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Calling all Astro photogs

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gonzalu

gonzalu

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I would like to respectfully request all those pro Astrophotographers in these forums to post their favorite Astro photographs and add a detailed explanation of how the shot was created.

I would love to get started taking pics of the night sky but have no clue what to do. The last time I tried to do it, I got streaks of white lines, really ugly :-(
Thanks in advance for your help!
Cheers
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
 
You can't talk to these guys at night, Manny. They're out shooting the heavens. But you inspired me to give it a go with my new glass.



Tripod mounted 5700 plustc15ed
Full optical and digital zoom
Manual settings of 1/250th second @ f/4.7

--
Warm regards, Uncle Frank,
FCAS Charter Member, Hummingbird Hunter, Egret Stalker
Dilettante Appassionato
Gallery at http://www.pbase.com/unclefrank/coolpix
 
The cheapest way to get into astrophotography is to use a webcam mounted on the biggest scope you can afford. The Saturn photo on my signature was taken through a Toucam Pro webcam and an 11" SCT C11 scope. The camera and infared filter and adapter will cost less than $200. With a webcam, you can take planet and moon pictures that can come ouit better than proffesional astronomers take with huge scopes. The secret to getting a good planet shot is living in a location that has excellent seeing conditions. I don't live in one of those locations, so I have to setup my scope a lot and wait for a night with good seeing. Last year I had 3 of those nights in the whole year and was able to get a good shot of all 3 planets, Mars, Saturn, and Jupiter. The rest of the 365 nights, it was either cloudy or the seeing was bad. Places with good seeing are Florida, Arizona, or New Mexico. But if you setup enough times, you will eventually get good seeing in just about any location.

Taking pictures of Deep Space Objects (DSO's) like star clusters, nubulas and galaxies is actually easier, but it takes a lot more money to get good results. The most important thing for DSO's is having a good tracking mount. The scope and camera is not as important as having a good mount. Good mounts are not cheap. They usually start around $2000 not counting the scope. I got a friend here in Austin that is proving me wrong. He has a $600 setup and he gets pretty good results. http://www.andysshotglass.com/ You can follow his advice on the articles he has written and get some decent pictures. A good DSO camera is either a Digital Rebel or a 10D. As with anything else in life, the more you spend, the easier it gets.

I buy most of my stuff used on http://www.astromart.com/categories.asp If your serious about getting some nice used equipment, let me know and when I spot a good deal on there I can let you know about it. Or you can do like my buddy Andy did and try his approach. The first thing you should do is join http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digital_astro/ Go into the files section and read the FAQ's.
Ralph
gonzalu said:
I would like to respectfully request all those pro
Astrophotographers in these forums to post their favorite Astro
photographs and add a detailed explanation of how the shot was
created.
I would love to get started taking pics of the night sky but have
no clue what to do. The last time I tried to do it, I got streaks
of white lines, really ugly :-(
Thanks in advance for your help!
Cheers
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
Click to expand...
--
Honorary FCAS Member, Black Hole Division

 
And a lot to digest. I will take your advise and join the Yahoo club. The website you linked is absolutely a gem for people like me who spend their money on Kids, School, Nikon stuff, cars :-)
Ralph this is an invaluable post you have made. Thank you sir!
Manny
Ralph Encarnacion said:
Taking pictures of Deep Space Objects (DSO's) like star clusters,
nubulas and galaxies is actually easier, but it takes a lot more
money to get good results. The most important thing for DSO's is
having a good tracking mount. The scope and camera is not as
important as having a good mount. Good mounts are not cheap. They
usually start around $2000 not counting the scope. I got a friend
here in Austin that is proving me wrong. He has a $600 setup and he
gets pretty good results. http://www.andysshotglass.com/ You can
follow his advice on the articles he has written and get some
decent pictures. A good DSO camera is either a Digital Rebel or a
10D. As with anything else in life, the more you spend, the easier
it gets.

