Please Help - Photos With Eos & Tripod

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi all,

Tonight is the first night I will be able go out and take some photos in over 3 months. I now have some new equipment and was interested in getting some advice.

I will be using the same camera, Canon EOS 1100D. But this time I have a new Tripod and new lens a 75mm-300mm, plus a wireless clicker.

So I am planning on going out tonight at 19:00. I will have mounted my camera on to the tripod, having the lens set to 200mm, with auto focus off.

But im unsure on what I should set the ISO, Aperture and Exposure. So here is what I would like to try and photograph.

Orion Constellation - with more of a focus on the belt.

Pleiades - with more focus on the bright centre stars.

Andromeda - more focus on the galaxy rather than the constellation.

The Moon - with a bit of landscape in the foreground.

So I will only be using the camera on the tripod for these photos. I will make use of the remote shutter I have so I do not disturb the photos. The lens will be set to a 200mm zoom.

as for the location I will be take these photos from, its got some light pollution but its not at a high level I would say its medium. I live at the start of the country but can still see lights from the near by towns.

At a guess for the camera settings I will have an Exposure of around 10 seconds, an ISO of 1600 and for the Aperture F2.8.

Do these settings sound good for the first 3 objects? as for the moon im planning on keeping the 200mm zoom and an ISO of 100, Aperture of F11 and an exposure of 1/125.

how dose that sound?

With these settings if they sound good, I will take 10 images of each object and stack/combine them to make a final result. Would 10 images be enough to give a half decent result?

Im planning on taking the image all in RAW, so if any editing needs doing I can do it in Photoshop.

The one thing I do need help with the most, is focusing the camera. How is the best way to do it? should I focus it during the day on an object that's far in the distance? or should I focus in during the night on the moon? Do I need to focus on infinity, if so how do I do that?

Thanks in advanced for any help you can give me.

If the weather holds up and keeps clear I will post the results of these photos.

[belfieldi]

Hi Joe,

I can't give you any sensible suggestions for ISO and aperture settings, but at 200mm you will get star trailing at exposure lengths greater than about 1.5 seconds. At 70mm you would be OK at up to about 4.5 seconds.

Good luck

Ian

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi Ian,

that's interesting, I do wish to avoid star trails. But 1.5 seconds is a short exposer time. would that be long enough to gather enough detail to produce a half decent image. I am planning on taking multiple photos and combining them. is their a minimum number of shots you would suggest for that exposure time?

I also have the standard lens that's 18mm-55mm. How long of an exposure could I take with an 18mm?

Thanks for your help.

[PeterCPC]

"I also have the standard lens that's 18mm-55mm. How long of an exposure could I take with an 18mm?"

I think that you could go to 15 seconds with that but it depends where its pointing - straight towards the pole might be less.

Peter

[MattJenko]

As for focus, live view and zoom on a bright star and try and minimise the size of it is the simplest approach when just using the rear screen of the 1100D.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi Peter,

Thanks for the tip. I will be pointing the camera mostly East just above the horizon and West just above the horizon. So hopefully I maybe able to get the 15 second exposure, I may use that for the Moon, and the Orion constellation.

Hi Matt,

that's sounds easy enough, I will give that a try.

Thank you both for your help.

[jgs001]

Take a look at http://stargazerslounge.com/topic/36308-basic-widefield-with-a-camera-and-tripod/. It's something I wrote up for a photography group.

Realistically, with that setup, you're going to want to use the lens wide open with the ISO as high as you can, and try and deal with the noise in processing, to try and get as much data as possible in the short time available.

As a rough rule of thumb, with a crop sensor camera on a static tripod, use exposure time in seconds = 400/focal length 

You should be able to capture something useful on the very wide field images, and it's all good learning experience with focusing, capturing and processing.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi John,

Thanks for the info I have looked at the link you provided and I have a question. you say to use the largest ISO I can, so for my camera that's 6400 and to set the aperture to wide open.

How exactly do you set the aperture wide open?

Thanks for the help.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

never mind I have worked it out, to have it wide open you mean to set the aperture to the lowest number available

[Skipper Billy]

As a rule of thumb the maximum exposure time before star trailing for various focal lengths is....

10mm - 40 sec

15mm - 25 sec

20mm - 20 sec

25mm - 16 sec

35mm - 11 sec

50mm - 8 sec

80mm - 5 sec

100mm - 4 sec

150mm - 2.6 sec

200mm - 2 sec

300mm - 1.3 sec

500mm - 0.8 sec

Use the appropriate time for your lens, set the lens wide open - lowest f stop then use the ISO setting to adjust the exposure and see what you get - but above all - HAVE FUN !!!

[happy-kat]

Related read

http://www.nightofmanywords.com/articles/kit-lens-astrophotography

Make a lens shield with out one your lens will mist over quite quickly I think. I made one from a plastic flower pot.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi Billy,

Thanks for that, it should really help me out in the futrue knowing all those times

Hi Kat,

thank you for the link, i will read through soon.

So the weather is very windy and some coulds but the cloud should clear in the next hour acording to my local weath. so hopefully i will get some good shots, just hope the wind will not be an issue.

[Craig20264]

As a rule of thumb the maximum exposure time before star trailing for various focal lengths is....

