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Orion Nebula with the Tair 3, My First Astrophoto
2/24/2012 9:10:28 AM
I just constructed a barn door tracking mount so I can start making long exposure astrophotos. It isn't quite finished yet, but I couldn't help jerry rigging it to use it for a little while tonight.
I attached my Tair 3 300mm lens and camera to the barn door tracker and here is what I got with my first photo.
It is Orion Nebula taken at F4.5 and a 10 second exposure at 1600 ISO. You can see that it isn't perfect yet. I don't have the tracker fully finished, so it wasn't aligned quite right to Polaris, so the stars are a little oval.
Once everything is working and adjusted right, I should be able to get up to around 5 minute exposures with the tracker. When I can do that, I can stack multiple images to get a hubble-like photo. It will definitely take some experimenting and learning though since this is my first step into astrophotography.
Here is the 10 second exposure. A longer exposure would show much more of the nebula and many colors, this is just my first test image. This is going to be fun!
orion-nebula-tair-3 by Colorado CJ, on Flickr
I attached my Tair 3 300mm lens and camera to the barn door tracker and here is what I got with my first photo.
It is Orion Nebula taken at F4.5 and a 10 second exposure at 1600 ISO. You can see that it isn't perfect yet. I don't have the tracker fully finished, so it wasn't aligned quite right to Polaris, so the stars are a little oval.
Once everything is working and adjusted right, I should be able to get up to around 5 minute exposures with the tracker. When I can do that, I can stack multiple images to get a hubble-like photo. It will definitely take some experimenting and learning though since this is my first step into astrophotography.
Here is the 10 second exposure. A longer exposure would show much more of the nebula and many colors, this is just my first test image. This is going to be fun!
orion-nebula-tair-3 by Colorado CJ, on Flickr
2/24/2012 10:43:07 AM
That's just cool. Nice work! Now, photos of the rig?
2/25/2012 10:35:43 AM
Thanks.
Here is a shot of the setup as it sits right now. I am waiting on a ball head to arrive so that I can get rid of the wobbly jerry rigged mount.
I have a green laser attached to the mount right now to point the mount at Polaris, but I'm going to install a polar scope to get the mount aligned exactly.
Sorry for the poor photo, I only have one real digital camera, so this was taken with my Ipod.
tracker by Colorado CJ, on Flickr
Here is a shot of the setup as it sits right now. I am waiting on a ball head to arrive so that I can get rid of the wobbly jerry rigged mount.
I have a green laser attached to the mount right now to point the mount at Polaris, but I'm going to install a polar scope to get the mount aligned exactly.
Sorry for the poor photo, I only have one real digital camera, so this was taken with my Ipod.
tracker by Colorado CJ, on Flickr
2/27/2012 3:26:59 PM
What's your location?
2/27/2012 9:09:12 PM
Northern Colorado
2/27/2012 11:22:35 PM
Pretty sweet!
I see your in colorado. Do you do star parties?
Ive have been wanting to get into astro photography myself. Would be nice to have someone to do it with.
I see your in colorado. Do you do star parties?
Ive have been wanting to get into astro photography myself. Would be nice to have someone to do it with.
