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Help: Beginner astro-photography setup


Astro_Pingu

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I have couple of questions, I would really appreciate it if someone can answer them.

I have a samsung WB200F point and shoot camera. Do I need to have a DSLR for astrophotogrphy or will I be alright with my point and shoot?

What kind of telescope will I need to get photos? GOTO Telescopes? 

What other things do I need to buy?

Do I need to good at image processing? I have no previous experience.

I don't live near a dark-sky, can I just use some kind of light pollution filters instead?

Thanks!

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Welcome to the forum.  My suggestion would be to invest in this first https://www.firstlightoptics.com/books/making-every-photon-count-steve-richards.html and then things should become clearer. There isn't a straightforward answer to your list of questions.  There is plenty of experience and help on this forum though. Happy reading.

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Welcome

I think you could use your camera to take star trail pictures these can look great. You could try your camera on the widest lens setting 24mm and the exposure at 16 seconds (which is the maximum the camera will do) and take say 50-100 photos and then use free program called starstax to combine and great your image. Experiment trying a star trails image with the lens at at say 200mm and 16 second exposure. I would guess ISO to be 400 or 800. Use the camera on a tripod and the self timer so you minimise shake from pressing the shutter button and use landscape mode I think.

Something in the distant foreground can look great in this type of image.

See what you can get from the camera you already own.

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Welcome to SGL! The book listed above is great, and a must-read. Your camera will struggle in astronomical imaging, as it doesn't really allow manual control of focus and exposure time. Besides, it cannot export images in raw mode, which is really needed. Try to get a cheap second-hand DSLR, preferably modded for astrophotography (there are some EOS 450D and similar types available quite often), and with a short telephoto or even a cheap-as-chips "nifty-fifty" you can start taking short exposures without a tracking mount. A tracking mount will allow longer exposures. I managed the following shots by combining loads of 60s exposures with a Canon EOS 550D (modded) and Canon 200mm telephoto on a cheap (second-hand) SkyWatcher EQ3-2 mount:

M31-07012018-2re2.thumb.jpg.9ef8fa772b6b211bdd396d9f641a0c68.jpg

This is about 2 hours worth of images. There are several programs available for image processing, many of them free (Deep Sky Stacker, Gimp and AstroImageJ are worth a look). I use Astro Pixel Processor for most of my deep sky stuff

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