pipnina Posted January 5, 2018 Share Posted January 5, 2018 I noticed the weather was good tonight so I took the opportunity to give the new Star Adventurer a go! Polar alignment is a bit difficult, because I both haven't aligned the polar scope yet (oops) and cannot seem to get the diagram in the polar scope to rotate. I ended up getting polaris kinda close to the center and hoped for the best. In the Aldebaran shot you can see stars starting to trail but given as it's a 4 minute exposure with a 105mm lens, I don't think that's too bad! Obviously the first target at this time of year was going to be orion, I took 10x70 second exposures for a total of 11m:30s exposure. Using the 105mm @ f9. I was hoping to get some hints of the horsehead but sadly it hasn't shown itself. The orion nebula and the flame seem to be looking good, however. I wasn't sure what to try and take a shot of next, because after the orion shots my camera was complaining about low battery, so I decided to see how the Star Adventurer coped with a much longer exposure. I put the ISO down from 800 to 200and took a 4 minute single shot of aldebaran & the surrounding cluster. I'm fairly happy with both results but seem to be having more trouble with hot pixels now Can't wait to go out and use it again! EDIT: I think I can see the faintest hints of the horse, but only just. Also I think I can see parts of M78! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scooot Posted January 5, 2018 Share Posted January 5, 2018 Nice shots, the little star adventurer is great Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kirkster501 Posted January 27, 2018 Share Posted January 27, 2018 Nice. You’ve got the flame and the red curtain behind the horse. Well done. Keep at it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
newbie alert Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 On 05/01/2018 at 22:51, pipnina said: Polar alignment is a bit difficult, because I both haven't aligned the polar scope yet (oops) and cannot seem to get the diagram in the polar scope to rotate. I think you rotate it with the clutch loose and tighten it up once done.. Very nice images..hope to do the same with mine soon Just out of curiosity what lens was you using .. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davew Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 The more I see nice images taken with the SA the more I fancy getting one. Why did you use f 9 ? I have one of those lenses and mine works quite well at f 2.8 and f 4. If it's because you think the corner stars are iffy then you can crop slightly. I'd be interested to see you have a go at Orion again and see if you can tease out some more of the HH. Now I know this is controversial but if you're only doing one or two images in the night and are noticing hot pixels then auto darks may be ok to try. It's not like they're going to take a few hours eh ? If you go on and get a dozen or so subs then stacking will become your friend and auto darks won't be needed. Dave. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pete Presland Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 A nice start looking forward to seeing more images in the future. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pipnina Posted January 29, 2018 Author Share Posted January 29, 2018 3 hours ago, newbie alert said: I think you rotate it with the clutch loose and tighten it up once done.. Very nice images..hope to do the same with mine soon Just out of curiosity what lens was you using .. Sigma 105mm f2.8 macro I had the clutch tight so I didn't notice the picture moving. Cheers 1 hour ago, davew said: The more I see nice images taken with the SA the more I fancy getting one. Why did you use f 9 ? I have one of those lenses and mine works quite well at f 2.8 and f 4. If it's because you think the corner stars are iffy then you can crop slightly. I'd be interested to see you have a go at Orion again and see if you can tease out some more of the HH. Now I know this is controversial but if you're only doing one or two images in the night and are noticing hot pixels then auto darks may be ok to try. It's not like they're going to take a few hours eh ? If you go on and get a dozen or so subs then stacking will become your friend and auto darks won't be needed. Dave. I used f9 in these shots because I had found the lens to produce somewhat iffy sharpness in the center of the image wide open. I'm on a cropped sensor so edge-of-field sharpness and vignetting isn't so bad. I used f8 for future attempts. But since even between f8 and f2.8 there are like 3.3 stops (turning 5 minutes into 40+!!!) I'll have to experiment with what f-stop is most acceptable. As soon as the clouds depart you bet I'll be back out there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JemC Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 they are pretty good images, well done, hope to be doing some of this soon with SA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davew Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 We both use Nikon cameras it seems so I must say I find using LV and the rear screen fairly accurate. f 2.8 has a very shallow depth of focus so extra time may have to be set aside to nail it. F 8 is nothing like as sensitive to focus but as you say, it blocks out so much light. Give it a go anyway as it's right next door to free to experiment Looking forward to your next effort. Dave. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 With a bit of brutality on the processing I can see the Horsey and M78. Nice one Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pipnina Posted January 29, 2018 Author Share Posted January 29, 2018 31 minutes ago, davew said: We both use Nikon cameras it seems so I must say I find using LV and the rear screen fairly accurate. f 2.8 has a very shallow depth of focus so extra time may have to be set aside to nail it. F 8 is nothing like as sensitive to focus but as you say, it blocks out so much light. Give it a go anyway as it's right next door to free to experiment Looking forward to your next effort. Dave. I'm thinking next time I'll shift the frame left a bit and try to capture the loop in shot as well. It's dark but hopefully doable I'm hoping the battery and dew heater I bought recently will help, the heater strap doesn't get very warm and it's very cold outside. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stu Posted January 29, 2018 Share Posted January 29, 2018 19 minutes ago, pipnina said: the heater strap doesn't get very warm and it's very cold outside Heater straps never get very warm, unless on high power and wrapped multiple times around. They just need to be warm enough to keep above the dew point, too high and you get convection currents Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RichM63 Posted January 31, 2018 Share Posted January 31, 2018 Oh heck, this is bad news. I have the same lens, assorted bodies, tripods, but don't have an SA. I'm 'doomed', or at least slightly compromised. Agreed, virtually all lenses benefit from not being wide open in any situation, but f8 with this lens in low light might be a step too far and 'dof' at this distance is not such an issue. My Sigma is certainly crisp at f5.6 in Macro bug mode during the day. PS, invest in a Battery grip if possible, makes life a whole lot easier. Best, Rich Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pipnina Posted January 31, 2018 Author Share Posted January 31, 2018 On 29/01/2018 at 14:21, davew said: We both use Nikon cameras it seems so I must say I find using LV and the rear screen fairly accurate. f 2.8 has a very shallow depth of focus so extra time may have to be set aside to nail it. F 8 is nothing like as sensitive to focus but as you say, it blocks out so much light. Give it a go anyway as it's right next door to free to experiment Looking forward to your next effort. Dave. 4 hours ago, RichM63 said: Oh heck, this is bad news. I have the same lens, assorted bodies, tripods, but don't have an SA. I'm 'doomed', or at least slightly compromised. Agreed, virtually all lenses benefit from not being wide open in any situation, but f8 with this lens in low light might be a step too far and 'dof' at this distance is not such an issue. My Sigma is certainly crisp at f5.6 in Macro bug mode during the day. PS, invest in a Battery grip if possible, makes life a whole lot easier. Best, Rich Wasn't much gap between the clouds today, but I just about managed to snap two shots at f8 and f2.8. Strange thing is with this lens, wide open the center seems a bit off (but maybe still usable...) while outer edge is crisp! f8 just seems to bring the edge sharpness to the middle of the field. However, I may be sold on brightness alone. Even in the 10s shot at 2.8 on a full moon I managed to get so many stars. It would have been an 90s+ exposure at f8. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
happy-kat Posted February 1, 2018 Share Posted February 1, 2018 What about focusing where the thirds intersect to spread focus. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pipnina Posted February 1, 2018 Author Share Posted February 1, 2018 1 hour ago, happy-kat said: What about focusing where the thirds intersect to spread focus. I'll try that! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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