July-August has been one of the most splendid months of my life by far. Not just I went for my first ever trip overseas but because this trip combined two of my passions: Astronomy and Photography.
I was a part of IAYC 2016: International Astronomical Youth Camp.
This was the 52nd edition of the camp this year which took place at Somerset, UK. The camp was 3 weeks long held from 24th July to 13th August. IAYC brings together 65 odd astronomy enthusiasts from every corner of the world together who carry out various astronomical projects together. The camp was divided into 8 different groups having 8 different sub-topics of astronomy. Every group is headed by a leader who guides its group members in their projects. I was a part of the group which dealt about astrophotography.
The camp was situated at a picturesque location in Somerset. Our house, Nettlecombe court, is a 16th century manor alongside a church with beautiful architecture. Surrounded by hills it was a spectacular location! The area is also declared as the dark sky reserve area which meant we got super clear skies away from light pollution. However, weather in UK is usually cloudy so we had enough of our share of cloudy nights!
The house was a beautiful place to live in. The house staff was helpful and very cooperative. They served some amazing British food everyday with a variety of choices.Delicious!
I was a part of astrophotography group named ARES: AstrophotogRaphy and sciEtific Studies. Led by Alex who is called as 'encyclopedia of astrophotography' we did a fine job producing some amazing photographs of the night sky. We were a total of 8 photographers in this group who took up different projects.Me, Martin and Eva-Maria produced an ultimate guide for astrophotography. Radka and David produced some stunning time lapses and star trails. Stefan did a project on 3D modelling in astrophotography. Marta and Carys did some narrowband imaging using modified cameras. In all we had diverse topics which made our group really fun to work with.
I personally dreaded with the post processing part of astro-photos before going to the camp which I surely improved exponentially now. We photographed several DSOs (deep sky objects) like Andromeda galaxy, ring nebula, iris nebula and many more. It was an amazing feeling to produce such pretty images of the objects which are so tough to observe in the night sky. Although, it was super cold in the nights, nothing could bother our enthusiasm to shoot these photos. The thrill of sleeping under the cold starry night in our warm sleeping bags while our telescope and camera did their job was beyond amazing!
However, it wasn't just astronomy which we did for 3 weeks.We had hell lot of fun everyday during those 3 weeks. Every day we had a session NAP: Non Astronomical Programs. These session were total fun full of different types of games and activities. Not only it entertained us, but also we socialized effectively with each other. I still admire Aitor a lot for conducting these session so well. We also had a lot of free time in which we were allowed to do whatever we wished to. We played some sports, made some music (we had a huge piano in the house along and some amazing musicians among us!) some of us went photographing in the woods!
We had Thursdays as our free days.We went to the University of Bath and interacted with some of the physics faculties over there. We also spent some time in the city witnessing some stunning markets and Roman architecture.
On one of the Thursdays we decided to walk to the beach which was 4 hours away from us. It was very tiring to walk that long but in the end it was worth it. The town of Watchet seemed great and we enjoyed the long adventurous journey!
I cant forget the national evening! Since all the participants were from different countries, we were asked to represent our countries in 10 mins. It was really cool because everyone did something innovative and even brought some delicious food from their land! Hell it was a great experience!
Another major night was the poetry evening. It was a candlelight evening in our huge hall where everyone read out their favorite poetry regardless of the language followed by some amazing singing session. I wish I could live those days back again as I write this...
Our timetable for the day was something like this:
11.30: Waking up service (comprised of Aitor singing "Morning has broken...." out loud in our rooms and spraying water on us!)
12.00: Breakfast
Free Time
13.00-15.30: 1st working group session
Free Time
17.30: Lunch
Free time
19.30: NAP
22.00-24.00: 2nd working group session
24.00: Dinner
Observations throughout the night!
