Thank you for that, the sites I'd looked at had me quite confused around long exposure trailing factors & tracking. To do it well I realised it would be an expensive hobby but merely by the fact I knew very little about how to even begin I thought I'd best ask. When I get the chance to have a first try I'll see where it leads me. It's probably featured in one of my photo books. Thanks again & wish me luck! Before I end up buying whatever.
I'd agree with this. If you go for an astrophotography refractor, you will need a heavier weight tripod and might have balancing issues, but still be restricted to 15 second or less exposures and not really get the most out of it.
I have no set budget for whatever I go to, I'm only at the very initial stages of investigating which items would be key. I had a decent idea that a much sturdier tripod would be required plus a refractor (& mount) to use with my D80. Many years ago I tried some long exposure shots of moving car headlights & lightning strikes with a different [Nikon F80 & Praktica BX20] film cameras but this is a totally different ball game, as I picked up when I checked a website. My plan at this point is to investigate long exposures in darker conditions to see the effects with what I have before looking to specifically improve it to some astrophotography shots with specific kit. I looked at the Star Adventurer but my knowledge of the subject, or lack of, stopped me there. I also need to check what my programs are capable of and decide how far I'd be willing to go with it all. Im likely to buy a book on the subject for further aid but again I've not got to that yet. Maybe one day?
Sorry to be a pest, but further to my earlier reply: Do you know of any reason that the book Astro. for the Amateur [Michael Covington] would not be of help to me in my current position to pick up knowledge on the subject?
Cheers. Feel free to message me.
About the book, the one on Amazon is 1999 and there have been a lot of advancements since. I’m not sure about a modern book, but it might be worth looking out a local astronomy society.
I appreciate your reply, I only mentioned that book because it was cheap and could have given me some insight! I'll look further for some more modern book. I live in Jarrow but am currently in Cumbria. My personal point of note is that I have MS so am rather restricted for full safe mobilty which largely pulled the plug on my love of mountain walking & photography. I note your list of free programs
On consideration, do you think I could take a some nightsky trial shots on a tripod [or other stabilising means] with the 2x converter, 300mm lens and the timer? Or do you think use of a 10mm lens for the broader sky to begin may be better? I could then tinker with software to see where I go re: next equipment?
I missed this and just replied to your PM, but I'll repeat it here as it may be of interest to others
stellarium-web.org
I've now come home, checked my photo kit [ie D80, 2x converter (poor quality) with Nikon 70-300mm lenses capabilities on a few handheld supported moon shots so I now know I need a decent tripod for the long exposures as per your advice for darker skies. I'll trial my existing Jessop tripod over the next few days if I have a suitable sky but I know a Manfrotto would be a better bet. I'm close to the tweak settings stage, I now have a Philip's Stars & Planets basic guidebook to start me off with identification & location. I've checked for local astronomy clubs [only N'castle & S'land hold one], the sky is becoming more dark so more personal trials will be carried out in daylight to nail down what further (or better) equip I'd need. I assume manual focussing at infinity would be the best bet. I'll try specific object focus to see what img difference comes out, I can zoom into the shots on computer img downloads & photo programs (I could sharpen with Adobe photoshop elements or the Nikon program) to see where I'm at. I think what I need now is a darker sky but the original img quality is key. The Stellarium pgm you sent me is a godsend!I missed this and just replied to your PM, but I'll repeat it here as it may be of interest to others
Cool. Sorry I didn't reply to your post in the thread, I saw it come in as I was going out and forgot about it.
Have you looked at any night sky apps? I personally like Stellarium the best. There is an online version but it is not as good:
Make sure you let your location. That should give a good idea of what you can see.Stellarium Web Online Star Map
Stellarium Web is a planetarium running in your web browser. It shows a realistic star map, just like what you see with the naked eye, binoculars or a telescope.
