, I feel a bit responsible because I remember, back in 2014, David commenting about my shortlisted Copernicus crater image, that he is not a fan of colour saturated lunar images, but somehow this one works. Well after that, in subsequent years he seems to have changed his mind, as we can see. Also my last year's winner of the category has the most amount of work that I have invested into an image, in case anyone thinks that these images are easy.
I will try to produce more of these images as I find them very interesting, but only in high resolution, as not many people are doing such work.
https://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/new...Copernicus.jpg
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