Chapter 1 ā Introduction and the site
Hello to all,
I have been a beginner astro-photographer for a few years now and I have reached the point where I realise that the best improvement that I can make to my images is to build a dedicated observatory. Now I set up a portable tripod and I find that I spend too much of my available time setting up and aligning and I am ready to move to a permanent site.
Inspired by many on these forum pages I am going to tell the story of my journey. Not that I think I have any special insights, but to put back into the community after receiving so much information and guidance got from reading others build stories. Thanks to all of you who have shared your experiences, I hope that you and others find this thread useful.
I will build my observatory at home, in the outer suburbs of Melbourne, Australia. Some photos are attached of the site and the general view. These photos were taken in mid-winter, close to the solstice. I think that I have Bortle 4 to 5 sky.
The attached images are compass point views (S, E, N and W) followed by a recent single DSLR image to the east.