My first Saturn pic (25/01/2006)

[middy]

Thought I'd try out my new digital camera by pointing it up the end of my lowly 40mm refractor one night (zoom: telescope 60x, camera 4x).
What you see is the result of cropping and stacking 5 images (0.5 sec exposure each).
I think I'm getting hooked on this astrophotography thing. Must get a bigger scope. I NEED more photons dammit ....... ;)

[EzyStyles]

Great pic of Saturn middy for a first pic. My first pic of saturn was a shocker compared to that. well done! btw, what digital camera are you using?

[middy]

Kodak Z730

[EzyStyles]

you might want to stack more than 5 images to get an even clearer image. keep it up.

[Robert_T]

Welcome to the wonderful world of planetary imaging Middy.

Just imagine what you'll be able to do with a 60mm refractor :)

[[1ponders]]

Hahaaaa :evil: another convert to the dark side. :wink2:

Good onya middy. I think you've set a record here for the smallest aperture telescope used to capture Saturn :clap: Here's a couple of tips that might help you for next time.

1. Do you have a tripod? If so connect it to the camera, extend the legs but don't spread them, use it like a monopod. If it's not high enough find something to stand it on. This will help heaps in keeping your camera steady.

2. Can you increase you ISO speed and reduce your exposure time. That will help alleviate some of the movement of the view brought about by turbulent seeing.

3. you didn't mention how you stacked them. If you haven't already then download Registax. It's free and great for this sort of work. Can you take videos with your camera? That might help you get more images to work with.

Great to see another budding imager. Go for it. You'll have a blast.:cool:

[ving]

nice start :)

dont do it. once you have turned to the dark side it is near imposible to turn back :P

[davidpretorius]

and he did so well holding out. top effort, say good bye to the family and prepare for a lifetime of increasing difficulty, and the odd very satisfying giant step!!!

[middy]

Thanks for the tips. I'd say that is the best I'll ever get from this scope. I was using the camera on a tripod. It was a lot of fiddling around but once it was aligned with the scope eyepiece I could leave the camera where it was for several minutes and just keep nudging the scope a little as saturn passed out of the field of view of the scope.

ISO was at 400 which is the highest I can set it on the 5 MP setting. If I lowered it to 1.1 MP I could get 800 ISO but I decided that would sacrifice too many pixels :)

The images were stacked in Photoshop using a manual and extremely painful method I found on the web somewhere. I have since tried with Registax letting it do everything automatically but my first attempt didn't look as good. Registax looks very complicated :confuse3: and I haven't had time to play around with properly yet.

[EzyStyles]

at first i find Registax seem very complicated to use. But David helped me out all the way. You can find his tut from this link:

http://precons.com/iceinspace/Articles/imaging_toucam_planets_notracking.a spx

hope it helpss.

[asimov]

Good one Middy! Welcome to the wonderful world of imaging! I started off with a kodak easyshare & once you have the settings down pat you'll come up with some nice shots.

Well done!!