8 replies to this topic

[Jack23]

I thought I should start with the easiest DSO in the night sky, the Orion Nebula. I started at 600mm and initially was trying at 10 to 20 seconds and obviously had long star trails that I thought was due to my weak camera stand. I could see the color in the pics with the star trails so I decided to put the camera on the ground and prop it up with whatever I could find in the backyard, and I still got the trails. That's when I finally realized my mistake and went down to 1 second and got a much better image, but with the stars still elongated. Then I finally tried the 0.6 seconds and that gave me almost round stars. I didn't want to up my ISO to 6400 so stayed at 0.6 seconds. I took the image in raw and disabled the in-camera noise reduction. The only edits in LightRoom were exposure, highlights, blacks, clarity and noise reduction. When manually focusing in the camera (live view zoomed in), I was surprised that I could clearly see the 4 stars in the trapezium. 

 

So at 0.6 seconds exposure, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much color and detail was visible in the Nebula. This is my first try at a DSO. I've tried the Milky Way with the Rokinon 14mm a couple of times, the Moon and even the Sun, but never tried a DSO before. Next I'm thinking of putting the camera and this lens on my old Sirius mount (non-GoTo but with tracking drive) to see what i can get. Does anyone know if that will be good enough, or would there be a lot of shake because of the drive motors?

 

Question on the color - Shouldn't the green be more muted and the red more pronounced? Is it because of the lens or the un-modded camera?

 

Camera - Canon 6d mk2

Lens - Sigma 150-600mm contemporary

1 exposure - 0.6 secs, 600mm, f/6.3, ISO 3200

taken from a Yellow/Green zone.

 

Full size image - http://www.bhavdeep....bula1sttry.html

(You'll have to scroll to the middle of the image to view the nebula)

 

CN restricted size pic attached.

 

 

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[Jim Waters]

This is a good image...  Don't be afraid to up the ISO to 6400 and higher.  If you are taking a SINGLE sub enable Long Exposure Noise Reduction.  It will eliminate some of the background noise.  Keep posting your pics.  If possible shoot at speeds faster than f/6.3.  Consider getting one of these below.

 

https://optcorp.com/...nturer-pro-pack

 

or 

 

https://optcorp.com/...nt-full-package

 

These images were taken with the Star Adventurer above from a LP Green Zone.

https://flic.kr/p/Y7Tj7g

https://flic.kr/p/YrWXuV

https://flic.kr/p/YUvW9W

https://flic.kr/p/CXjq8y

[WolfBiederman]

I thought I should start with the easiest DSO in the night sky, the Orion Nebula. I started at 600mm and initially was trying at 10 to 20 seconds and obviously had long star trails that I thought was due to my weak camera stand. I could see the color in the pics with the star trails so I decided to put the camera on the ground and prop it up with whatever I could find in the backyard, and I still got the trails. That's when I finally realized my mistake and went down to 1 second and got a much better image, but with the stars still elongated. Then I finally tried the 0.6 seconds and that gave me almost round stars. I didn't want to up my ISO to 6400 so stayed at 0.6 seconds. I took the image in raw and disabled the in-camera noise reduction. The only edits in LightRoom were exposure, highlights, blacks, clarity and noise reduction. When manually focusing in the camera (live view zoomed in), I was surprised that I could clearly see the 4 stars in the trapezium. 

 

So at 0.6 seconds exposure, I was pleasantly surprised to see how much color and detail was visible in the Nebula. This is my first try at a DSO. I've tried the Milky Way with the Rokinon 14mm a couple of times, the Moon and even the Sun, but never tried a DSO before. Next I'm thinking of putting the camera and this lens on my old Sirius mount (non-GoTo but with tracking drive) to see what i can get. Does anyone know if that will be good enough, or would there be a lot of shake because of the drive motors?

 

Question on the color - Shouldn't the green be more muted and the red more pronounced? Is it because of the lens or the un-modded camera?

 

Camera - Canon 6d mk2

Lens - Sigma 150-600mm contemporary

1 exposure - 0.6 secs, 600mm, f/6.3, ISO 3200

taken from a Yellow/Green zone.

