Casiopia first RAW data attempt

[happy-kat]

Had the chance while on holiday to take the AZ3 and the 1100d to a dark location. There was a 3/4 moon behind where we had setup and the air was pretty horrid, very wet and also there looked to be a sea mist.

Was in a carpark by the sea. The land rose slightly in front of us which shielded any localised light from the few houses, no lights could be seen in the direction faced directly.

Used the kit lens to start with but the amount of data collected was very low looking in the view finder so changed to the 55mm f2 lens I have.

Took 32 lights and 7 darks ISO 800 f2.8 (ish) and 5 seconds in RAW mode.

This image is post procesed and cropped from the stacked data.

I had to horibly over (think it is called) stretch it in curves to bring out the stars.

The colour was then pushed right up in saturation to see what was there as I hoped for a hint of milky way.

Is the red area real or just well poor data?

[happy-kat]

Any thoughts from anyone please?

It was a murky clear night with the naked eye the stars did not leap put like they should have done for the location and lack of clouds, but there was much moisture like haze in the sky and could be seen with the massive light halo around the Moon behind.

[TiTanecd]

Think the red is over saturation. Maybe stretched a little too much.

Longer subs should do better.

Guessing you didn't have any tracker, that's why 5 seconds was used? Maybe try and see at what point the star trails appear and back off 10/15% of the time, to get the longest possible sub.

I don't know what those gradient rings across the image is, seen it on some peoples images, but I haven't had them. Maybe someone with that knowledge can help.

Hope my 2secs helped. 

Mostly just practise

[D4N]

The red is a gradient that has crept in from somewhere, probably light pollution or horizon glow.

The sky should be darker in that direction than around the constellation.

It took me a while to recognise the constellation, either you're a lot closer to the equator than me or you have the image rotated 90 degrees.

I can see the owl cluster there but no nebulous regions at all, I assume it's an un-modded camera?

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

[happy-kat]

Thank you

Yes I had to agressively stretch it to get the stars to show and I did over saturate it to see what else might show.

Yes un-modded camera.

5 seconds was the longest I could do with no star trails.

Perhaps the air haze really did not help as the constellation does not pop out.

[Pete Presland]

looks fine, you could always try it at 18mm and get a wider field and longer subs

[happy-kat]

The kit lens at 18mm picked up even less stars by a big margin so I changed lens. It is a slower lens than my 55mm.

[jgs001]

There's several things... the exposure lengths are really a bit short (although, it's all you can use) to capture a great deal. The damp you mentioned in the atmosphere has caused you issues, that red is almost certainly linked to it... picking up street lights from somewhere I guess. Add in the moon washing across the mist/dampness... And you'd be really up against it. 

With the 18mm, you ought to be able to get 25 to 30 second exposures, at f/3.5 so you'll gather in data, if the conditions allow it, and I think it's the conditions that have hampered you the most.

[happy-kat]

Thank you.

Can't wait to try the location again. There are no street lights to mention it was in Guernsey but a curry place 1/2 mile away hidden from site.

Next visit time I will have my barn door tracker too.