Taking pic of comet

[Anthony1979]

Can anyone tell what setting to use on my nikon d3500 to image the comet thanks

[fwm891]

@Anthony1979 If this helps then fine:

I shot the comet last night with a 70 - 200 zoom at f3.5. I used 2 and 2.5 second exposures at 400 iso.

I had to tweak the exposure in processing so 3 seconds would have been a better choice.

So it depends on your lens aperture settings. Based on the above for every 'f-stop' slower (bigger number) than f3.5 you need to double the exposure length or double your iso settings i.e. 400 / 800/ 1600 / 3200...

Best thing is to bracket well each side and check the results on the view screen. Ideally increase the iso rather than lengthening the exposure if your on a static tripod to avoid subject motion.

Good luck

Edited July 12, 2020 by fwm891

[Tenor Viol]

I used a 70-200mm zoom lens. Using the '400 rule' I can get 5 seconds at 70mm and 2 seconds at 200mm. I should add my camera is a full frame Z6, so for a cropped sensor (Nikon is 1.5) you will have to reduce exposure length to 2/3 of mine. I used ISO 800 - 3200 and lens was at f/2.8. 

[Anthony1979]

Thanks im going to have a go tonight... I will be using sigma 70-300 dg lens.... not the best i no

[Snooze]

I used that sigma lens this morning to capture the comet and it did pretty fine. However I was using my star adventurer mini too I did 15s exposures.

 

[Spaced Out]

I had a go last night. A bit of trial and error with lenses, I wanted some landscape in and so needed to keep it fairly wide angle.

I used a Canon 5D Mk4 + EF 85mm F1.8.

5 secs, ISO 1600, F5.

 

[Anthony1979]

Never managed to get out clouds destroyed my plans

[Tenor Viol]

49 minutes ago, Anthony1979 said:

Never managed to get out clouds destroyed my plans

Probably another chance this weekend and it will be higher up

[michael8554]

Just take lots of images at different exposures and focal lengths, you'll soon get a feeling for what works.

Michael

[Scoobs767]

I have a Nikon D5200, with a 50mm  F 1.8 lens.  Any advice on ISO and exposure times for the comet... very new to this.

 

[Hargo]

I would probably start at 2 seconds with the lens wide open

[happy-kat]

I've been using a 55mm lens on a canon 1100d (crop sensor) and have done 5 or 6 seconds, ISO1600 and stopped the lens down to f2.8

[don4l]

Last night's settings for me (which were spot on) :-

Canon eos250d,  50mm at 2.8, ISO 800, 8second.

There was the tiniest amount of star trailing, so maybe ISO1600 at about 5s might have been a bit better.

This is a single jpeg straight out of the camera, downsized for display:-

 

 

[Edit]  The tricky bit was focusing.  I've got an App on my phone which allows a 10x "live view" zoom.  I'm not sure how I would have done it without this unless I had a pc directly connected.

Edited July 18, 2020 by don4l