I buy most of my stuff used on
http://www.astromart.com/categories.asp If your serious about
getting some nice used equipment, let me know and when I spot a
good deal on there I can let you know about it. Or you can do like
my buddy Andy did and try his approach. The first thing you should
do is join http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digital_astro/ Go into the
files section and read the FAQ's.
Ralph
gonzalu said:
I would like to respectfully request all those pro
Astrophotographers in these forums to post their favorite Astro
photographs and add a detailed explanation of how the shot was
created.
I would love to get started taking pics of the night sky but have
no clue what to do. The last time I tried to do it, I got streaks
of white lines, really ugly :-(
Thanks in advance for your help!
Cheers
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
Click to expand...
--
Honorary FCAS Member, Black Hole Division

Click to expand...
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
 
showing off your abilities again. Stop Flexing :-)

NICE shot. The best I could muster was a cheapo 1/60th of a second exposure on Kodacolor Gold with a 600mm lens and it looked like someone punched a hole in a nicely exposed negative LOL

I have to get serious about this stuff. After the dSLR comes in (hopefully today) I will start to investigate the scopes needed for all this astro stuff.

I always find myself browsing through SKY and TELESCOPE and other mags like it. I need to bite the bug already
Thanks for the inspiring shot UF.

BTW, can you re-take it without digital zoom? I wonder what it looks like maxed out all optical :-)
Cheers

--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
 
Thanks Ralph!

I have spent much time on astromart. I have the new 10" Intelliscope dob along with an older Meade ETX90.

I've ordered my new Nikon 8700 and I am eagerly awaiting for it to arrive.

How do you think the pics will be using the dob since it is manually tracked?

The optics (size) of the Orion dob are so much better than the Meade. Obviously a 10" primary will be better than a 3" one. And the new Naglers help too!
Ralph Encarnacion said:
Taking pictures of Deep Space Objects (DSO's) like star clusters,
nubulas and galaxies is actually easier, but it takes a lot more
money to get good results. The most important thing for DSO's is
having a good tracking mount. The scope and camera is not as
important as having a good mount. Good mounts are not cheap. They
usually start around $2000 not counting the scope. I got a friend
here in Austin that is proving me wrong. He has a $600 setup and he
gets pretty good results. http://www.andysshotglass.com/ You can
follow his advice on the articles he has written and get some
decent pictures. A good DSO camera is either a Digital Rebel or a
10D. As with anything else in life, the more you spend, the easier
it gets.

I buy most of my stuff used on
http://www.astromart.com/categories.asp If your serious about
getting some nice used equipment, let me know and when I spot a
good deal on there I can let you know about it. Or you can do like
my buddy Andy did and try his approach. The first thing you should
do is join http://groups.yahoo.com/group/digital_astro/ Go into the
files section and read the FAQ's.
Ralph
gonzalu said:
I would like to respectfully request all those pro
Astrophotographers in these forums to post their favorite Astro
photographs and add a detailed explanation of how the shot was
created.
I would love to get started taking pics of the night sky but have
no clue what to do. The last time I tried to do it, I got streaks
of white lines, really ugly :-(
Thanks in advance for your help!
Cheers
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
Click to expand...
--
Honorary FCAS Member, Black Hole Division

Click to expand...
 
Manny,

Ralph has pretty much given you the straight skinny. Start with the webcam....it is absolutely amazing the caliber of pics that you can get with the little cams. All of the required software for processing the webcam images is available on-line and free.

When you get to this point email me and I'll be glad to give you some info. on what to do and how to do it.

It really is a fun hobby, and the site that Ralph showed for information looks to be pretty good.

--
bud guinn....FCAS charter member
Hummingbird hunter/gatherer
Nebula and DSO chaser
http://www.pbase.com/budguinn/root
http://www.bytephoto.com/photopost/showgallery.php?ppuser=340
 
I was very impressed. My issue is that I have NOTHING, nada, zip, zilcho. LOL

I have a webcam! :-) I have a Logitech 4000 webcam... but no scope of any kind... I have a pair of cheapo 20x binos and live in a poluted area (NYC)

But, on a clear night, there are two or three stars that look as bringht as a helicopter. They have to be planets... but even that I dunno!!! hahahahahaha
I hate being a lame ass newbie...
Thanks for your help and the offer to help further. I plan to take you up on it.
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
 
gonzalu said:
I was very impressed. My issue is that I have NOTHING, nada, zip,
zilcho. LOL
I have a webcam! :-) I have a Logitech 4000 webcam... but no scope
of any kind... I have a pair of cheapo 20x binos and live in a
poluted area (NYC)
But, on a clear night, there are two or three stars that look as
bringht as a helicopter. They have to be planets... but even that I
dunno!!! hahahahahaha
Click to expand...
Have you tried pointing your binoculars at those three 'stars'? The really bright one - in the west - (Venus) should be a crescent. The next brightest - in the south - (Jupiter) should have a visible disk. The one in the middle of those two should look salmon-coloured to the naked eye. That's Saturn - if you're lucky the bins will show the rings.
 
