New to this site and Astrophotography

[VigdisVZ]

Hi and welcome! Glad to have you on board!

[todd8137]

Hi and welcome from me

pat

[michigander]

Welcome to SGL, Chris!

Dana

[Tom2012]

Brilliant app that sky walk!

Welcome to the forum mate! I too have been in that "ask silly questions" group and there a ton of help from the kind people on here!

Good luck with the AP!

Tom.

[ubertank]

Hi Chris. Welcome to SGL

[Welrod50]

And hello from me too Chris.

[Bizibilder]

Hello Chris and welcome to SGL!!

[stellawolf]

Hi & welcome to SGL

[tranas]

Hi Chris, welcome to forum.

[Robp]

Welcome Chris.

I too use the Star walk app and find it very useful indeed!

Everyone here is very helpful, head on over to the imaging forums for all the advice you will ever need

[nephilim]

Also +1 for Steve's book, I bought it ajust over a week ago & have read it twice so far ( & i'm sure many more times in the future) With AP you'll spend most of your money on the mount as the mount has to be sturdy enough to take the weight of the OTA, the guide scope, the guide camera & DSLR and i'm afraid the mount for the slt wont be able to handle it. a pre requisite for AP is the EQ type mount (preferably HEQ5 or EQ6 Syntrek the EQ6 has a maximum weight load of 25kgs for visual BUT only 18kgs for imaging) so if your serious about AP then Steves book is a must in my eyes. You say that moddifiying a webcam looks complicated, trust me its really not, im not 'tech' minded and I managed it, capturing the avi using sharpcap & stacking in Registax v6 just takes practice and patience ( which i have only a little of ) have a look at this thread http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/131246-xbox-livecam-mod-cliff/ and see what u think, I managed this on my second attempt

Capture 12_9_2012 7_44_02 PM.bmp and was very happy with it, using my Skywatcher 130m with 2x Barlow, all from a £5 X-Box cam, so you've nothing to lose really, although I MUST WARN you that when the day arrives when you achieve your first good image you can wave goodbye to having any money in the future. After my results i'm now scrimping & saving for a 'real' AP setup & thats when the money monsters will start popping round!! haha.

Good luck with whatever you do choose though.

Steve.