The Milky Way from South Africa

[samir_ansari]

Hi everyone, been a while since I posted in here but I just got back from a trip to the South African bush and couldn't resist taking a tabletop portable EQ mount with me. This was the result:

There is some warping due to my light pollution filter not being on straight and there is also some trailing as I think my polar alignment was off by a smidgen (I have never aligned to the SCP before and I found it pretty tricky).

The shot details were as follows:

Canon 450D on a portable motorised table top tripod

4 panes of 10 x 30 seconds (with about 10 dark frames)

50mm @ f1.8 + 2" Astronomik light pollution filter

Hope you like it!

[Darth Takahashi]

Wow... simply stunning...

[AndyUK]

Amazing - That must have been quite a sight - Thanks very much for posting...! I think my daughter needs one of those mounts for her forthcoming school trip to Morocco... Sadly she won't take it with her as unfortunately she has no interest in astronomy (it would be REALLY uncool to have the same interest as her dad), but I could possibly put it to some good use afterwards!

[Gina]

Wonderful - what a fantastic sight

[samir_ansari]

Thanks! It was indeed gorgeous to look at. Actually I was nearly mauled by a leopard in order to get to the location to take that picture (true story) but I think it was totally worth it

[AndyUK]

Actually I was nearly mauled by a leopard...

Care to enlighten...?

[samir_ansari]

Care to enlighten...?

Long story short I was luckily only 20 meters from the shack when I heard a Leopard growl in the bushes ahead of me, then once I was inside it proceeded to walk around the walls and scratch at them. I know it was the wrong thing to do but I ran like a little girl when I heard that first call

[AndyUK]

Hmmm... I'm pretty sure I would have legged it too... and I'm not sure I would have wanted to have been in that shack with a hungry Leopard scratching around it for too long either... You must have been REALLY out in the wilds!

[Black Knight]

It's a great picture, and leopards rustling through the undergrowth trumps hedgehogs and foxes any day of the week!