http://gallery.me.com/joebergeron#100034
My friend Dick Bower and I shot these last night with his Canon Eos Rebel XTi DSLR and my AP Stowaway refractor (92mm f/6.6) on my Losmandy G11 equatorial mount.
I did a careful polar alignment using the G11's polar scope which was so good I got away with unguided exposures up to 10 minutes long. Most of the full-size images do exhibit some trailing, but it's less apparent at these small image sizes.
Exposures ranged from 2 to 10 minutes. The Pleiades shot is a stack of 5 images. In all cases I messed around in Photoshop to reduce noise, adjust colors and contrast, and so forth, seeking only to produce a nice-looking picture.
The whole experience was fun and pretty easy.
My friend Dick Bower and I shot these last night with his Canon Eos Rebel XTi DSLR and my AP Stowaway refractor (92mm f/6.6) on my Losmandy G11 equatorial mount.
I did a careful polar alignment using the G11's polar scope which was so good I got away with unguided exposures up to 10 minutes long. Most of the full-size images do exhibit some trailing, but it's less apparent at these small image sizes.
Exposures ranged from 2 to 10 minutes. The Pleiades shot is a stack of 5 images. In all cases I messed around in Photoshop to reduce noise, adjust colors and contrast, and so forth, seeking only to produce a nice-looking picture.
The whole experience was fun and pretty easy.
Joe Bergeron
Moderator, Astro-Physics Forum