How Does He Do It

How does Akira Fuji, of Sky and Telescope, make those photos of the star constellations for the "binocular viewing" column each month?
His pictures have all those dim little stars between the big bright ones, the huge wide angle? What kind of gear do you have to have to do that?
I'm more impressed by his wide angle, rich fields than I am by the solitary deep sky objects.

Hi Lief,

Akira Fuji uses Pentax 6x7 film holder with several Pentax lenses. The main ones I have seen him use are a 300mm f/2.8 and a 120mm f/2.8, and a 100mm f/2. He also uses a Nikon 35mm camera with a number of different lenses.

Below is an image that I have taken using one (yes he has several!!) of his 120mm f/2.8 lenses. The scan is not great as it is from Agfa 400 asa slide film. But even with this scan you can see how good the lens is.

This was a 30 minute shot. The numbers were identifying the various deep-sky objects in the image.

Cheers,

Maurice

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