quiet shores and starry
skies, with an unexplained
pull to the U.S. Southwest
and Pacific Coast. For
the past three years, he
has taken three weeks off
every spring to adventure
by himself, affording him
the luxury of exploring and
photographing at his own
pace, with his supportive
wife holding down the fort
at home until he returns.
Kukucska shares some of
his journeys with us—the
ones that created two of his
favourite astrophotography
images, Making Contact and
Guiding Light.
MAKING
CONTACT
“I have only a handful of
‘bucket list’ images that I
want to capture, and I am
delighted to say this shot
taken at the Owens Valley
Radio Observatory was one
of them. Being a bit of a sci-
fi nut, the movie Contact is
one of my all-time favourites,
and the chance of being
able to merge a Milky Way
image together with a large
dish couldn’t get much better
(ok…a friendly alien would
have been interesting too).
“This was captured in late
May 2017 while staying in
Bishop, California. I was
in Bishop for two evenings
for the sole purpose of
photographing in the
Ancient Bristlecone Pine
Forest, and I almost drove
off the road seeing the
array of dishes off in the
distance. I inquired with as
many locals as I could about
this facility and was told it
was military and not to go
anywhere near it. ‘They’re
watching you!’ the locals
insisted; however, it is run
by the California Institute
of Technology and I got
onto their website, made a
inspadesmag.com • 093