Imaging with Point-n-Shoot

[SixString_Chris]

Hello!  I know that many people - myself included - were so excited by what they saw through their scope, they wanted to share the sights by taking pictures.  In the last 6 months (since I got my telescope), I immediately fell in love with the idea of astrophotography and wanted to start capturing the images and sharing them with the world.  I quickly learned it involves a good-sized learning curve, and that my equipment isn't well-suited.

My telescope is a Carson RP-100 (76mm x 700mm) Newtonian, which serves my "beginner" needs extremely well.  It isn't the best, however, at viewing deep-sky objects.  My camera, although new, is also not well-suited for astrophotography (Sony H300),  it is considered a "Point-and-shoot" camera, not a DSLR.  To my favor, however, it's a highly capable camera that falls into the category of a "bridge" camera - somewhere between a PnS and a DSLR.  The biggest downside is that it only takes jpeg images - a nightmare for astrophotography!

Through a lot of trial and a LOT of error, I've learned it is still VERY possible to get wonderful images with such a simple and inexpensive setup, and I thought I'd share a couple of images to hopefully inspire those like me who can't afford a nice DSLR or fancy scope and still want to get some great pictures to share.

The first is a shot of the moon.  This was taken just after the official "Super Moon" several weeks ago.  I simply used the camera on a tripod, set to it's max zoom (It doesn't tell me the focal length, just the zoom level) of 70x (the camera has 35x optical and 35x digital zoom), which is on-par with my scope and the 20mm eyepiece.  Yes, the image is edited, but just to adjust some of the luminosity, brightness, and contrast.

The second image I took last night (early this morning, to be exact) of the Pleiades Cluster.  This was a bit more tricky to edit - The original jpg frames were converted to TIFF files, then stacked using Deep Sky Stacker (all with free software!).  I'm still playing around with it, but to be quite honest, some of the original images look just as good as the final image from DSS.  

The second image is edited quite a bit, as the jpeg format is simply unable to capture all the detail - unlike the RAW format from a DSLR.  So it didn't capture the faint nebulosity associated with the stars in the cluster and I ended up adding a bit of "artistic license" to make the image more stunning than simply a black background with several white dots.

So enjoy!  And if you are like me with "simple" equipment, don't fret!  You can still take WONDERFUL images with what you've got!

[Charic]

SixString_Chris......Hi, very impressive and inspiring for those new to astro-photography on a  shoestring budget. I have some basic images taken afocal and prime using an Android phone and  a Nikon, just messing about, you know,  should still be in my Gallery. But I like  your Pleiades image. leaves my Moon shots behind!

[Atreta]

Really liked the pleiades picture.

[SixString_Chris]

Thank you all for the kind compliments, replies, and likes!    I feel more inspired to continue my learning with GIMP and seeing what I can do with my PNS, and I hope I can help inspire others to do the same (you DON'T need a lot of expensive gear!!).  I'll be sure to share more in the applicable forums.  

[bluegiraffe]

Wow!  I love your Pleiades image!

[tingting44]

thats excellent for a point and shoot!