Pentacon 50mm - 'best' aperture?

[Dazzyt66]

After a disappointing night last night with a 400mm I'm going back to widefield, but want to try my 50mm (which I haven't used with tracking before).

I've worked out that widefield gives me the most satisfaction image wise, but its a learning curve atm.

I want to try and get a decent image with about 1-2 hours of exposures - probably around 60s max on my HEQ5. I'm wary of doing the subs wide open f1.8 (or even a few stops down f2.8) as I think this will not give me clean stars. I'm tempted to go for f4 but will this give me enough data for a viable image in the time?

At the moment I'm interested in just getting a nice visual with an hour or so of data - with the intention of doing longer and longer integrations as I work out what works and what doesn't.

I just want to make sure I get something from the limited clear periods we're having so any advice greatly appreciated.

[Rustang]

I shot my last widefield image at f4 and that was only 38 mins worth in a Bortle 6 location so not sure if that helps!?

[rotatux]

Hi, I rarely use this lens now but here is a sample I had with it :

 

 

[Dazzyt66]

54 minutes ago, Rustang said:

I shot my last widefield image at f4 and that was only 38 mins worth in a Bortle 6 location so not sure if that helps!?

That sounds good - I'm in Bortle 7 and was aiming for around an hour worth of subs given the erratic weather...