I finally got a chance to put to practice what i have learnt and gleaned from all the astro sifus and their amazing and eye-popping astrophotos here on Singastro.
On a recent family trip to Perth, since I had 'man'power (aka hubby and son), I decided to lug up my Takahashi Space Boy Mount together with the mini Borg 45 mm to try out astrophotography with a small telescope.
The Set Up:
a) Takahashi Space Boy Mount with single axis drive (no longer in production, circa 2001)
b) Imaging scope is Borg 45 mm ED (f6.6) with 7885 reducer (gives a focal length of around 270mm and f 5.6). Using helical focuser 7857 so that i can lock the focus and dont have to worry about focusing next time round
c) Canon 500D modded fitted wth Hutech LPS filter.
d) Borg 50mm finderscope for drift alignment using Vixen illuminated guider. Also had a RACI diagonal from an old UO finderscope to help me star hop.
e) Laser pointer in Scopestuff laser pointer mount strapped to telescope. This greatly helps to reduce the time i spent star hopping but take note the laser (alpec brand) does not work in sub 5 degrees celsius. (just been told by my brother that i need to strap a handwarmer to the laser cos all lasers dont wont in cold weather)
f) Dell computer running Windows Vista and Canon Utility program - used to check histogram, focusing, and framing for the images.
The Location - Suburban Perth
I was imaging from the balcony at the apartment where we were staying which had a south west facing towards the ocean, albeit across from a car park with powerful street lamps. There was also a wall on the left which meant i couldnt see the magellanic clouds. Still, way better than my room window at home and much much less light pollution than Singapore.
2012-06-23 13.04.41 by tuna7777, on Flickr
2012-06-27 07.53.22 by tuna7777, on Flickr
The whole set up fits into a regular luggage plus lowe photo backpack but weighs a total whopping 27 kg in total...
1) Tak Space Boy Mount head 4.2 kg
2) Tak Tripod legs 3.0 kg
3) Borg scopes and camera and misc 5 kg
4) Counterweights and bar 2.8 kg
5) Luggage 6.5 kg
Definitely not a portable astro set up for me.
The Booty:
I struggled a bit trying to get the mount polar aligned and therefore you will see that the subs were not consistent and all over the place during the 2 day imaging sessions, as i race against time and weather to get as much photons as possible. Still L learner plate.
All shots were stacked in Deep Sky Stacker (courtesy of Barry of Asign II's tutorial on image stacking)
and use Adobe Photoshop CS3 to post process.
Widefield shot of Lagoon/Trifid Region.
9 x 4 min sub, 1 x 3 min sub, 1 x 5 min sub, ISO 800. Applied some darks. This picture is pretty much what you see - uncropped from the original and was amazed to see the amount of detail compared to our Singapore skies. Now i really know why you guys keep going to malaysia religiously.
sagi star cloud by tuna7777, on Flickr
Antares Region
19 x 1 min sub at ISO 1600, 5 x 4 min sub at ISO 800, Darks 5 x 1 min at ISO 1600, Darks 5 x 4 min sub at ISO 800. Again, this picture is uncropped and is what you get straight from the scope. Somehow I wasnt able to get as much nebulosity as the stuff that I see the sifus get here.
Perth 2 antares by tuna7777, on Flickr
Keyhole Nebula/ Carina
The perennial favourite for southern skies. 10 x 1 minute subs ISO 800, 10 x 1 minute subs ISO 1600. Some darks applied.
Carina001 by tuna7777, on Flickr
Centaurus A aka Hamburger Galaxy
11 x 3 min subs, 5 x 1 min subs ISO 1600, Darks applied.
I used Drizzle 2x in Deep Sky Stacker - so it effectively is about a 50% crop of the original picture. This galaxy is near the Omega Centauri cluster.
Hamburger_drizzle by tuna7777, on Flickr
M83 Southern Pinwheel Galaxy in Hydra
16 x 2 min subs, 7 x 3 min subs ISO 1600. Darks applied. Again used Drizzle 2x in Deep Sky Stacker - for a 50% crop of the original picture. I really wanted to see if a small scope can pull out some details from a small deep space object - no where close to the detail as the bigger scopes - and will probably need more exposure time than the 50 minutes that I managed to capture this trip.
Advice and suggestions are as always, welcome as I continue to learn.
pinwheel_drizzle by tuna7777, on Flickr
![[smilie=admire.gif]](./images/smilies/admire.gif "admire")
![[smilie=good-job.gif]](./images/smilies/good-job.gif "good-job")
"The universe is composed mainly of hydrogen and ignorance." 