Cakedestroyer

9 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

I to use the rough /500 divide as I don't use full frame though the direction the target is does have quite an influence on star trails. If you stack using intersection that deals with a fair bit of field rotation. With canon cameras some users are finding darks add more noise, I don't take darks but I like flat darks as well as flats (same as flats just add lens cap).

Just to make sure I have them all right:
Lights - The photos of stars

Darks - Same settings, lens cap on
Bias - 1/8000th second/fastest exposure and lens cap (/body cap?) on
Flat - White thing over end of lens and phone behind it, move histogram to middle?

I can't change the direction of the target I am trying to shoot but I'll bear it in mind for the future.

Thanks!

16 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

The lens is still 250mm crop/smaller sensor has a smaller field of view it does not alter actual magnification.

Pointing at targets to the East and West with altitudes between roughly 20-50 degrees minimises how fast star trails appear.

Ok. All the videos I have been watching say you need to multiply the focal length by the crop factor for the rule of 400/500. I do know about how long to expose for, I am mainly not as sure about the iso.

41 minutes ago, michael8554 said:

Had you left LiveView on ?

Michael

I think so, yes.

Cake

1 hour ago, almcl said:

Here's your image overlaid on a star map:

Awesome! Thanks for the cool map, did you make it or use a tool? Seems like a cool thing to be able to use if it's like a website.

4 minutes ago, Alien 13 said:

Are you using the 400 rule to determine exposure time for example 400/fl =time in seconds before trailing becomes obvious so if you had the lens at 200mm then 400/200 =2seconds.

Alan

Yeah. Due to this camera having a crop factor of 1.6 I have 250mm * 1.6 which is 400 so one second. I tried the npf rule and got similar results.

4 minutes ago, david_taurus83 said:

How did you mess up your bias frames?

Wrong exposures and iso for the darks, and other issues with the other types

2 minutes ago, david_taurus83 said:

It's noisy because the background noise (bias signal) is dominant due to such a short exposure. The only way to overcome this is to expose for longer or shoot many many more subs, which will then require some time on your PC for processing and stacking. Orion is a bright target so you really don't need to go higher than ISO800. Are you shooting from just a tripod with no tracking?

Ok. I did have a good 500 or so shots but I messed up my bias frames so I need to try this again another night. So you don't think there is any advantage in going from 800 --> 1600?
I am just using a static tripod but if I do this a bit more I am looking forward to getting a star tracker/mount.

3 minutes ago, Alien 13 said:

What lens or scope are you using and is it on a static tripod?

Alan

Just a static tripod and efs55-250mm lens. This will be my second attempt at dark sky after the failed attempt a few weekends ago. After I do this a bit more I think I might grab a star adventurer 2i pro pack or something.

Bad new is it seems like the clouds are moving in for tonight . Hopefully the cloudy streak ends soon!

On 18/09/2022 at 23:19, Synchronicity said:

Sorry I am a bit new but what object is this? Looks very cool!

Just now, Alien 13 said:

There are no hard limits but you might not gain anything by going higher, 1600 might be OK though depending on conditions.

Alan

Ok, I might go for 1600 then. I think it was probably good that I asked before I used 6400 for another night. Does this mean I will need to increase the amount of shots I take? I am currently planning on about 500 subs at 1" which would be a total exposure time of 8 minutes and 20 seconds.

Thanks!

9 minutes ago, Alien 13 said:

The reported "best" ISO for the Canon 60D is 800, have a look here.

Alan

Thanks!
Is it ok to go a bit higher than 800 or is that pretty much a hard limit?

33 minutes ago, Mr Spock said:

It would help to know what camera your are using. Some are good at hight ISO, some aren't 

Thanks for your reply. I am using a canon 60d with the kit 55-250mm lens. Do you think this is bad enough I should go down to 3200 even if I am going to stack a good 300-600 light and do all the bias (flat, dark and bias) frames?

After looking at some videos it seems to me I have a lot of red/purple light in my shot. Is this more than you would think I should see? I am going to attempt to again tonight and just want some advice. I do have the iso at 6400 so I was wondering if I need to lower it to 3200?

One other thing is I am 99% sure but I would not be very happy with my self if I was taking so much time so just wanted to check, the middle "star" of those 3 is the Orion nebula right?

Thanks and clear skies!

3 hours ago, SthBohemia said:

Something I didn't see earlier, you live within NZ 🙂 Congratulations, Bortle 1 skies! I  lived within the mountains in Oz until 4 years ago with skies like yours, now within Europe with constant rain, clouds, even more rain and clouds, summer daze 22 hours long with extra clouds and a winter resembling the inside of a freezer 😞

Best of luck to you (I'm jealous)...

