Tony Buick

Dr Tony Buick is a chemist by profession, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and spent a career in research medical, veterinary and agricultural science specialising in analytical chemistry. To fulfil his original ambition to teach he taught science, geology and computing in a primary school at the beginning of retirement and witnessed the intense enthusiasm of kids for science, especially during science club sessions. Astronomy has been his passion for some time, in particular designing and constructing an adaptor, many years ago, to attach an early digital camera (the size of a small brick) to a telescope to photograph the Moon.

At the time of first publication with Springer, a suggestion by Patrick Moore, there were no such adaptors, available or discussed; it had to be built from bits of wood and cannibalised tripod pieces. It was reported to be the first of its kind, at the beginning of the 21st century, and commercial ones followed soon after. Hence the first book published, ‘How to Photograph the Moon and Planets with your Digital Camera’ and a second edition to add a chapter concerning Narrowband Solar Photography by Philip Pugh. Since then, many such adaptors have become commercially available.

‘The Rainbow Sky’, reflects his life-long involvement with spectroscopy and colour. The book is not just for amateur astronomers it is for anyone interested in nature and the vast cosmos! All is coloured but interpretation of the colours has to be made with care. Images captured by telescopes operating at wavelengths other than our narrow visual range must be changed to allow anything to be seen. So, it is easy to believe that the colours are true instead of created for our benefit. The wonderful myriad, coloured objects throughout our world and universe could not be completely covered in a single book but the photographs of sunsets, rainbows, brockenspectre, clouds, planets, moons, nebulae and distant objects takes the reader on a spectacular tour. The short cameos of theory and the brief history of light will add to the understanding of some chapters - or just skip them to appreciate pictures that emanate from almost the beginning of time.

Recent books are about the Orrery, first and revised edition. They concern the history of orreries, the lives of clockmakers and conditions they endured in the 17th/18th centuries, with forewords by noble descendants of the 4th Earl of Orrery whose name will forever be associated with the mechanical model of the Solar System, or parts of it.

Since very early retirement from a science career life has been filled with playing golf, the piano, clarinet, indulging in geology, photographing nature, writing and microscopy. Also, publishing articles on tardigrades, robust microscopic animals that can even survive in space.

Tony Buick PhD CChem FRSC