With a German Equatorial mount you need to make sure you are perfectly aligned to Polaris when you are in the northern hemisphere. This ensures your mount has the best chance of accurately tracking your chosen objects. Without correct alignment you will find that your mount struggles to track objects accurately.

So what is involved and what is my process?

The way I do it is by starting during the day most of the time. I use a level and a compass to get my tripod pointing as close to north as possible and perfectly level.

I then add the mount and tighten it down before adding the counterweights and telescope and balancing them. There will be another post on the setting up of everything as it’s quite an involved process.

Once it gets dark I start the proper alignment. My mount comes with a polarscope built into it which makes things very easy! I just take the caps off and then use the diagrams drawn on the polarscope to position Polaris correctly for the time of year.

I use the free app called PolarAllign to find out the correct position. The image at the top of this post is from that app. I just position Polaris at the correct position and I’m good to move onto the next step of aligning the mount to the rest of the sky.

I’m not too sure what I’ll be talking about next time so I may go through one of my images to make things a bit more interesting!

Clear Skies!

So what are these different frames that are taken?

Lights

These are the main image files with your star data in them. You will want to take as many of these as possible to ensure you have plenty of detail in your final image. Depending on the camera used you will either have one set of lights or multiple sets spanning different light wavelengths using filters.

Darks

These are images taken as soon as you have finished taking captures of your target. They are taken with the same settings as your light frames but you put the lens cap on the end of the camera/telescope. These frames are then combined using magic and fairy dust inside your chosen stacking software. This removes any amp glow from your camera sensor so they need to be taken at a similar temperature to your light frames.

Flats

These are my least favourite images to take as they are a little bit move involved to capture. These images remove any vignetting from your frames. There are multiple methods to capture flat frames but my chosen method is to get a white t-shirt and hang it over the end of the telescope and then get a text editor open on my laptop and hold it up to the end of the telescope. You are basically looking to create a flat white image although when the settings are correct it will look like a pale purple.

Bias

As far as I know bias frames are used to get rid of further noise on your sensor. These are taken with the lens cap on and at the shortest possible exposure length. These images will remove any broken or hot pixels form your camera sensor. I have 2 dead pixels on my current camera and using bias frames removes these from my final images.

All these different frames are then combined together and aligned. I use Deep Sky Stacker to handle all of this for me. One day I will sit down and work out what each of the frames does and that may well make up a more detailed post but for now this will do…

So as you can see it’s not quite as simple as pointing your telescope to the skies, getting it focussed and taking a picture! These images take time to build up to get the true colour and detail out of the object you are targeting! This does however give you a much bigger sense of accomplishment when you get your final image!

Hope you have enjoyed this post and let me know if you want to know more about this or anything else and I’ll do my best to cover it!

Clear Skies!

I’m not sure it quite does but sometimes you have to bend the rules and this is my website so I make the rules

This photo was one of those moment where you just happen to be in the right place at the right time with the right equipment!

I was on tour in Serbia and we walked to this restaurant at the top of a hill just in time for the sunset. We were also lucky to get a table right on the edge of the balcony so I grabbed my camera and started shooting!

Not a lot of editing on this one, just a bit to bring out the detail of the city below.

I think this one looks good as a stretched canvas but if you would like it in any other format then let me know and I’ll get it added to the store.

Clear skies (or in this case some artistic cloud cover for effect)

I setup my camera on my friends balcony and set it going while we enjoyed the evening. Unfortunately I managed to knock the camera part way through when I was checking things so the end of the timelapse jumps. Always learning though!

My only regret is not leaving it running longer but hey ho, hindsight is always 20-20!

Here is the video, hope you enjoy it!

Clear Skies!

The image you see above is my current best image of Orion but in this post I am going to go through my progress with this stunning part of the night sky, starting with my very first attempt some 2 or 3 years ago.

As you can see my first attempt lacked somewhat in detail and colour and pretty much everything!

It was good to give it a go though, I was just very limited due to the telescope not having a tracking mount so I could only take fairly short exposures resulting in this image being the way it is.

This is one of my first attempts from the current telescope with the tracking mount but before I had setup autoguiding so I was again limited on my exposure time so this image is made up of only 30 second exposures. However in total there is about 45 minutes of total exposure time

As you can see there is a lot more detail in this image and I have started to get some of the colours that are present in this nebula.