Cheers Rob.

Yeah we are pretty lucky over here! I think my home is Bortle 4 but you don't have to go far too get away from it.

Best of luck to you too!

3 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

It's a great site you can also view the full size plate solve.

 

What I posted now is ok right?

1 minute ago, happy-kat said:

You might want you share only the image with the platesolve and not your private location panel on the right.

Uh oh I didn't see that. Thanks for the advice!!!

55 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

You could use astrometry.net to plate solve your image and see what part of the sky you captured. Stellarium is a great planetarium too.

Wow astrometry is so cool!

Thanks for the tip!!

3 minutes ago, ollypenrice said:

The link to the photographer's video shows someone who knows what they're doing but he does make a serious error in saying that his focal reducer will give him a 'magical increase in light gathering power.' It will, in reality, give him no increase in light gathering power whatever. How can it? It lies at the back of the telescope and the light is gathered at the front. What it will do is reduce the size of the image of the Pillars of Creation projected onto his chip, so the original amount of light falls on fewer pixels, each getting more light as a consequence. The reducer gives a smaller, brighter image which is only brighter because it is smaller. The idea that focal reducers increase light gathering power has been done to death under the heading of 'The F Ratio Myth.'  Sorry to bring it up again but this is a beginner part of the forum.

Olly

You learn something new every day! As a novice I guess I just skipped over that part but good to know!

1 minute ago, SthBohemia said:

I agree with your parents! 🙂 Some images presented look to me like something (reference to Jupiter) that I was accustomed to viewing from Mt Palomars 200 inch during the '60's! Maybe some basic images are simply VERY heavily photoshopped??

Perhaps the answer lies within future experiments with the Canon camera connected to a Meade LX200 10" SCT using eyepiece projection... Time will tell 🙂

That eagle nebula one was taken using a pretty fancy telescope by someone who knows a lot more to me lol.

11 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

The eagle nebula was taken with a telescope and substantial mount, for now with a static tripod have a look at Forrest Tanaka M31 if you like YT

Star trails can be many or say 20 to get started 5 second exposure images, your camera perhaps no higher than 500iso take raw images, starstax or startrails both free to stack. GIMP is good editor and free to post process further.

I know the eagle nebula one was taken with some pretty good gear, they didn't believe even a very good backyard telescope could get that close to the Hubble telescope.  They were wondering what NASA was spending all that money on haha 

2 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

For experimenting try ever longer exposures in 1 second increments and different ISO to understand what G9x does and what settings make the image too noisy when looked at afterwards on a computer.

Then you would know what you could try now and what is the maximum exposure and ISO you could use. If you find ISO500 and 10 seconds is ok then could use that for startrails.

I was trying out the G9X last night with general photos and I got this. I wasn't really aiming at anything but I don't hate it!

2 minutes ago, happy-kat said:

It's a shame there is no CHDK port for the G9x that could have got you started with time lapse, if it has a timer then could have a go with star trail image with your camera. Just need to trigger the shutter without vibration so delayed timer works for that.

I made a barn door works well and is manual though I used a 40mm lens with it.

For a star trail image do you take lots of images or just use a high exposure?

I'll make sure to check out your post about the barn door!

1 minute ago, SthBohemia said:

It was a 'bloody' NIGHTMARE which I would never again attempt to repeat 😞 😞 😞 . Half way through I was wishing I had never begun the operation!!!

Maybe I'll stay away from that then haha!

35 minutes ago, michael.h.f.wilkinson said:

The lower of the two images would be roughly the same with a non-modded camera, as it does not contain H-alpha emission. For the top one you would need at least twice the exposure time to get a similar result, because modding the camera more than doubles the sensitivity to H-alpha.

M31 with my old EOS 700D shows what can be done with a non-modded camera

All images above were taken with my APM 80mm F/6 with 0.8x reducer. Below is a 200mm telephoto shot

Modding a camera yourself is possible, although I have never done it. There are several modding services

Just showed my parents these photos and they don't believe that you could do this without a telescope haha!


They also don't believe that the photo on the right can look pretty close to the hubble one on the left while being taken by a person in their backyard (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QcJaD9klDc)

2 minutes ago, SthBohemia said:

Like yourself I am new to imaging with 'electric' cameras! My previous efforts were with a Minolta srt 101 over 50 years ago! A few weeks ago thought, 'might give imaging a try', thus purchased a Canon 1000D from Ebay for 25 UK quid, and removed the IR filter. Since then nothing but rain and clouds 🙂

 

25 quid sounds like a steal!!!! How hard was it to remove? Would I have a high chance of breaking it?
😀