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DSO photography


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Hi guys,

Over the past few months my girlfriend and I have been overjoyed at the views of the DSOs we've managed to find using our Celestron Piwerseeker EQ127.

We've tried getting images with our Canon 1000D using prime focal attachment but the results are poor. There's nothing wring with the camera or for that matter the scope if we just want to view things but the scope obviously isn't up to the task of dso photography. This leads me onto the inevitable question if tour recommendations? Budget of between £500-£700?

Thanks for all your help!!

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When you say the results are poor, what exactly is the problem? Are you having trouble focussing or tracking or what?

What mount/tripod do you have - this maybe the problem if you have a lightweight aluminium tripod that isn't sturdy enough for astrophotography...

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Many of the spectacular DSO photos we see were taken on equipment costing 10's of thousands of pounds.

As a basic minimum, you will need something like an HEQ5 mount, ED80 Refractor** to image with, ST80 Refractor to guide with, A guide Camera (self controlled like LVI or Synguider or with a laptop to control), possibly a field flattener or coma corrector depending on the scope you go with, Deep sky stacker, processing software like Adobe CS3 or CS4.

I think I've blown your budget but that really is about the minimum for DSO's and even then only the bigger and easier ones.

You could probably use your current setup with a webcam based camera to take good images of planets or the moon with not too much investment (Although a IS DMK41 would set you back around £500 is you wanted a good camera) but cheaper alternatives could get you going for less than £100 if you have a laptop already.

** you can use other imaging scopes if they have well corrected optics and can produce flat fields with a coma corrector or field flattener

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Can help feeling a little more power on the scope wouldn't go amiss.

If by power, you mean magnification then I'd advise against that as this 'scope has an effective focal length of 1000mm already. To get started imaging DSOs, a much shorter focal length would help and, of course, imaging allows you to use a smaller aperture and yet still capture great images. Some of the best DSO images I have seen were taken on 80mm refractors!

Your mount is really your biggest concern as the EQ1 that you have just isn't up to the job as a platform for imaging anything other than perhaps the Moon.

You could do this in stages, buy a good substantial mount and put your DSLR on it and take widefield images with your camera lens, save up and get yourself something like the Sky-watcher ED80 for the next step on the journey. You DON'T need to spend thousands to have a lot of fun but the start point is a decent mount and here you must not compromise so we are talking £590 - £709 for an HEQ5 in one form or another.

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Actually, before spending any money on kit, buy Steve's book (see the link in his Sig just above) :).

You should be able to get some reasonable widefield images, if you're prepared to work at it, with your EQ1, your 1000d and the 18-55 kit lens at 18mm.

That would allow you to get some data under your belt, whilst reading about the right direction.

Then an HEQ5 and go from there.

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As another newbie who was asking a similar question a month or two back... Here's what I've learnt or been told...

Firstly, buy the book :-) 'making every photon count' is really essential reading for DSO imaging.

You can't get into DSO imaging from scratch for much less than a grand. That's the first thing I learned :-)

A HEQ5 Synscan is the lowest spec mount to go for... The go-to version is nice, but bumps the cost up from £600 odd quid to over £700. You would then be hard pushed to find a better scope than the SW 80ED DS Pro... About £330 for the OTA.

As has been said already, fast scopes are what you want, f7.5 or below really. Apperture doesn't count for much in DSO imaging... It's all about speed.

You don't HAVE to get a guide camera and scope straight away... You can get some lovely images with 2min or shorter subs stacked on an unguided (but well polar aligned) mount. Likewise, you don't have to blow £600 or so on a full version of Photoshop either. You can stack and process your images to a reasonable level with free (or at least cheaper) software.

You will need a DSLR camera to capture with... Or a suitable CCD... These aren't megga ecpensive at the lower end, you can of course blow thousands on them if you want to :-)

You could also pick up the scope or mount second hand. Be quick though... With hundreds of people all eager to get into DSO imaging and everyone on here recommending the same gear... HEQ5's and ED80's go fast :-) you could pick up both though for about £950 or so new, or about £750 second hand.

My 80ED is due for delivery next week, picking up the HEQ5 next week too... Looking forward to actually getting started on this interesting journey :-)

Ben

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Hi,

I second the general advice given in the previous posts: I got my Sirius EQ-G mount (same as HEQ5) and ordered at ED80T CF (just another flavor of 80mm ED scope). It's better to invest properly at the beginning instead of burning cash through newbie mistakes (of which I have done a lot :S ).

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Thanks guys. The dslr we brought was based on advice from here and hasn't let us down in any way :) I guess it's easy to get bogged down by all the terminology etc but knowing what's worked for others and seeing the results they got is invaluable.

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