[iceman (Mike)]

So what's the best way to get/preserve rich and deep star colours with an unmodded DSLR (my 350D, to be exact)?

I was of the mindset that long exposures helped to reveal the deep star colours - but in a recent image, the long exposure just saturated all the stars and they're almost all white (ISO800, 5 minute exposure on an ED80 (480mm,f/6)).

Should I use a lower ISO? Should I use shorter (1-2 minute) exposures? Obviously we want long exposures for the object itself - so then would you blend (in processing) the starfield from one set of exposures and the object from the other?

Or do I need to go the whole HDR/LDR process that Bert does to such great effect?

Thoughts and suggestions welcome.