# First astrophotography attempt!



## Traveltom2406 (Jan 16, 2018)

hello everyone! This is my first time using a forum so bear with me 
I went to blue ridge observatory and star park last night to try Astrophotography for the first time. I’m also a complete beginner and new to photography. I was wondering if anyone could give me feedback and tips on how to get the best astrophotography shots possible  I often see images with galaxies and nebulas shining bright and dominating the picture. How do I get these shots? Is it through editing or can you capture these in camera?
I’ve included 4 photos, the first 3 have no editing whatsoever but the last is slightly edited. What could I have done to make these shots better? Thank you all!




 

 

 

 
I’ve slightly edited the contrast and exposure of this photo.


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## KmH (Jan 16, 2018)

The last is technically known as a nightscape, not an astrophotograph.
http://clarkvision.com/articles/nightscapes/

If you really want to get into astrophotography, particularly if you want to image deep sky stuff I highly recommend the book The Deep-sky Imaging Primer, Second Edition.


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## 480sparky (Jan 16, 2018)

By the last image, you've got boat-loads of light pollution.  What you're trying to emulate was probably taken in an area known for lack of such pollution.... truly dark skies.


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## Traveltom2406 (Jan 16, 2018)

KmH said:


> The last is technically known as a nightscape, not an astrophotograph.
> http://clarkvision.com/articles/nightscapes/
> 
> If you really want to get into astrophotography, particularly if you want to image deep sky stuff I highly recommend the book The Deep-sky Imaging Primer, Second Edition.



Thank you for the reply  I’ll have a look into that book  I’ll see if they do a digital copy as I’m currently travelling and can’t carry too many things.


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## Traveltom2406 (Jan 16, 2018)

480sparky said:


> By the last image, you've got boat-loads of light pollution.  What you're trying to emulate was probably taken in an area known for lack of such pollution.... truly dark skies.




The last photo was taken just after sunset so it was still pretty light I was just experimenting  I’m heading to the Pogue Pickett dark sky park this week to try get better shots


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## KmH (Jan 16, 2018)

In the US the few areas that have truly dark skies are west of the Missouri river.
DarkSiteFinder.com - Light Pollution Map


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## Traveltom2406 (Jan 17, 2018)

KmH said:


> In the US the few areas that have truly dark skies are west of the Missouri river.
> DarkSiteFinder.com - Light Pollution Map



Thank you for the help and replies ! Its appreciated!


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## 480sparky (Jan 17, 2018)

You might consider purchasing a motorized camera mount to counter the earths rotation. This would allow much longer exposures.


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## Traveltom2406 (Jan 17, 2018)

480sparky said:


> You might consider purchasing a motorized camera mount to counter the earths rotation. This would allow much longer exposures.



At the moment I’m travelling the world for a year so I can’t afford or carry much equipment with me. I currently have a dslr camera and basic tripod. I’m hoping to take good nightscape and astrophotography shots with the equipment I have and learn as I go. But I’ll definitely be looking into more advanced gear as I progress  thank you


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## KmH (Jan 17, 2018)

Not having a tracking mount limits the exposure time you can use to make the stars points of light rather than streaks of light.
As lens focal length increases the shorter an exposure needs to be to prevent star trails.
So we get the longest possible exposure without star trails with short (wide angle) focal lengths.


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## Sportrunner (Jan 18, 2018)

What camera and lens are you using? I can give you a starting point from there.  Light pollution can make night photos tough but you can also try using it creatively. Keep in mind some of the images you see are composite images where the foreground and shy are shot separately.


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## Light Guru (Jan 18, 2018)

480sparky said:


> You might consider purchasing a motorized camera mount to counter the earths rotation. This would allow much longer exposures.



Or you can try doing star trails.  Those don't require a fancy camera mount. 
How to take great photos of star trails | EarthSky.org


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## rosh4u (Jan 18, 2018)

This is actually not astrophotography.


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## Sportrunner (Jan 19, 2018)

Yes, I assume he meant night scape photography.


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## birdbonkers84 (Jan 22, 2018)

Hmmm I've been posting my star trails in the wrong gallery it seems?

If you are wanting to shoot the stars, try and get a sturdy tripod nothing fancy, mines £50 off of amazon and it seems to do fine; a wide lens, I use a 18-55 kits lens on a crop body.  You want to set the lens f-stop to as wide as it will go, on my kit lens that is f/3.5.  You then want to set your ISO to 3200 as a starting point.