For me, anyways! Okay, so the stars, they also change location as we spin, that much should be obvious, or maybe not. And those planets also move around respective to us and the sun and the background starfields... etc. etc.

AGGGHHHRRR

It matters when I am in NYC as opposed to Nevada, right? Okay, so I need the really really first lesson in looking up at little white dots on a black canvas

Seriously, this is so helpful to me, thanks all...

--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
 


this is part of my very first shots at the moon, taken with my trusty 990 , i did these pictures for a completely different reason, namely testing the RAW mode on the 990. I'd just posted them to the coolpix yahoo group and i saw this topic too.

Be gentle , its my first time ;) hopefully that image isn't too large.

http://www.ipaqzone.com/test/ has some more, the NEFs and the RAWs that came off the cameara, then converted to NEF for nikon view.
gonzalu said:
I would like to respectfully request all those pro
Astrophotographers in these forums to post their favorite Astro
photographs and add a detailed explanation of how the shot was
created.
I would love to get started taking pics of the night sky but have
no clue what to do. The last time I tried to do it, I got streaks
of white lines, really ugly :-(
Thanks in advance for your help!
Cheers
--
Manny
FCAS Member - http://manny.org/FCAS
http://www.pbase.com/gonzalu/
Click to expand...
 
Charlie, you are going to have alot of fun with the 990. I've seen some great shots with these cameras and a scope. I bought a 4500 for the same purpose.....as well as a great "walk around" camera.

What kind of scope?

when you post a pic from PBase you might try posting one of the smaller sizes and then supply the link to a larger size.

good start, keep em coming.

Why not try one of the comets that are coming up in the morning?...can you mount the camera to the scope?....piggyback?

--
bud guinn....FCAS charter member
Hummingbird hunter/gatherer
Nebula and DSO chaser
http://www.pbase.com/budguinn/root
http://www.bytephoto.com/photopost/showgallery.php?ppuser=340
 
hey Bud,

I've had my 990 for a few years, i tend to lurk a lot on dpreview these days, you'll see me pop up now and again, usually only on the tech stuff.

Its a Meade 8" LX200 with a williams DCL28 and a parks 2x barlow, connected to a laptop with remote control of the camera using my cPix sofware in its video capture mode for framing, and remote control software for the LX200.

i don't use PBase, the pictures were large for a different reason, i took the pictures while playing around with RAW mode on the 990, and i just happened across this thread after i'd just posted them elsewhere, it was late, and i was being lazy and not resizing :)

As you can probably tell i just slapped the scope pointing at the moon and did a remote trigger, i'm sure if i'd taken the time it'd have been a lot better, but this is only my 3rd day with the scope. I just wanted to see if i could get better out of it with the 16 bit images and tinkering with my remote control software.

I am interested in getting into astrophotography, but its going to take a bit for me to get any good at it.

and sorry mark, i hope you didn't call too many people before realizing.

best regards,
charlie
Bud Guinn said:
Charlie, you are going to have alot of fun with the 990. I've seen
some great shots with these cameras and a scope. I bought a 4500
for the same purpose.....as well as a great "walk around" camera.

What kind of scope?

when you post a pic from PBase you might try posting one of the
smaller sizes and then supply the link to a larger size.

good start, keep em coming.

Why not try one of the comets that are coming up in the
morning?...can you mount the camera to the scope?....piggyback?

--
bud guinn....FCAS charter member
Hummingbird hunter/gatherer
Nebula and DSO chaser
http://www.pbase.com/budguinn/root
http://www.bytephoto.com/photopost/showgallery.php?ppuser=340
Click to expand...
 
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