 

Full size image - http://www.bhavdeep....bula1sttry.html

(You'll have to scroll to the middle of the image to view the nebula)

 

CN restricted size pic attached.

That's pretty darn good compared to my first recent attempt. I just ordered Skyguider Pro that Jim mentioned, can't wait. How do you like that Sigma 150-600mm? I was debating between that and the Tamron 150-600mm G2.

[2ghouls]

Next I'm thinking of putting the camera and this lens on my old Sirius mount (non-GoTo but with tracking drive) to see what i can get. Does anyone know if that will be good enough, or would there be a lot of shake because of the drive motors?

 

Question on the color - Shouldn't the green be more muted and the red more pronounced? Is it because of the lens or the un-modded camera?

Mount: I would say give it a try. If you can do 20 or 30 sec. exposures on Orion, you will reveal a lot more of the nebulosity.

 

Color: looks right. The true color of the trapezium is teal like that. Nothing wrong with your camera or lens.  If you want to read a pretty long article on it. Roger Clark has this on his website: http://www.clarkvisi...ium.true.color/

I am not a fan of every article on his site, but this one is good, and stands up to my own observations and experience.

 

Processing: feel free to make your astrophotos a bit brighter in the shadows/blacks. You will be surprised by how much is there!

[Jack23]

This is a good image...  Don't be afraid to up the ISO to 6400 and higher.  If you are taking a SINGLE sub enable Long Exposure Noise Reduction.  It will eliminate some of the background noise.  Keep posting your pics.  If possible shoot at speeds faster than f/6.3.  Consider getting one of these below.

 

https://optcorp.com/...nturer-pro-pack

 

or 

 

https://optcorp.com/...nt-full-package

 

These images were taken with the Star Adventurer above from a LP Green Zone.

https://flic.kr/p/Y7Tj7g

https://flic.kr/p/YrWXuV

https://flic.kr/p/YUvW9W

https://flic.kr/p/CXjq8y

 

Thanks! Nice pics you got there. Yeah, I have been thinking of getting the skyguider, but will experiment first with the mounts that I already have.

 

 

 

That's pretty darn good compared to my first recent attempt. I just ordered Skyguider Pro that Jim mentioned, can't wait. How do you like that Sigma 150-600mm? I was debating between that and the Tamron 150-600mm G2.

 

I've been using the Sigma 15-600 for regular photography. I have the usb dock for the lens, but haven't tweaked with any lens settings yet. But the lens is nice and it's sharp as it came from the factory. It's great on birds, and I used it in an air show last year with excellent results. I'm attaching a couple of cropped pics from the air show below (highly compressed). And from what I saw last night, looks like the lens is good for astro too

 

 

 

Mount: I would say give it a try. If you can do 20 or 30 sec. exposures on Orion, you will reveal a lot more of the nebulosity.

 

Color: looks right. The true color of the trapezium is teal like that. Nothing wrong with your camera or lens.  If you want to read a pretty long article on it. Roger Clark has this on his website: http://www.clarkvisi...ium.true.color/

I am not a fan of every article on his site, but this one is good, and stands up to my own observations and experience.

 

Processing: feel free to make your astrophotos a bit brighter in the shadows/blacks. You will be surprised by how much is there!

Thanks for the tips and the link. I tried another attempt last night, which I'll post below, with rough polar alignment, and I was able to get 10 second exposures.

 

 

 

Sample daytime pics from the lens below:

Attached Thumbnails

• 
• 

[Jack23]

So last night was clear too. And I wanted to see what I can achieve with tracking. I have an eq2 mount with drives that I used instead of the Sirius mount. I did a rough polar alignment, so that didn't let me take exposures longer than 10 seconds.

 

The camera was on top of the tube rings without the telescope and was shaking a lot at every touch. So I had to download the phone app to connect to the camera using WiFi. Even with that, I think I took maybe 20 to 25 pics out of which only 10 were usable.

 

I stacked them in Photoshop using a tutorial I found on YouTube. Also, in the process, I realized that my PC is really slow . I edit regular daytime pictures all the time in LR and PS and have no issues, but stacking 10 raw pics in Photoshop made my computer really sloooow. Anyway, I was able to finish it up and below is the resulting picture. This seems like a fun thing to do, I think I will have to start upgrading my PC.

