Astrophoto

[DIW35]

Just getting into astronomy, and this was my first attempt to photo something other than the moon. For anyone interested, it's the M42 nebula in Orion. Have already got ideas on how I can improve at my next attempt, but I'm encouraged by this one for a first go.

[ofcorsa]

I think tonight is the moons closest orbit for sometime tonight,

[mikee boy]

What equipment are you using for this kind of work?

I used to work woth a guy who had a great big motorised telescope that he'd leave on his front lawn for hours on end. Eventually somebody nicked it out of his garage, but the police found it a couple of weeks later dumped in a field!

[DIW35]

That was taken with my 40D attached to a reflecting telescope on a motorised mount.

[Stu247]

DIW35 said:

That was taken with my 40D attached to a reflecting telescope on a motorised mount.

How long was the exposure? Single shot or a number stacked ?

[Bee_Jay]

ofcorsa said:

I think tonight is the moons closest orbit for sometime tonight,

Indeed it is: http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2008/09dec_full...

Shame it's really f'ing cloudy today where I am - last night was very bright...

[DIW35]

Stu247 said:

DIW35 said:

That was taken with my 40D attached to a reflecting telescope on a motorised mount.

How long was the exposure? Single shot or a number stacked ?

Stu I only took 9 x 10 sec exposures, of which I stacked 7. That's one reason why there isn't as much detail there as other people have captured - exposures are too short and there are not enough of them. However, as I hadn't aligned the scope at all, I didn't feel confident of taking exposures longer than 10 secs without incurring star trailing.

[stevieb]

Sorry to ask a obvious question. how do you stack the photos?

[bigfoot7]

To stack images you need to use software such as Registax.

http://www.astronomie.be/registax/

[DIW35]

I actually used Deep Sky Stacker, which is available as a free download. At the moment I don't understand all the options it provides so have only used it at the default settings, which possibly isn't giving me the best results.