Since I got my DSLR (Canon 450D) a couple of months ago, I decided to give long-exposure astrophotography a go - to see if I can snap up some stars, nebulae or whatever else is out there - without a telescope! I had no experience in this area, so here's a quick overview of what I've achieved from Day #0.

(Note: Most of the star images are clickable for a much larger version)

So, the simplest approach - camera on tripod:

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/484168724_DFYvQ-X3.jpg


Aim at night sky, 10-15 sec exposure at high ISO setting:

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/484167675_fPSLB-X3.jpg


Looks alright, so many more stars visible than with the naked eye! Any longer than 15 secs and you get star trails. So what next? Put the camera on a German Equatorial Mount usually used for telescopes, allowing the camera to rotate opposite to Earth's rotation and keep the stars steady. That way we can take much longer exposures - the main difficulty is aligning the mount precisely (can take up to an hour)!

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/484167226_GaTpo-X3.jpg


Take a quick 6 second test shot at 55mm focal length, all good:

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/484168129_yYZUv-X3.jpg


What's the bluish thing in right of centre?

The Orion Nebula (also known as Messier 42, M42, or NGC 1976) is a diffuse nebula situated south[b] of Orion's Belt. It is one of the brightest nebulae, and is visible to the naked eye in the night sky. M42 is located at a distance of 1,270±76 light years and is the closest region of massive star formation to Earth

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messier_42

Bump up the focal length to 250mm for extra zoom, stack 9 x 1min exposures:

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/484167294_pxyNm-X3.jpg


Not as good as the NASA shots but not bad for a home camera. The main problem is the camera sensor's filter blocks out a certain wavelength that the nebula emits heaps of, so some of the detail is missing.

What's next? I heard there was a comet called Lulin currently being observed around the world. I didn't expect to see much with the camera but was surprised that it was visible with a 25sec exposure at 250mm focal length:

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/484168619_VwAHh-X3.jpg

The next night I prepared early and set up the Canon software to take a 25sec exposure every minute for almost 2 hours. Then aligned the frames and made a time-lapse animation to show the comet's path:




Hope you enjoyed the read and pics.

that is really cool parabol! :D especially the 9 x 1min exposure stack of orion! my telescope is at a mates place up at mt.mee... great place for viewing but i hardly ever go there anymore... hope he hasn't sold my scope :p

i'll have to stick my digital camera on the mount one night n see what i can achieve... it's not a dslr though... just a sony f707 :/

What do you use for a remote shutter with your 450D? Was thinking about getting one but not sure which one to get. or do you just use a laptop?

^ Canon RC-1 wireless remote:

http://www.canon.com.au/products/slr_camera_accessories/remote_controls/1576.html

Bought it from Ted's. For automated stuff I just use the laptop with the EOS utility.

Wow!

parabol delivers yet again!

Great thread Parabol. well done man.

well done everybody!


i mean parabol!

Another nice thread para, love the time lapse.

Have you considered heading out bush (I mean way way out bush) away from the lights of towns and cities? I remember when I was growing up as a kid in the bush in WA the clear night skies were really something to marvel at. People tend not to realize what a huge difference getting away from teh city makes to the night sky.

Dont even have to head too far to the bush, if you could find a narrow valley it would block off light pollution more but could decrease or field of view a bit

Have you considered heading out bush (I mean way way out bush)

Yeah I was at the base of Mt Warning for NYE, but at the time I had no idea how to use the camera properly, how to do widefield shots, nor even how to focus on stars - so the results came out quite blurry and crap.

I was absolutely amazed at how many stars were visible. We were seeing satellites hoon past regularly. Wouldn't mind taking the gear down there again sometime and giving it a proper go.

Pwoah that detail is incredible..

Out here at Kholo the amount of stars you can see is amazing... would love to take a quick shot of it with my GF's SLR..

If i get a tripod for it can i get a picture like the first one you posted?

Its a canon S3 SLR

i can see stars from my balcony at coorparoo, i can take photos of them from my telephone

i can see stars from my balcony at coorparoo, i can take photos of them from my telephone

http://zedomax.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2008/07/camera-phone.jpg

I grew up in a small iron ore minign town in WA called Paraburdoo. I can remember nights during winter when the air was really clear that the stars were so numerous and bright you didn't need a touch to find your way around. When I moved to the Galdstone area here in QLD I noticed the difference the first night I was here.

Being a coastal environment I guess moisture in teh air had a little to do with not being able to see as many plus being a fair sized town with a heap of lights.

If i get a tripod for it can i get a picture like the first one you posted?

Its a canon S3 SLR

Tripod helps for sure. Just have to find a way to take the shot after a delay (or remotely) so the camera doesn't shake. I'm not familiar with that camera, but others seemed to have some level of success with it:

http://astronomer.proboards23.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=ps3&thread=1283&page=1

hay, u should do that shot where you focus on the pole and let all the stars rotate around in perfect circles!

you need a better tripod, that one looks so chav.

hay, u should do that shot where you focus on the pole and let all the stars rotate around in perfect circles!

not sure if it can be done on the 450d. need "bulb" release. can be done on my 20d :D

not sure if it can be done on the 450d. need "bulb" release

Yes it can be done, and was done for a couple of these shots.

Already discussed in this thread :)

just needed a thread to post this in ;]



orrjeh. <3 dead can dance

Moon was coming up outside, just before twilight just then. Thought I'd give some photography a go :)

Camera is a Canon 9MP SX110 PowerShot (only $400) with 10x zoom so its a decent camera but not even close to DSLR or your kinda gear.

Put it on manual mode and brought the ISO down to 80, F4.5 aperture with 1/250 shutter speed. Managed to snap this up (cropped only).

http://img17.imageshack.us/img17/7379/img0612.jpg

I've just been reading a bit about those camera settings. Should I increase the ISO and bring down the shutter speed even more?

By the way, that's standing up in the yard without a tripod and just my arms. The auto-stabilisation is pretty mad.

last edited by 3dee at 22:06:27 05/Mar/09

Nice work Para! As always!

Should I increase the ISO and bring down the shutter speed even more?

You could give it a shot - I always recommend trying several settings of the same scene for experimentation/education. But those aren't bad results for a regular camera at all - can't see much room for improvement on the raw image, might want to try stacking/sharpening (see below)?

Below is mine hand-held at f/5.6, 1/500 exposure, ISO 200 (native), image stabilisation. The second image is with Wavelet sharpening applied in software. Looks better but notice how as a side effect it brought out the grain noise as well? That can be offset by taking say 10-20 shots and aligning/stacking the best 5 or so - increases the SNR and reduces grain. Stacking is very helpful :)

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/486560443_Tp5kd-X3.jpg

http://www.smugmug.com/photos/486560478_wtxzZ-X3.jpg

last edited by parabol at 01:48:39 08/Mar/09