Star Adventure Pro

[TomColes]

Hello all and thankyou for allowing me to join

my main reason for joining it’s to improve my Astro photography with the help of all the kind people on here.

i am in need of a little help I am trying to take some deep space photos

I have a star adventure pro a Nikon d7500 and various lenses. 
 

i have been able to get lovely pin sharp photos of the stars using my Nikon 55-300.  Set at ISO 100  f.       And a 2min exposure. However this is not producing the deep space photos I am searching for.

i have tried my 150-600 tamron lens for deep space but I keep getting a very strange star trail when doing this and therefore writing the images off as useless. 

setting used fully zoomed in. ISO 100 f.     And even at 30sec it’s still doing it.

i have triple checked the polar alignment and the balance of the camera and counter weight. All good.

i was photographing the pin wheel galaxy (or trying too)

my question is what am I doing wrong? What settings are others using?

i found it very difficult to locate the pinwheel galaxy. Is the an easier to locate galaxy that you would suggest ( an easy to find / beginners galaxy )that I can get everything sailed in on and finally start taking some decent images.

i intended to take multiple shots then stack them however at the moment with what’s happening that will be a waste of time.

[MarkAR]

Could be that the 150-600 is just too heavy.

Get a planetarium app on your phone, select target and place phone flat on to front light shield so that you can still see where your target is and manoeuvre the camera.

Its a bit of a faff but can get you there abouts.

Take a test shot minimum 30s at 1600 and hopefully you will detect a faint smudge that is your target. Or go by the stars in the image and compare with the planetarium app, manoeuvre camera carefully for better framing if necessary.

[Spaced Out]

48 minutes ago, TomColes said:

Hello all and thankyou for allowing me to join

my main reason for joining it’s to improve my Astro photography with the help of all the kind people on here.

i am in need of a little help I am trying to take some deep space photos

I have a star adventure pro a Nikon d7500 and various lenses. 
 

i have been able to get lovely pin sharp photos of the stars using my Nikon 55-300.  Set at ISO 100  f.       And a 2min exposure. However this is not producing the deep space photos I am searching for.

i have tried my 150-600 tamron lens for deep space but I keep getting a very strange star trail when doing this and therefore writing the images off as useless. 

setting used fully zoomed in. ISO 100 f.     And even at 30sec it’s still doing it.

i have triple checked the polar alignment and the balance of the camera and counter weight. All good.

i was photographing the pin wheel galaxy (or trying too)

my question is what am I doing wrong? What settings are others using?

i found it very difficult to locate the pinwheel galaxy. Is the an easier to locate galaxy that you would suggest ( an easy to find / beginners galaxy )that I can get everything sailed in on and finally start taking some decent images.

i intended to take multiple shots then stack them however at the moment with what’s happening that will be a waste of time.

Welcome to SGL !

So..... Maybe the 600mm is a bit too heavy for that mount ? A longer focal length will magnify any little errors too.

For DSO's I normally use fairly high ISO and stack to reduce noise, 100 ISO is very low to pick up detail of faint objects even with 2 min exposures.  For example when I use my 6D with a lens at f4 I use ISO 1600 for 2 minute exposures. When I used to use a DSLR with my F5 telescope I used ISO between 800-1600 for 10 minute exposures of galaxies.

What f. do you use ? Of course wide open lets in the most light but I usually stop down one or two stops to increase star sharpness with most of my lenses.

For framing I use maximum ISO and short exposures (maybe 10-20 secs) to get stuff where I want it before running the actual images.

 

[Davey-T]

Welcome to SGL, I use the SWSA adventurer and the biggest lens I use is a 300mm f/4 this can do around 2- 3 minutes depending on where I'm aiming, the 600 zoom is probably a bit too heavy although you may see reasonable images taken with one on the SWSA as with all mass produced mounts the quality is very variable so not all of them can produce the same results.

There are videos on fettling them to try and improve performance if you think it's worth it.

On the finding target point a red dot finder mounted in the hot shoe can be used to star hop to your target once aligned with the camera.

Dave

[TomColes]

Thanks for your replies my Nikon lens goes down to F5.6 fully zoomed at 300. Once I find the object, would you suggest iso 1600 and 2-3 mins? Is this current lens going to be sufficient or would you recommend a lens with a lower f-stop??

[Davey-T]

Like most astro' imaging it's a case of try it and see, no experience of Nikon but try iso1600 anyway, the main problem with DSLRs is the higher the iso the more "noise" is introduced which doesn't affect daytime photography so it's a bit of a trade off depending on what results you're happy with.

There is infinite variety in size and brightness of targets so f/5.6 will be fine for starters.

Dave

[Waldemar]

Do you stretch the images? Maybe what you want is there but not visible on your comp, yet...

