Tracker direction in North Hemi, while facing north or south

[ju1234]

I started astrophotography only recently, using camera and manual tracker (barn door tracker). So basic question:

I do the polar alignment of the tracker, while facing north. The tracker is set up with hinge on left side, so the tracker will open anti-clockwise moving with the rotation of the sky. For taking photos of the northern sky I would mount the camera pointing north while tracker is set up as above. Am I right so far? But now I want to take photos of southern sky. On the same tripod as set up above, will I just mount the camera pointing south (hinge on right side)? Or do I turn the tracker around so the hinge is on right? And what if I am taking photos of east or west sky? Thanks.

[Demonperformer]

Tracking in the northern hemisphere is clockwise: N->E->S->W. This is the same whichever way you are facing, so the hinge should always be on the right.

[barkis]

The hinged side of the Tracker is the Polar Axis, and points to the North Celestialb Pole.
It stays in that position, whether your camera is imaging in the Southern sky, or the Northern sky.
You turn your Camera to your chosen target, not the Tracker. The tracking movement is always East to West.

Ron.

[happy-kat]

My barn door tracker my manual turning handle is also going anticlockwise, but the hind of the mount faces Polaris (I build my barn door on a wedge design for my latitude) I use a red dot finder for this, the barn door opens East to West (hinge on left), the camera is on a ball head and can point anywhere I choose.

I hope you enjoy your barn door as much as I do and please share images taken with it. I have found 40mm works great for me and can attain 3 minutes consistently. I make use of the 10 second buffer before star trails for my camera (1100d) and usually float around a 5 second delay and never get ahead of the movement as this will instantly give star trails.