Hi folks,
I'm a bit of a beginner at this, so bear with me...
Have been tediously dabbling with astrophotography for little over a year now without much previous practical experiance with a camera, or astronomy. What can I say... I learn best being thrown in the deep end and don't think I've done that badly so far (I'll figure out some way to get the sample under 200kb later sorry)... Albiet, humbally still a long way off being content with my ability
The EF-S 50mm F1.8 has been an excellent lens to begin with, but have gotten a bit bored with producing the same sky-only images as everyone else with better gear and more experiance... I want to start taking shots that showcase my rather privledged dark skies (my parents farm near Yarrawonga).
This has led me to purchase a Tokina 11-16mm F2.8 lens to start doing some scenic wide angle shots that will hopefully alow me to take some more unique views of said dark sky and the lovely unique landscape that I miss so dearly after living in the big smoke for a while.
I use an EOS 550d on a HEQ5 piggybacked off an Orion awesome autoguider package.
The camera is controlled by BackyardEOS (highly recommended) and the goto runs wirelessly off SkySafari on my iphone (yes... only because it's totally RAD and impresses the ladies!)
Anyways... To the point John:
I want a level horizontal horizon, yet can't see in my mind how to orient this on an equatorial mount?
If I aim, lets say east, the resulting horison line will run from the top left of my frame to the bottom right, right??
I don't want to de-align the camera/lens from my autoguider/shortube to compensate for this as I believe (in my noob mind) this will affect the alignment overall and stars will begin to trail? I'm fickle and may be blowing this out of context due to the short exposures resulting from dark sky + fast lens + many exposures stacked. Is 'bending' the camera to the right simply a practical solution to this problem?
Any suggestions welcome
Cheers!