Dr. Mike Shaw is an award-winning astrophotographer, author, speaker and teacher based in St. Paul, Minnesota.
Mike is an astrophotographer, teacher, and author of “The Beginner’s Guide to Astrophotography (2023),” “Creative Nightscapes and Time-Lapses” (2018), and “The Complete Guide to Landscape Astrophotography” (2017). Mike’s field workshops take him and his students around the globe, searching for the darkest, clearest skies. He began teaching photography classes in 2010 while working as a physics professor and soon succumbed to the lure of the open road. He quit his job in 2014 and has been enthusiastically teaching night photography ever since. He especially loves being present when people experience, often for the first time in their lives, that human connection with the night sky and the universe that transcends international borders.
Mike offers interactive online lessons with Adobe Photoshop Lightroom and helped create the video tutorials for the Planit Pro app. In addition, he provides astronomy training to the US National Park Service, taught night photography and time-lapse classes in the Bryan Peterson School of Photography, and led an interactive Nightscapes Star Party Live! weekly on Slooh.com. He licenses his work through Science Photo Library in London. He is a Delegate to the International Dark Sky Association; and an active member of the Minnesota Astronomical Society and the Astronomical League.
His first book (2017), “The Complete Guide to Landscape Astrophotography – Understanding, Planning, Creating and Processing Nightscape Images,” Routledge/Focal Press, integrates astronomy, photography and planning methods to allow you to be at the right place, at the right time, with the right equipment and knowledge to get your shot right the first time.
His book (2018), “Composite Nightscapes and Time-lapses,” Routledge/Focal Press, explains everything you need to know to make state-of-the-art multi-image photography and time-lapse projects using photographs made from a fixed tripod position.
He holds a Ph.D in Materials Engineering from the University of California, Santa Barbara, an M.S. in Ceramic Engineering from the Ohio State University and a B.S. in Materials Science and Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley. He spent two years as a post-doctoral research scientist at Cambridge University, England. Before his photography career took off, he was a physics and astronomy professor; and an applied physics research scientist before that.
https://rockynook.com/shop/specialized-topics/astrophotography/the-beginners-guide-