Since this image was taken I have learnt a lot more about processing these images to the point that I have started to bring out a lot more detail and colours in some of my older images like this one.

However the biggest change came when I was able to get my autoguiding to work so I can now take exposures up to 5 minutes at least! I haven’t tested to see how long I can go yet but I’m sure the time will come for that!

Now comes my current best image of the Orion nebula. This is a combination of some 10 second exposures as well as some 5 minute exposures. I think there is around 1 hour 30 minutes of images here.

I used the shorter exposures to bring out the detail of the 4 stars in the centre of the nebula and then the 5 minute exposures to bring out the colours of the gas clouds surrounding the core.

You can buy this image as a framed poster in multiple sizes, just click the link below to be taken to the secure checkout.

Or if you want this on a t-shirt, phone case, mug, mini skirt (yes a mini skirt!) and a host of other formats then you can find them on RedBubble by clicking here

Clear Skies!

Telescope

I have the SkyWatcher Expolorer 130PDS reflector as my main imaging scope. This has a 650mm focal length and a 130mm primary mirror giving it a final ratio of f5 so it’s a fairly fast telescope.

There is also the 6×30 finderscope attached to the body to help me get everything aligned.

On top of that there is the guidescope which is a 280mm refractor running at f4.67.

The Mount

Next is probably the most important section of any astrophotography setup. The mount.

I went with the SkyWatcher HEQ5 Pro GoTo mount. This is a German Equatorial mount that has a star database, polarscope and tracking all built into it. I will probably do a separate post on the mount and how to set it up in the future as it’s quite an involved process.

In a nutshell this mount on its own enables me to take much longer exposures than I would be able to if the telescope was just on a fixed mount.

The Cameras

This is the area that I am currently lacking on. I am using a completely stock Nikon D5000 DSLR camera mounted straight to the telescope for my main imaging. It’s good enough for now but I’m getting towards the limits of what it can do now so will be looking to upgrade this camera fairly soon.

I also have a ZWO ASI 120MM Mono camera as my guide camera. With this active and properly setup I have managed to increase my exposure times from 30 seconds all the way up to 300 seconds and I haven’t found the limit yet!

Filters

Currently I only have an LRGB filter set that will work with the ZWO camera for planetary stuff but I haven’t got started with that yet so it’s something that will come in the future. I am more likely to get a filter wheel to enable me to use these filters easier without losing focus and alignment.

Control machine.

This is another part that will be upgraded soon. I am currently running on a very old Windows laptop to connect everything into. This sits outside with the scope and cameras connected to my wifi network so I can then control it all from inside using TeamViewer.

The Software

There are 4 pieces of software I use for imaging.

Adobe Photoshop for processing.

Deep Sky Stacker for combining all the images of an object.

APT (Astrophotography Tool) for controlling the camera and setting up an imaging session

PHD 2.0 (Push Here Dummy) for autoguiding to make sure my targets don’t move in the frame while I am imaging.

I think that just about covers everything and I’ll try to keep this updated as I make improvements to the setup!

Clear Skies!

This is basically a place for me to share my images of the night sky. There will also be options to be able to purchase my images as posters, framed pictures and maybe even mugs!

So how did this all start?

My Dad decided to buy a telescope when I was living back there and that was what sent me down the rabbit hole of capturing images of deep space objects. I just couldn’t quite do it by holding my phone against the eyepiece so purchases were required!

The first step was to get an adapter to attach a DSLR camera to the telescope. Then I really started to get excited. Well, I thought I was excited… These were just the starter steps though. My Dad’s scope was a pretty good visual telescope but if I was going to be taking any better images then I would need an upgrade…

I finally get my own place and what is one of the first things I buy (much to my family’s wonderment)?

Yep a telescope with tracking mount!

Fortunately I was able to find a second hand mount so that saved me a lot of money but it was still a significant investment for me but I was off to the races!

I think this is one of the first images using my new ‘scope. I don’t often capture the moon as I find it pretty boring to image, it only takes a couple of minutes to get setup and you’re ready to go. You can spend a further 20 minutes fine tuning it but on the whole it’s very easy to image the moon even with a camera and lens!

The enjoyment for me is having to spend hours capturing the same part of the sky and then spend further hours editing it all together and processing it to get the final image. More on that later though.

I think that will just about wrap it up for this into post here. I think the next post will be some more detail on my current setup that I will try to keep updated as things get added to my setup!

Clear Skies!