It's all black

[tomcamish]

Hi All, 

I've had a reflector telescope for years but never really used it (this one) . I've recently dusted it off and decided to try my hand at astrophotography. 

I was really pleased with myself when I successfully pointed the telescope at Saturn and could make out the planet and rings (it looked like one big white ring but a good start). Once I'd nailed getting the planet in view I decided to hook up my Canon EOS 600D.

Initially I connected it using THIS and was able to get a picture of a Saturn and ring shaped slightly blurry blob, which I have to zoom in on the image to see, thus blurring it further. For my first attempt I was pretty pleased. I then watched some YouTube videos of people showing how it's done and upgraded the Canon T-ring to THIS so I could drop a lens into it for more zoom. 

However, when I try the new adapter with a lens the camera picks nothing up - any picture I take regardless of how long exposure I use just comes out as a black screen - not even any stars.

If I take then lens out of the adapter I get the same. I only get a picture if I use the original T-ring, back to the blurry really small blob. 

Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong? I'd really like to get into astrophotography but not getting anywhere yet. 

Many thanks in advance. 

Edited August 29, 2019 by tomcamish
Corrected links

[Davey-T]

Hi and welcome to SGL.

There may not be enough focuser travel on your scope to accommodate additional extensions. 

Does your camera have the 1 to 1 640X480 crop mode video feature which some Canon cameras have, this is good for videoing planets.

Dave

[Cornelius Varley]

Most reflector telescopes don't have sufficient inwards focuser travel for imaging. To solve this problem use a barlow lens to move the point of focus outwards.

[bobro]

Looks like a Jones-Bird design. If so, there will be a corrector lens at the bottom of the focuser tube. Although reflector telescopes often do not have enough inward travel to attach a DSLR, the x2 magnification of the lens doubles the effective length of the focuser travel and it seems you have been able to focus with a DSLR.

Unfortunately the image quality with this sort of low cost telescope is not normally very good and there's no point in trying to magnify the image as it will only show up shortcomings even more.

Have fun with it as it is, though a telescope more suitable for imaging is the way forward.

Edited August 30, 2019 by bobro