There is a thing called the "500 rule" whereby  you divide you lens focal length by 500 to get the shutter speed. i.e 20mm is 25 seconds, some people follow this, some don't it's up to you, but you will find anything longer than 30s the stars start moving.

Also a wireless/wire remote works a treat and stops any camera vibration.

Then once you have your shots you can take them into LR and mess around with the temp, exposure etc to get the desired look.

If you want to try star trails, I find setting your cameras internal interval thing works fine.  I set it to intervals of 34s with 30s exposures this allows the camera to successful save the shots and not miss any out.  Same thing applies, camera on tripod, with wide lens set as wide as possible.  For star trails the ISO can be anything between 100-800 depending if the moon is out etc.  Setup up your interval shots, e.g 120 x 30s, click and sit back and wait.  Once its finished sort them in LR then bring them into a program called StarStax (free) and it will comp your shots on together for you.

Hope this helps.


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## KmH (Jan 22, 2018)

rosh4u said:


> This is actually not astrophotography.


Nightscape photography has land/buildings in the image frame.
Astrophotographs have nothing but sky, and can be done without a tracking mount.
If you get serious about doing astrophotography make sure you have plenty of $$$$$.

Note that in the following video Forrest Tanaka images M 31, the Andromeda Galaxy.
Looking at the sky with our naked eye the Andromeda galaxy is almost 6 moon diameters wide. It's the closest big galaxy to us, which is why is so big in the sky.
So it can be imaged with just a DSLR and a lens that has sufficient focal length.
With our naked eye, and if where we are is dark enough, we can only see a very faint fuzzy spot about 1/4 of the moon's diameter that is only the central core of the galaxy.

There are other things in the sky even bigger, but even fainter than M 31.

Other "deep sky objects" & galaxies require using a telescope having a larger lens or mirror so more light can be gathered per unit of time.
Check out this link to a stunningly beautiful astrophoto of the Orion Molecular Cloud Complex made by Rogelio Bernal Andreo.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/47/Orion_Head_to_Toe.jpg


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## Nwcid (Jan 22, 2018)

I have only tried a few times.  I have had moderate luck with the moon. 

Taken in a very dark field outside of Oakridge Oregon.  In early September about 22:00.
D7100, Tamron 150-600mm @600mm and slight crop, 1/125 sec, f9, ISO 100, on a tripod. 





Taken in the same very dark field.  Mid September about 22:00.  Apparently I was in a flight path, I made several shots and all had the streak on the left side.
D7100, Nikon 10.5mm Fisheye, 30 sec, f2.8, ISO 500, on a tripod


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## birdbonkers84 (Jan 22, 2018)

Nwcid said:


> I have only tried a few times.  I have had moderate luck with the moon.
> 
> Taken in a very dark field outside of Oakridge Oregon.  In early September about 22:00.
> D7100, Tamron 150-600mm @600mm and slight crop, 1/125 sec, f9, ISO 100, on a tripod.
> ...



Nice images, just a little tip f/11 is the sweet spot for shooting the moon apparently


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## KmH (Jan 22, 2018)

With the moon effectively at infinity (250,000 miles away) you can use a more wide open aperture than _f_/11 and a faster shutter speed so atmospheric turbulence doesn't hurt the focus sharpness of your image quite as much.
However, it is wise to make sure you're not shooting over a building or fallow field that is releasing heat it gained during the day.

For the best moon images astrophotographers shoot video and then pick frames made while the atmosphere was steady and not moving, a technique known as 'lucky imaging'.

I made this composite of a total lunar eclipse in September of 2015 using a 400 mm focal length, f/5 refracting telescope as a lens.  The telescope was just mounted on a tripod. My DSLR was mounted to the telescope rack & pinion focuser.
The scale of each shot of the moon is uncropped relative to the APS-C size frame they were composited on.

Here the moon is exposed for the sunlit part of the moon as the eclipse ends - f/5 and IIRC 1/400.




Here I've exposed for the dark, approaching fully eclipsed part of the moon - still f/5 but IIRC 2 seconds for each exposure, which is why the sunlit part of the moon is way over exposed.


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## rosh4u (Jan 22, 2018)

KmH said:


> rosh4u said:
> 
> 
> > This is actually not astrophotography.
> ...


Yes, now you got it well described.


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## birdbonkers84 (Jan 23, 2018)

rosh4u said:


> This is actually not astrophotography.



I don't get why people post comments like this...

Pro tip: press enter next time followed by a helpful explanation of Astrophotography.


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## KmH (Jan 23, 2018)

For the same reason we don't call arms - legs, or a Ferrari a Ford, or a hammer a saw?


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