Hello (New England) !~

[Unimatrix0]

Hi everyone, My name is Frank.
I'm relatively new to astrophotography, but somewhat experienced in stargazing and regular daytime photography.  
A little background on me. 
1st telescope (long long time ago - a Russian made something.. very plastic , but on a heavy duty equatorial mount. (mid 1980s,  that mount was heavy but really good by beginner standards, the refractor on it left a lot to desire).  I think I used it like 3 times, I had no idea how to use an equatorial mount (no internet and forums, no cellphones) so i think it was given away (back in Europe) .  

2nd time I picked up on sky observing  was about 15yrs ago.  I bought a Newtonian reflector for my brother's birthday on an EQ mount again, also bought a 60mm refractor on an Alt-AZ.   He ended up using the refractor for a few weeks, then forgot about the whole thing.  I found the telescopes a year later in the shed outside, under a tarp. 
 I began to use  the Newtonian 6"  (the refractor was indeed a poor quality scope and the newtonian needed culmination done)  and discovered a few things for the first time, as I learned how to use the mount and I was using a paper chart and the dial numbers.  (People need to learn this really, can be so useful just to set it on the numbers, unfortunately mount manufacturers treat this as an afterthought and the dial groves/numbers are not accurate enough! )  I picked up Saturn,  Andromeda, Mars, and a bunch of other objects I have never seen with my own eyes before. 
Meanwhile I was also doing photography long before this, starting with a 35mm film SLR I borrowed (Canon-something)  from my dad's drawer. He really loved that camera and eventually he put it away to a better place where I couldn't find it, after he discovered I was making pictures of a waterfall, nearly standing below the water. 😁  I was also taking photography lessons in high school and had multimedia art class in college (photoshop skills. )
After that, for the longest time ever, I didn't care about photography, I had no experience with DSLRs beyond the point of setting it on AUTO and taking a picture on birthdays and Christmas.  And that again wasn't mine, I never owned one until now. 
So to put it altogether, just recently (COVID times) thought about making pictures of things on the skies. 
I brushed off my knowledge regarding the night sky objects (kinda forgot a whole lot of things)
I bought myself a DSLR (Pentax K70)- which wasn't my first choice, but I found one for sale, half the price of the Canon I really wanted. it's good for now. 
I recently bought a Williams Optics Z61 scope and my latest purchase (I'm out of money!!) is an EQ 6R Pro.  
By the way, I still haven't imaged with this combo. I wanted to familiarize myself separately , both the camera and the mount and the scope. 
So all I've been doing is making all kind of pictures with my camera on regular camera tripod  (the camera has an astrotracer feature- making the sensor shift inside the camera to stop star trails, which is sort of a hit/miss feature in my experience) 
The mount and scope - So far I only used for visual observing, since it's a new purchase there has only been a very few days without clouds at night. It's like purposely happening, that I cannot get a clear night . 
Anyway, see you around, 
Also, I got some intermediate skills with Photoshop as well, you may find me commenting on processing posts. 
Happy Trails, Clear skies! 

 

[toml]

Curious where you are. I'm in southern New England and I can empathize about the weather...

[Unimatrix0]

18 minutes ago, toml said:

Curious where you are. I'm in southern New England and I can empathize about the weather...

Haha!  I was just about to do some scoping, Weather channel said "clear" , it looks damn cloudy to me !  I'm in Northwest Connecticut. 

[toml]

Yes, a few clouds moving in from the west by you but they should dissolve in a bit. The bigger issue is the northern jet stream above us at the moment that blurs seeing. I was going to offer some help but I'm in SE Massachusetts so we're a little far apart.

[PXR-5]

Welcome Frank, thanks for joining us 😊

[SStanford]

Hi Frank, welcome to the forum.

[banjaxed]

Hi Frank, welcome to SGL.

[Mr Spock]

Hi Frank, welcome to SGL 

[laudropb]

Hello and a warm welcome to the SGL.

[PeterCPC]

Hello Frank and welcome.

[Floater]

Welcome. Hope you continue to have lots of fun. 🙂

[sloz1664]

Hi Frank, and a very warm welcome to the Lounge

Steve

[Dave Lloyd]

Hi Frank, welcome. 

[Pete Presland]

Hi welcome to SGL from Pete in Bedfordshire  🙂