exposure queston?

[lostinspace]

Could anyone shed any light on this for me please? I would like to try a quich go at imagine without having to invest a huge amount of money, just want to dip my toe in and see if its for me really. Firstly have i picked a realistic target (Orion Nebula)? Most importantly though, what will i need? Am i right to assume the aperture on the camera needs to be fully open constantly while tracking the nebula to attract the colour we see in the amazing pics we see from people on this forum? I had a very old camera where i could adjust the aperture manualy, would this do? also is a special kind of film needed? I`m sure ive left out more important questions so would be gratfull to anyone who felt they could help in any way,

thanks in advance for any help offered,

john

[roundycat]

the target you have picked is big and bright, how are you going to track it? What lens are you using, shorter focal lengths are not so critical of guide errors. With 35mm 80-100mm focal length will give you a reasonable image scale. If you are using film exposures will need to be fairly long, around ten to fifteen minutes with Kodak Elite Chrome E200, one of the best for this business as it does not supress the red sensitivity inherent in the emulsion.

The best thing is to get out there and try it.

Dennis

[brantuk]

Hi John - webcams are great and very cheap - you could add a tracking motor (from FLO above) to your mount and get some great results with planets. Use Registax to align the frames and Gimp to process them (both free downloads).

Don't know anything about film cameras - but a dslr if you have one is very useful with dso's.

Hope that helps

[Capricorn]

You are going to need to go digital.

A film camera will require long exposure times and I am not sure that an EQ3 will enable you to do that.

Also if anything goes wrong during the exposure on a film that is it all lost. On a digital you simply disregard that shot and use the others.

The approach is to take say 30-50 short(ish) exposures then stack the good ones on top of each other to get a good composite image built up.

The EQ3 will need motors and it will have to be accurately aligned. It will also need to be firmly sited.