10mm - 40 sec

15mm - 25 sec

20mm - 20 sec

25mm - 16 sec

35mm - 11 sec

50mm - 8 sec

80mm - 5 sec

100mm - 4 sec

150mm - 2.6 sec

200mm - 2 sec

300mm - 1.3 sec

500mm - 0.8 sec

Use the appropriate time for your lens, set the lens wide open - lowest f stop then use the ISO setting to adjust the exposure and see what you get - but above all - HAVE FUN !!!

Don't forget the correction factor for your sensor size. (unless using full frame of course). A 200mm focal length on APS-C (Nikon) is equal to 350mm, so using the rule of 400 you are down to a shade over 1 second. A 35mm lens on APS-C (52mm equivalent on FF) would give you around 7 seconds.

[Skipper Billy]

Don't forget the correction factor for your sensor size. (unless using full frame of course). A 200mm focal length on APS-C (Nikon) is equal to 350mm, so using the rule of 400 you are down to a shade over 1 second. A 35mm lens on APS-C (52mm equivalent on FF) would give you around 7 seconds.

He is using an 1100D - the timings I gave allow for the fact that its a cropped sensor using the 400 rule. Just trying to keep it simple for the OP to get him going.    

[Craig20264]

He is using an 1100D - the timings I gave allow for the fact that its a cropped sensor using the 400 rule. Just trying to keep it simple for the OP to get him going.    

Please, correct me if I'm wrong as I use Nikons, but the crop factor on the 1100D is 1.6, thereby making the 35mm lens equivalent to a 56mm lens at Full Frame. I was under the impression that this is the figure we use to calculate using the 400 rule. Therefore 400/56 = 7.14 seconds.

I do of course stand to be corrected on any of the above.

Cheers

[happy-kat]

If you have an android device should look at using dslr controller makes focusing a lot easier.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

hi all thanks for the advice. Sadly the weather was not very good. Very windy and lots of clouds. But i did manage to get some picture.

There was little clouds around the Moon so i managed to get a handufll of shots.

Then their was only one other place that was clear, a small patch of sky to the east. Not 100% sure what star i was my camera at due to not been able to see any other stars around it, but i belive i was pointing it at Deneb.

So i also got a handful of shots off of that.

I will spend somtime doing some post prossessing and hope to share the photos i got with you all later tomorrow or during the weekend.

[Craig20264]

hi all thanks for the advice. Sadly the weather was not very good. Very windy and lots of clouds. But i did manage to get some picture.

There was little clouds around the Moon so i managed to get a handufll of shots.

Then their was only one other place that was clear, a small patch of sky to the east. Not 100% sure what star i was my camera at due to not been able to see any other stars around it, but i belive i was pointing it at Deneb.

So i also got a handful of shots off of that.

I will spend somtime doing some post prossessing and hope to share the photos i got with you all later tomorrow or during the weekend.

Hi Joe,

Try at 75mm, 3 second exposures at ISO 6400. Take around 50 or 60 exposures, 20 or so Dark Frames. Throw em all into Deep Sky Stacker, then process the image in your software of choice. See what comes out, you have nothing to lose and it's fun. You may be surprised. I am in the same boat as you regarding a fixed tripod. It's fun and challenging to push your cameras limits and see what you come up with. Enjoy. 

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi Craig,

thanks for those setting suggestions, I will give them a try when I next go out. Hopefully I will get some nice results.

So far I have done some processing on of one of the photos I took of the moon. I took a handful, I really should learn how to combine them in to one photo.

As for the ones I took of the stars, they are not looking so good. It was so windy I could see the camera slightly wobbling because of it.

Hopefully I will have something to show you all later today.

[michaelmorris]

My understanding is that in most DSLR cameras, shooting at much above ISO 800 or ISO 1600 noise tends to increase substantially and hence there is not much benefit to be gained shooting at higher ISO settings because of the marginal changes in the signal to noise ratio beyond this point.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi Michael,

Yes i do feel like i had a lot of noise with the settings i used. The next time i go out i will be using a lower ISO.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi all so here are my results.

this is what I got for the Moon. This was one single image taken at a 300mm zoom with the following settings. ISO 3200, Aperture F/11, Exposure 1/125 Seconds.

I took multipal shots but im unsure on how to combined them in to something better.

https://flic.kr/p/Cc8Vza

and this is what I got from the Start. This was one single image taken at a 75mm zoom with the following settings. ISO 3200, Aperture F/4, Exposure 13 Seconds.

I this is 22 photos combined but im sure I have done it wrong. Also during the capturing of this picture it was very windy and I could see the camera shaking.
https://flic.kr/p/D1r96f

[happy-kat]

The Moon is a great start, nice image.

The second shot is either wind or focus is out. Getting focus is tricky but key. Try to focus using a star that is a third in from a corner. Where the third line from all sides would intersect.

Try to not fully extend the tripod as well.

Try again hopefully it won't be windy for you.

In my lp I don't go higher the iso800.

[Joe_Dinsdale]

Hi Kat,

Yes it was very windy, but also maybe my focus was off. My local weather says it should be less windy tonight and i should have another hour or so of clear sky around 21:00. So im hoping to go out again. Im also planning on using a lower ISO i will start with 1600, take a couple of photos and review them, and drop down to 800 if needed. I will also try your tip for not fully extending the tripod.

[Stub Mandrel]

Hi

I took multipal shots but im unsure on how to combined them in to something better.

For the moon try Autostakkert!2 or Registax.

Also PIPP is very good for pre-processing your images.

All three are free.