A Favorite Photo from the 70's  


While looking for an electronic copy, I noticed that the online versions at the source at the Space Environment Center in Boulder Colorado (in the "general graphics" area http://sel.noaa.gov/graphics_library/general/index.html) is pretty poor in quality.... I had the slide scanned, touched it up a bit for scratches and sent it to the folks at SEC, asking if they might be able to use it in place of the poor quality version posted on their site.

...In brief it was taken by staff at the NOAA Space Environment Laboratory (now Space Environment Center) several decades ago. It is taken through a telescope from the NOAA facility in Boulder looking west towards the Flatirons. 

The Man and Sun photo is a very powerful image from my past. I haven't seen it in years and years. But it came back to me as a vision and I decided to go looking for it online. While looking for an electronic copy, I noticed that the online versions at the source at the Space Environment Center in Boulder Colorado (in the "general graphics" area) is pretty poor in quality. So I went looking and found an old slide of the image which I've scanned and am hoping to include in this post (at least a small version). I had the slide scanned, touched it up a bit for scratches and sent it to the folks at SEC, asking if they might be able to use it in place of the poor quality version posted on their site. I received this reply from Howard Singer:

An entire article could be written about this picture, but I'm not the one who knows all the history. In brief it was taken by staff at the NOAA Space Environment Laboratory (now Space Environment Center) several decades ago. It is taken through a telescope from the NOAA facility in Boulder looking west towards the Flatirons. Probably a few miles away. I think the "apparent shadow" in the upper right might be from clouds, but I would need to confirm that. A few years ago, some people tried to take a similar picture, but getting the exact timing, optical conditions, and a person in the right place at the right time, proved to be a huge challenge and the picture couldn't be reproduced. The picture has been widely disseminated and even appeared in National Geographic. We often present a mounted version of the photo to folks when they leave SEC or to those we want to give some special recognition or thanks.
 

Posted: Sat - October 23, 2004 at 06:19 p.m.         | |

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