Fantastic start to the New Year

[Josh40996]

Happy New Year to everyone.

For a while now I have been interested in astrophotography, and for the past year or so I have been imaging the planets and moon through the very cheap Celestron Powerseeker 50AZ and an iPhone. Due to being a student, my funds dont really allow for me to upgrade, so I was kind of stuck with what I had.

Over Christmas, I have now upgraded to a better camera and larger telescope. I now have a Nikon D50, Celestron astromaster 130eq-md and other bits to make it all work. I only have a 35-70mm lens for now. The telescope and camera are far from the best, but they are a dramatic improvement from what I had, so you could imagine my frustration when there has been nothing but cloud overhead since Christmas.

Last night I went to a New Years Eve party and brought my camera along to take some pictures. Just after 12 and we go out to let off the fireworks I looked up and was amazed at the clarity of the sky and the brightness of the stars, I can not remember ever seeing as many stars as I could except from when being abroad. I could not resist trying to get atleast 1 image of the sky, so I borrowed my cousins very wobbly tripod and took a few pictures of orion, which was when I also noticed that I could see the orion nebula with the naked eye! I was absolutly amazed, I had never seen it before. So I managed to get 5 x 3 second shots and went back to the party. The images are very poor quality, but its the first DSO I have managed to image, even if it is just a little fuzzy blob.

Sorry for the little ramble, but I just had to tell people who have the same interests as me. [emoji1]

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[Eri]

it's always exciting when we see something for the first time with our own eyes not from Uncle Hubble, I saw Jupiter for the first time last night and its always been my favourite planet and had a little squeee moment, next try to get a 30 second sub on orion through your scope and you'll more than likely feel that same feeling all over again

[Josh40996]

Just had a chance to look at the images on my computer and they are worse than I thought. I stacked 3 images in DSS and then had a quick play around with it in Photoshop.

ISO 1600

3*3s subs

70mm Focal Length

F/4.5

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[Craig20264]

Simply a case of not enough photons hitting the sensor. Try a wider Aperture, higher ISO, longer shutter speed, or a combination of the above.

[Josh40996]

Oh yeah I will definatly be doing as you suggested when I get some more clear skies, I was just at a party and so I had to be super super quick. I was just getting my fix haha.

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