Lunar Eclipse

[mrkleinig]

Hi guys,

I need help. I stayed up till 5am trying to get a gap in the clouds to take some shots of the lunar eclipse... this is the best I could do (I compiled the pre- and mid-lunar eclipse shots together into one).

For the life of me, I can't figure out how to take a crisp, clean shot of the moon that looks fantastic at high resolution.

If anyone out there has any tips on lunar photography or general astrophotography, I'd be so greatful.

Oh, I also attached a shot of the milky way I got about a week ago with my new dslr. I didnt have a tripod, scope, mount or anything with me. Was just out in the hills in Perth. Ended up fiddling with settings until I had almost no star trail and still some decent structure (used a dvd case and a jumper to prop the camera up..haha)

Kind regards,
Glen

[Liz]

Hey Glen, am sure someone more experience will answer, but they look pretty good to me. The eclipsed Moon maybe not as sharp, but have seen many similiar, must be difficult to focus on it. Looking good though. :thumbsup:

[scagman]

Hi Glen,
I'm as far from expert as you can get but I would agree with Liz, they look wicked.

[Mliss]

I agree, gorgeous photos, and 5am is nothing short of dedication! :thumbsup:

[iceman]

Hi Glen

What equipment did you use to capture the images?

[stevejack]

Can't help with the technical but i really like the shots nice job!

[nebula]

Nice work, I really should have got the megrez and phillips web cam out for this :)

[mrkleinig]

Wow.. thanks to everyone for your kind responses.

My gear setup for this shot

Skywatcher Black Diamond ED80
EQ3-Pro Mount
Canon 600D @ ~ISO800. Can't remember exposure time, but it was very short. Took an average of the best 3 frames.


Starting to see that this eclipse was pretty hard to shoot because it was very dark and there was a lot of cloud cover, so I guess I got pretty lucky!

Honestly though, I still can't even do a decent polar alignment. Once I can though, I'll hopefully be able to muck around a lot more and get some decent deep sky images :)

Thanks again for your comments!

[ZeroID]

I reckon your moon shots are pretty good. Under the conditions I would not be expecting to get high level detail, more interested in the colours and depth.

Re Polar alignment. If you have a location you use frequently at home then do a solar Nth/Sth alignment with a plumb bob at local Sidereal noon. This should give you an good Nth Sth alignment within a fraction of a degree then level your EQ3 head as best you can and set the angle to match your latitude. Should get you pretty close, after that it is just tweaking with some drift alignment adjustments. Certainly good enough for widefield pix. And once it is done as long as you mark the spots where the feet locate and don't adjust the tripod legs you should be able to reproduce it reasonably accurately next time.

[midnight]

Glen,

Nice images. I too had a similar disappointment with my moon images and soon came to realise that there are limits to one's gear. I found the following to be relevant (and in general order of importance) to improving my moon shots.

1. Focus - This is critical and obvious. Having a single speed rack and pinion is average and difficult to fine tune. Use Liveview on your camera.
2. Cooling. At a FL of 814mm (my OTA), thermal currents show up and prevent a uniform clear image. Take the scope out and let it cool. Better still, use a fan to cool if you're imageing via a Newtonian.
3. Collimation. Very important for Newtonians. Your scope may not be as subject to this as a fast Newtonian.
4. Mirror lock up on your DSLR. Usually found in the functions menu. This locks up the mirror before taking a photo. I usually wait about 6 seconds.
5. Stack. Take many photos and stack in Registax. Be careful though as you need to a reasonable polar alignment to do this otherwise each photo will slowly skew and Registax will have difficulty. For single exposure, polar alignment is not mandatory - it only helps keep the moon in your field whilst tracking.
6. Have fun! Experiment. Keep your gear clean. Try an external aperture mask (I did and found I got better results by increasing my focal ratio from F4 to around F7).
7. Get a Takahashi FSQ scope (eg 106) with a 5D MkII :P - Ok, I'm being a little sarcastic but this scope has seen some extraordinary single exposures of the moon I have ever seen and often rival (and beat) multiple stacking on much cheaper scopes. Have a look at what others have tried and you can gauge when you are hitting the limits of your gear. :thumbsup: You'll find your setup will be more than adequate to learn and sharpen your skills on without blowing the bank.

Good luck!!

Darrin...