 

10 subs, 10 seconds each, at 600mm, f/6.3, ISO 3200
Canon 6d mk2 with Sigma 15-600mm Contemporary

 

Full Size image - http://bhavdeep.net/...2ndAttempt.html (5.3MB)

 

Compressed image attached:

 

Attached Thumbnails

• 

[Jim Waters]

Thanks! Nice pics you got there. Yeah, I have been thinking of getting the skyguider, but will experiment first with the mounts that I already have.

 

 

 

 

I've been using the Sigma 15-600 for regular photography. I have the usb dock for the lens, but haven't tweaked with any lens settings yet. But the lens is nice and it's sharp as it came from the factory. It's great on birds, and I used it in an air show last year with excellent results. I'm attaching a couple of cropped pics from the air show below (highly compressed). And from what I saw last night, looks like the lens is good for astro too

 

 

 

Thanks for the tips and the link. I tried another attempt last night, which I'll post below, with rough polar alignment, and I was able to get 10 second exposures.

 

 

 

Sample daytime pics from the lens below:

Real nice pictures.  Nice and sharp.  I like the lens.  Here's my with a 70-300 f/4-5.6L at 300mm  Canon lens.

https://flic.kr/p/22xkfME

https://flic.kr/p/23W96vK

[2ghouls]

So last night was clear too. And I wanted to see what I can achieve with tracking. I have an eq2 mount with drives that I used instead of the Sirius mount. I did a rough polar alignment, so that didn't let me take exposures longer than 10 seconds.

 

The camera was on top of the tube rings without the telescope and was shaking a lot at every touch. So I had to download the phone app to connect to the camera using WiFi. Even with that, I think I took maybe 20 to 25 pics out of which only 10 were usable.

 

I stacked them in Photoshop using a tutorial I found on YouTube. Also, in the process, I realized that my PC is really slow . I edit regular daytime pictures all the time in LR and PS and have no issues, but stacking 10 raw pics in Photoshop made my computer really sloooow. Anyway, I was able to finish it up and below is the resulting picture. This seems like a fun thing to do, I think I will have to start upgrading my PC.

 

10 subs, 10 seconds each, at 600mm, f/6.3, ISO 3200
Canon 6d mk2 with Sigma 15-600mm Contemporary

 

Full Size image - http://bhavdeep.net/...2ndAttempt.html (5.3MB)

 

Compressed image attached:

Very nice improvement!! I have a video you might find useful for your next attempt: https://youtu.be/Qb1ceFM-DkQ

 

Really the only things I do differently in the video than what you've already accomplished here are:

1. shoot "calibration frames" and calibrate my raw pics before stacking them

2. use the free Deep Sky Stacker rather than Photoshop for the stacking part. I then bring the stack from Deep Sky Stacker in to Photoshop for the actual post processing of the image.

[Jim Waters]

So last night was clear too. And I wanted to see what I can achieve with tracking. I have an eq2 mount with drives that I used instead of the Sirius mount. I did a rough polar alignment, so that didn't let me take exposures longer than 10 seconds.

 

The camera was on top of the tube rings without the telescope and was shaking a lot at every touch. So I had to download the phone app to connect to the camera using WiFi. Even with that, I think I took maybe 20 to 25 pics out of which only 10 were usable.

 

I stacked them in Photoshop using a tutorial I found on YouTube. Also, in the process, I realized that my PC is really slow . I edit regular daytime pictures all the time in LR and PS and have no issues, but stacking 10 raw pics in Photoshop made my computer really sloooow. Anyway, I was able to finish it up and below is the resulting picture. This seems like a fun thing to do, I think I will have to start upgrading my PC.

 

10 subs, 10 seconds each, at 600mm, f/6.3, ISO 3200
Canon 6d mk2 with Sigma 15-600mm Contemporary

 

Full Size image - http://bhavdeep.net/...2ndAttempt.html (5.3MB)

 

Compressed image attached:

Real good improvement.  There's some very small star trailing and what looks like wiggle.  Try locking up your camera mirror to eliminate the wiggle..