I never ever had such an experience in my life. In a way IAYC helps you grow as a person, inciting the need of such experiences more and more..I made some amazing friends from all over the world with whom I shared 3 weeks of ultimate fun and learning. IAYC is no less than a family. It was my first camp and I got just a glimpse of what this family is about. It was an emotional farewell to everyone on the last day. We had made friends too close to say goodbye to in those 3 weeks. Even forgot the daily routine life waiting for us outside the IAYC. With a big stone in our hearts, we waved everyone only with a promise to meet again at the IAYC 2017.
It is scheduled to take place in the beautiful land of Spain which has always been on my travel wish list :). I hope I am able to make it next year for the camp and meet those beautiful people again and work on some cool astronomy stuff...:)
I was a part of IAYC 2016: International Astronomical Youth Camp.
This was the 52nd edition of the camp this year which took place at Somerset, UK. The camp was 3 weeks long held from 24th July to 13th August. IAYC brings together 65 odd astronomy enthusiasts from every corner of the world together who carry out various astronomical projects together. The camp was divided into 8 different groups having 8 different sub-topics of astronomy. Every group is headed by a leader who guides its group members in their projects. I was a part of the group which dealt about astrophotography.
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| Batch of IAYC 2016 |
The house was a beautiful place to live in. The house staff was helpful and very cooperative. They served some amazing British food everyday with a variety of choices.Delicious!
 |
| A 180° panorama of Nettlecombe court |
I was a part of astrophotography group named ARES: AstrophotogRaphy and sciEtific Studies. Led by Alex who is called as 'encyclopedia of astrophotography' we did a fine job producing some amazing photographs of the night sky. We were a total of 8 photographers in this group who took up different projects.Me, Martin and Eva-Maria produced an ultimate guide for astrophotography. Radka and David produced some stunning time lapses and star trails. Stefan did a project on 3D modelling in astrophotography. Marta and Carys did some narrowband imaging using modified cameras. In all we had diverse topics which made our group really fun to work with.
 |
| Andromeda galaxy |
 |
| Cocoon nebula |
 |
| Milky way galaxy |
 |
| A meteor from Perseid shower |
We had Thursdays as our free days.We went to the University of Bath and interacted with some of the physics faculties over there. We also spent some time in the city witnessing some stunning markets and Roman architecture.
 |
| A day at the city of Bath |
On one of the Thursdays we decided to walk to the beach which was 4 hours away from us. It was very tiring to walk that long but in the end it was worth it. The town of Watchet seemed great and we enjoyed the long adventurous journey!
 |
| Watchet beach |
I cant forget the national evening! Since all the participants were from different countries, we were asked to represent our countries in 10 mins. It was really cool because everyone did something innovative and even brought some delicious food from their land! Hell it was a great experience!
Another major night was the poetry evening. It was a candlelight evening in our huge hall where everyone read out their favorite poetry regardless of the language followed by some amazing singing session. I wish I could live those days back again as I write this...
 |
| Nettlecombe Court and the Church |
Our timetable for the day was something like this:
11.30: Waking up service (comprised of Aitor singing "Morning has broken...." out loud in our rooms and spraying water on us!)
12.00: Breakfast
Free Time
13.00-15.30: 1st working group session
Free Time
17.30: Lunch
Free time
19.30: NAP
22.00-24.00: 2nd working group session
24.00: Dinner
Observations throughout the night!
I never ever had such an experience in my life. In a way IAYC helps you grow as a person, inciting the need of such experiences more and more..I made some amazing friends from all over the world with whom I shared 3 weeks of ultimate fun and learning. IAYC is no less than a family. It was my first camp and I got just a glimpse of what this family is about. It was an emotional farewell to everyone on the last day. We had made friends too close to say goodbye to in those 3 weeks. Even forgot the daily routine life waiting for us outside the IAYC. With a big stone in our hearts, we waved everyone only with a promise to meet again at the IAYC 2017.
It is scheduled to take place in the beautiful land of Spain which has always been on my travel wish list :). I hope I am able to make it next year for the camp and meet those beautiful people again and work on some cool astronomy stuff...:)
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