At age 10, he was already trying to build his own telescope using his grandmother's reading glasses and taping one of the lenses to a body tube made from a rolled up newspaper. He borrowed eyepieces off his school's microscopes. In school, his favourite art subjects were always of the stars, planets, anything about the universe, "..and telescopes. The art teacher found it most curious that all my works were out of this world." His first memory of seeing the Milky Way was during a fishing trip with his Dad. Does his father know anything about astronomy? I asked. "He told me to go look up a book." Not long after, his Dad surprised him with a present : an 80mm toy telescope. "Probably to stop me from stealing my grandmother's glasses," he laughed. His toy scope's first light was the Moon. Quite by accident, he next aimed his scope at a bright yellow star which turned out to be Saturn. These remain his favourite childhood night sky objects. He would spend every night out after dinner observing till 10pm. School homework, of course, had to be done in the afternoon. His first astrophotography attempt was the Moon at age 14. He recounted amusingly how he had trained himself to memorize the rate at which his hand turned the RA and Dec knobs before fixing in the camera so that he could track the object by heart for up to one minute. "Not too bad, I probably got 2 out of 36 shots right." He later moved to America with his family. His toy scope followed him there. His first astronomy expedition of sorts was while camping with his family at Yosemite Park. "That was the first time I stayed up from dusk to dawn, blown away by the brilliance of stars under the American sky." The stars he claimed, were even brighter than those back home in Taiwan. Throughout that first night, the howls of coyotes accompanied him, plus there were bears in the vicinity. "Dangerous, and quite scary too," he quipped. His first purchase was an orange Celestron 80mm f/9 with an equatorial mount when he was 17.

So concludes my interview with Mr William Yang. He is quite a remarkable person. I'm including a small synopsis from his talk "The Fun of Astronomical Instruments Making". I sat in for this talk which was conducted in Chinese.

After graduation, he returned to Taiwan. In 1995, WILLIAM OPTICS was set up with one focused mission : To make a genuine astronomical product that would prove to be a strong opponent in the leagues of America's AstroPhysics and Japan's Takahashi. He bought the ingredients and figured out the chemical composition from scratch. He searched far and wide for the best optical glass available. Over the years, he has met with many different setbacks and failures in the quest for the ultimate scope and is most grateful for the many people who have assisted him in his foundation research. There was a 15-minute summary of his experiences which concluded that German-made glass together with fluorite coating were the most potent combination at this point in time. He then launched into a breakdown of how his apochromatic scope was made and assembled. Everything, he says, right down to the screws and bolts of the scope, was redesigned and remade. People often tell him how silly it was to waste time fussing over a simple screw, but it was important to him. He wanted to see to it personally that the entire conception of the telescope, every part was his and his alone. The caps are personalised with a swan logo, the trademark of WILLIAM OPTICS. (He even experimented with inscribing the logo onto the head of a screw.) The tube body was a triple-layered coating to give it the pearly-white exterior that was scratch- resistant; The retractable dew cap had a ring coat of 18-carat gold around it. He recalls how when he first launched his telescope at an American Star Party, it was critiqued mercilessly. But that was history and it proved to be the turning point for WILLIAM OPTICS as he is back with better scopes that is set to compete on the international market of astronomical instruments, beside AstroPhysics and Takahashi.

Check out William Yang Optics at http://www.williamoptics.com

Ok, this could possibly be a poor interpretation by myself of the 90-minute talk. Any mistakes, misunderstandings or misinterpretations is mine and mine alone. I remembered being extremely impressed with his fortitude and strong determination to break the traditional waves. His enterprising ways at how he handled assembling a telescope from scratch are nothing short of extraordinary. Here is one man who spent 3 days in a row without sleep to design the 142 basic parts to his equipment. WILLIAM OPTICS is going places. He now has his own dovetail plates that is touted to fit all astronomical products from Celestron and Vixen to Takahashi and AstroPhysics. He had just launched his own private line of equatorial mounts and GOTO technology. At this moment, there are plans underway to build the largest fluorite Apochromat refractor in central Taiwan. This 9" triplet  fluorite APO will be made by the William Optics. I have every confidence that WILLIAM OPTICS will be an astronomical force to be reckoned with in the 21st century. - Lin

Everything he knows about astronomy and astrophotography, he learnt on his own when he was young. He used his school's telescope extensively throughout his youth. Finally, at age 21, he bought a 100mm f/6 reflector on a Vixen SP. He still remembers the dates and circumstances when this occurred. December 6, 2315hrs, his friend came over with the maps to track Halley's comet. The very next day he purchased the R100S. He spent the next few months tracking, observing and photographing the comet. His first solo astronomical expedition was at age 22. He bundled up all his equipment and took a bus to Lishan Tienchi, a 2600-ft high mountain. He forgot his controller and so had to do manual guiding. Armed with his first shots, he approached the Japanese astronomy magazine, Sky Traveller. Six months later, the magazine published his first astrophotograph. Henceforth, he became a regular contributor to astronomy magazines, both locally and overseas. He sheepishly recounts how he delayed his graduation from the university just to delay his national army service, and take more astrophotographs. He bought the Takahashi MT160 reflector and borrowed the EM100 from a local science magazine. Once a week for 2 hours he would travel 240km from his mountain hideaway to attend classes at the university. The rest of the time he spent up in the mountains perfecting his photography. Thereafter, he spent 2 years serving the nation. Soon after his conscription ended, he started work and with his savings, placed an order for the AstroPhysics 130EDT which took another 2 years to get to him.

Mr Lin Qisheng's memory is amazing. He remembers many events chronologically right down to the specific date and even time. I have heard a few stories about him spending much time alone in the mountains photographing the skies.

Was he ever afraid? "Initially, yes. There was no one for miles around. But I got used to it. So far, I haven't encountered anything, seen or unseen." Any interesting tales? "1996, October 10, evening. I was photographing Hale-Bopp, 1995O1, and 1996Q1. I thought I'd take a break and I used the AP130 box to sleep in which looked pretty much like a paper coffin. The police came. They thought I was dead or something. I got off with a warning to use the triangular breakdown plate that cars use, just in case, I might get run over by a car while sleeping." His most adventurous trip to date? "I was with another astrophotographer, Anthony Chong. We took a single 150cc motorbike up to Xiao Xueshan (Little Snow Mountain) a 2600m high mountain. Two of us rode some 275km to the mountains carrying with us the AP 130EDT, EM200, SP, food, clothes, 13kg battery, and all other essential equipment. I think that journey was the ultimate trip. I don't think Anthony will be making another trip like that one anytime soon," he grinned. He remembered another time April 18, 1999 at Yu San National Park. It turned cloudy halfway through the night. He decided to take a walk when he spotted another pair of astronomers. As he approached them, he overheard them talking about him. "It's incredible, this gossip about me that was going around. Rumours were flying that I switched 24 jobs in one year."

His latest trip was to Australia where he photographed many more stars in the desert. "It was a different experience altogether. It was like going back to ground zero. I couldn't recognize a lot of the southern constellations. I was re-learning the night sky all over again." For this trip to Kuala Lumpur, he brought some 63kg worth of books and magazines to donate to the astronomical societies. There was the entire range of astronomical magazines which have featured his photographs. To date, he has taken over 3000 astrophotographs.

Unfortunately, I didn't manage to get a chance to really interview him.