[TomColes]

So just an update I spent 3 hours last night after polar alignment of my tracker trying to find my target Bodes galaxy. 
 

the method I used point the camera in its rough direction. With my lens a 55-300mm zoom right out. Took a photo spent ages try to work out what I was seeing then move the camera to the direction of the target. This is not easy because I had to realise the clutch move the arm (. A guess then adjust the left and right then try again with another picture) after doing this for three hours i found a galaxy not totally sure which one and the the camera battery ran out.

at this point I wanted to throw the tracker as far as I possibly could.

is there anything I can do to make my life easier. Eg. A small sighting scope that would fit to the hot shoe of the camera so I can point the camera with a bit of a more accuracy. 
 

 

[MarkAR]

21 minutes ago, TomColes said:

A small sighting scope that would fit to the hot shoe of the camera

They do exist but the fit isn't always good and may not point you along the axis of the camera.

Try something like Stellarium on your phone, you will be able to get close to target. I managed to get M101 dead centre in 10 minutes by placing phone on front of lens.

[Davey-T]

An RDF in the hotshoe is the easiest thing to use once lined up with the live view on the camera.

Dave

[City9Town0]

+1 for the red dot finder.... Made my life so much simpler and removed a massive frustration.

(I now can concentrate on the next level of frustrations)

[TomColes]

31 minutes ago, Davey-T said:

An RDF in the hotshoe is the easiest thing to use once lined up with the live view on the camera.

Dave

I’ve been trying to find an RDF but can’t seem to find one. Would you mind sharing the link for yours?

[Davey-T]

I just filed one down that I had to fit but you can buy one complete with hot shoe adapter.

Dave

https://www.365astronomy.com/Blitz-Hotshoe-dSLR-Camera-Adapter-and-Red-Dot-Finder-COMBO.html

[Whistlin Bob]

+1 for the hot shoe adaptor and RDF. 

Also, I'd suggest going for a shorter focal length to start with. I use a 135mm and a 300mm lens on my SA and the 135mm is vastly easier to aim (although targets are a little sparse this time of year). The 300mm often takes me half an hour to get the framing right- the 135 is rarely more than 5 minutes. And that's with me having years of observational experience with pointing Dobs at bits of sky! 

I completely understand the enormous frustration of when you can't get things working and have been known to sit in my back garden literally yelling at my equipment at times- but hang in there: when it comes together it's fantastic!

[TomColes]

So last night I got set up but the cloud put a stop to the fun. But I did manage to learn a bit. I stuck my mobile to the flat surface on the back of a flash I have and opened stellarium . In a very crude way it ment where I pointed the camera I could see the rough direction of the galaxy I was targeting it did help to speed things up.

 

however I did have a break through. I have liked my camera live view to my laptop and can run a split screen one showing what the camera is aiming at and one showing the pc version of stellarium this should greatly improve my ability to match what the camera is seeing and what I am looking for on stellarium. it also makes focusing on stars much easier. Fingers crossed for a clear night so I can try again.

[MarkAR]

2 hours ago, TomColes said:

I have liked my camera live view to my laptop and can run a split screen one showing what the camera is aiming at and one showing the pc version of stellarium

Brilliant idea.

[TomColes]

On 11/04/2020 at 10:50, MarkAR said:

They do exist but the fit isn't always good and may not point you along the axis of the camera.

Try something like Stellarium on your phone, you will be able to get close to target. I managed to get M101 dead centre in 10 minutes by placing phone on front of lens.

Excuse my ignorance how do you see the phone screen if it’s up against the lens ?? Sorry for the stupid question 

[MarkAR]

2 hours ago, TomColes said:

Excuse my ignorance how do you see the phone screen if it’s up against the lens ?? Sorry for the stupid question 

Have the selected target peaking out the side, not fully centred in the lens. Can get a little tricky sometimes.

[TomColes]

I would really like to say a huge Thankyou to the people above that have helped me. Your help and sharing of knowledge has been invaluable to helping me and my girlfriend to take the image below.
 

 yayayayayayay!!!!

the image below was taken by my girlfriend with me as an assistant. with your help above we have finally managed to take a deep space shot. The only issue I had was the camera flicked to jpeg when I attached it to my laptop during setup. Not sure why this happened but every days a school day. 
 

it was taken using a star tracker pro a tamron 150 - 600mm lens At 600mm  f6.3 ISO 1600 for 60sec. 70 stacked images (jpeg)

no filters (need to buy some)

taken on the outskirts of a busy town. In Buckinghamshire 

all in all happy but with room to improve. Any tips would be fantastic to improve.

 

[MarkAR]

That is really good, well done.

[Stu1smartcookie]

Brilliant pic ... in fact this thread has been really good to read . I have the same issues sometimes in finding the galaxy etc . I am using a Wo ZS61 and i am a bit frustrated that it didnt come with a finder bracket and or guide rings , which the 73mm scope did have! I know its a wide field scope but its still sometimes a nightmare to find a target , especially under light polluted skies .