About Lonewolf OnlineAbout me and my site - Lonewolf Online where I share my photos and write about astronomy, programming, photography guides and tips about the internet and technology.
Hello. I'm Tim.
I am a Senior Software Engineer and Photographer by day, amateur Astronomer by night.
I was born in Bristol, England, and now live in Glasgow, Scotland. This is my website, where I share my photos and write about astronomy, programming, photography guides and tips about the internet and technology. I started writing back in 2001 as a means to record my activities and hobbies as well as a place to take notes from the courses I attended. I find blogging allows me to reflect on what I've been doing in life and what I've learned from it. It's a great tool for self-growth, and I recommend it to anyone.
I have a passion for photography which I have held since I was very young. Over the years I have developed my interest from a compact 35mm camera to film SLR and was an early adopter of digital photography with my first digital camera being the Fujifilm DX-7.
I try and include photography in all my other hobbies, as it is an important part of my life. I always have a camera on me and I'm constantly snapping away! I also love writing, be it tutorials and articles for websites, my blog, programming code or recently, short works of fiction. As an amateur photographer, I take pictures because I have a love for photography, not because I am trying to make money. I have done a couple of photo shoots on a no-fee basis. I have done a few photography courses; I have a Diploma in Photography and completed a portrait photography course and studio lighting course.
In the evenings and weekends, I keep myself occupied trying to learn how to play the electric guitar, hiking over the hills at the weekends, tinkering with cars and bikes, watercolour painting, cooking and playing video games. If the weather is good and the skies clear I can often be found gazing up at the stars through my telescope. I have always had a casual interest in astronomy, even from an early age, but I started to get serious back in 2005 when photographing Mars at perigee. Strangely I also captured a star cluster in the photo, one that I could not see with my eyes. Later I found out it was the Pleiades, one of a hundred objects in the Messier catalogue. Furthermore, I found the New General Catalogue (NGC) with thousands of objects to see.
I acquired my first telescope in early 2006 (SkyWatcher Explorer 200) and began observing and photographing some of the more common objects (Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Moon, Pleiades, Andromeda and so on...)
As I started observing more and more objects, I felt the need to learn more about what is out there so I enrolled on a distance learning course with the University of Central Lancashire which teaches the fundamentals of astronomy, physics and astronomy history. I followed this up the year after with Astrobiology and I am currently studying for a degree in Astronomy with University of Central Lancashire (UCLan).
When I'm not enjoying life, I am working as a senior software engineer for a company in Glasgow. I help build innovative technology solutions for the post-acute healthcare industry market through automation and interoperability. This allows healthcare providers to improve how they manage their businesses and in turn improve the level of care of their patients.