What I would do is start with widefield shots, basically as much sky (low zoom) as possible. Cassiopeia would make a good target. Take a 15 second exposure on a medium ISO (400-800) and see what you capture. If you have a live view on your screen, do a digital zoom on one bright star and manually adjust the focus until the star is as small as possible. Zoom back out and see how long you can take an exposure for until you start to get star trailing.
One possible thing to do is take an hour worth of shots of the same bit of the sky with a timer and then join them together to make a star trail picture.
To the lower left of Cassiopeia , half way to Perseus is the double cluster. As you feel more confident in your imaging, you can use greater zoom and the bigger lenses to home in on that. The advantage of going for this as a starter object is it is fairly high in the sky at the minute. Being overhead means less thick atmosphere to go through and should be darker and clearer.
A few other objects to consider which are well placed in the sky at the minute are.... Cygnus, lots of interesting things there and the milky way runs through it, if you can get very dark skies then you might be able to capture that will out too long of an exposure. Further right is Hercules, M13 is a big star cluster. There is the Andromeda galaxy and there is also Leo. That one is getting a little low now, but has a nice little triplet of galaxies in it. You will likely only capture them as fuzzy balls, but it is so satisfying to pick them out.
One of the key things is do not be disheartened as you get started. Being in Cumbria you have access to some very dark skies, but perhaps practice a little at home first, where you have easy access to the internet to look things up or a computer for a quicker look at what you have captured. The other thing is to understand the atmosphere. Obviously cloud means you can't see anything, but high humidity in the atmosphere reduces clarity as does dust. If you have a hot spell with no rain for weeks, atmospheric humidity increases as does dust. So at the minute it is fairly poor 'seeing', to use the astro term. Add to that, mid-summers day is only 5 days away and the sky will not get properly dark, less so the further north you are, you pick a bad time to start. But hone your skills when times are bad and then you really enjoy the good times.
I would see if there are any local astronomy clubs to go along to. I bet someone there will give practical hands on advice and help you tweak your settings until you get something good.
Thanks for that, more points for me to note & learn from. As you can tell, I'm a very long way from being able to produce an img of that standard but it's something for me to aim for. A 1s exposure of something (when conditions are right) is probably one of my next learning trials to see what happens with the img & what I'd need to try for it to reach an acceptable sharpness & clarity. At this point I'd be overjoyed to even produce an img with trailing.
Raising the with ISO level will be one of my trials to reach the stage of managing to take an img. Firstly, I want to get an img (which I fully expect to be poor), then work from there on improving the standard of the next set of shots. I've never shot at that ISO 1600 level & beyond so what comes out of it will be new to me (I'll expect noise) apart from my recent trial the highest ISO I've shot at was 400 with film on my Nikon F80 & Praktica BX20 many years back. Grain I need to get used to, so ISO 1600 & above shots will be my next few days' investigation.
I've missed that for tonight, but the nature of astro means that there'll be some other good photo trial (in my case) opportunity coming when I'm set & prepared for it. The evening light is heading into a realm that would suit my next step. I'd need to see what my location can next offer & get fully ready.
My D80 does not have mirror lock up so I'd need to use exposure delay, my F80 has it which is how I was confused, sorry.
With a D80 Manual allows up to 30s exposure if you use B mode then you enable touch shutter in menu 5 and that allows you to control the amount of exposure by touching the screen to start and touch again to end.
I was convinced the D80 had it (for cleaning), I checked briefly online which said it wan't on the D80 so I'l dig the manual out and have a fiddle [in private obviously]. I've just found the manual and it does have lock up facility, instruction on brochure p125. I have a remote in my bag (with some unopened memory cards & filters) which I connected the other day. I'm on a right old relearning curve here because due to poor health camera use has not been high on my agenda for a few years. By all means feel free to get yours out & fiddle now......
Noted, thanks. I really need to see what the menu will cover & enable. I bought that camera because of the things the salesman explained about it's capabilities as we stood outside & he went over what it could do . The comprehensivity of what was at the time a new model in the Nikon repertoire really hooked me as I was moving from film to digital. This is bringing it all back for me.
