Finding South.

[xelasnave]

Startreck recent post re finding South is a great thing to know

Now I offer something similar if you have a camera on your scope that not only will find South but even get you very close to establishing the Celestial South Pole...AND will help folk who may not be around in the middle of the day...AND I once used this method to polar align back in the day where drift align was the way it was done which I found a hair pulling exercise.

At some time in the day light but you could do this at night...with your camera on scope point your polar scope at something and make sure you camera is in sync..each centred..

Now set your mount up pointing where you guess South may be ..do not turn on tracking..and elevate to the angle of your latitude...next take a time exposure...you will see that the stars make arcs in your photo...then move your mount via adjustment to get the centre of projected circle of those arcs in the centre of your image..taking another time exposure and hopefully you are closer and just keep at it so you have your star trails centre in the centre of your image.

If you can mount your DLSR on your mount that will also work...just go for the longest F/L in your lens kit.

Get the idea? If not ask and I will explain ...it is simple but often simplecthings explained sound complex...its not.

alex

[Startrek]

Alex,
Thanks for the advertisement and yes using the Suns shadow method for Time and Astronomy has been around for a long long time.
Your idea is really excellent, the humble DSLR is one of the most versatile tools in the Astro toolbox.
I still use my Canon 600D on live view to do Star and Polar alignment using the “Skywatcher Synscan Polar Alignment Routine” which is available on most Skywatcher EQ mounts in the handcontroller software ( a lot of folk wouldn’t even know it’s there , they just spend more money on cameras and use Pole Master , NINA , Sharpcap and so on ……. which is fine by the way )

Thanks for posting
Best
Martin

[Leo.G]

I'm just thinking it wouldn't have worked so well back in the 35mm film days, LOL

[xelasnave]

Not a problem...just developed one frame at a time and don't "fix" it....or adjust a Polaroid camera to do time exposures.:lol:

alex

[leon]

Hi Alex, have to agree I used to do this when I had no idea of drift align and any other polar alignment technique, it actually worked very well and one could get very close to exact SCP.;)

Thanks for the memories.:thumbsup:

Leon:thumbsup:

[leon]

Here we go Alex, it was a horror pic, noisy and very blurred, but it did the trick in the end.:lol:

That is how I aligned my rig to the SCP when I was imaging with the Takahashi :)

Leon :thumbsup:

[Leo.G]

I have a few Polaroids in my collection of antique cameras including a big thing used by news photographers, complete with big flash unit.
Problem is the price of the film, damn it's expensive for a pack of 8 from memory and that's just for the small automatic Polaroid, not the Land camera (where ever it is).


I did a lot of Astro without the capacity to do my own developing with my 35mm Nikon back in the late 80s. I kept a small notebook and pencil to write down every exposure, I was very new to the concept. There was no internet, no easy way to find information or people who could help and no knowledge of clubs or groups to join but I did chew the ears off many a salesperson in telescope shops.

I still know no better but I can simply delete the bad images with digital at no expense.
Then there was the issue with film labs auto-lightening my images because they were dark.
"They're supposed to be dark, they are astronomy shots you morons".
I may have gotten a little angry considering the price of film and processing. I should have shot slides like I always did when younger with my old large format camera (6x6 now I believe), processing was free for slides.

[xelasnave]

Film for Astrophotography would be a great introduction to suffering and force one to embrace a jovial attitude that's for sure.;)

alex

[xelasnave]

Thanks for posting your photo Leon I think it is great.

Isn't it amazing how all those stars know how to orbit the CSP....just how do they do it:shrug:

alex

[leon]

That is why people do Astronomy and Imaging Alex so we can find the answer I expect. :lol:

Leon :thumbsup: