First try of M43 with some cheap Canon gear

[AmpedInventor]

Hi Everyone, this is my first time posting on Ice In Space!

As a very quick introduction, I'm a 19yo studying Electronic Engineering and currently president of the Astronomy Society at the University of Technology Sydney. I love astronomy and am slowly making my way into Astrophotography.

I thought I'd post a photo I made a couple months back of the Orion Nebula. I don't have any serious gear right now so it was done with a Canon 200D II and a 50mm F1.8 lens (@ F2.8). About nine minutes of exposure with a custom 3D-printed Star Tracker that I made for DIYODE magazine. If you're interested, give it a quick search on Google :)

This photo is probably somewhat over-processed but I wanted to see just how much colour I could squeeze out of 9 minutes of integration. There is also some nasty pattern noise, perhaps could be fixed with some calibration frames. This was taken in the beautiful Warrumbungle national park earlier this year around February.

Any feedback is welcome!
Cheers everyone :)

Canon 200D II
50mm F1.8 (@ F2.8)
18x 30s Exposures
Custom Made 3D Printed Star Tracker
DeepSkyStacker & Photoshop

[bojan]

Liam,

This is very good outcome for 50 mm lens (nifty-fifty?)
It is cropped.. perhaps the whole frame would look better :-)

[PKay]

Hi Liam and welcome to the forum!

Have to warn you though, Astrophotography is a never ending journey.

Technologies move as fast in this game as anywhere else.

Good to see you studying electronics, I am (or was) an electronics engineer.

To make your image better, lots of study required. Type of equipment, software etc.

And my personal advice is...'enjoy the journey'!

Good effort :thumbsup:

[Jasp05]

Hi Liam,

I would be interested to see a pic of your 3d printed star tracker too mate. ;)

I've been designing one myself of late.