Sculptor Galaxy - Canon 100mm macro tripod mounted

[tah997 (Tim)]

Folks,

Another shot using just a tripod mounted canon 100mm macro. This time the very faint and small, well for my relatively tiny "telescope", of NGC253 Sculptor Galaxy and its neighbour NGC288.

This was taken under the darker skies of Tamworth and is a stack of 101x 3sec exposures at ISO3200 with dark frames. Stars are a little oddly shaped and the image is grainy, but I am impressed at my first galaxy. I wasn't expecting my camera to be able to pick it up.

I am amazed at the sensitivity of modern digital cameras, I mean, to be able to take a photo of a faint distant galaxy using just a digital SLR and a tripod, incredible.

[Vasya Pupkin (Pupkin)]

Really congratulate you, tah#.
As for me, I managed to find a galaxy on my photo one day (it was M31). But it was wide-field photo, and M31 is much more bright. So, if you managed to catch SUCH dark object, it's a really good luck!
Thanks for a photo.

[orestis]

Now that is cool, Awesome work.

Goes to show what a person can achieve when they put there mind to it.

Just wondering do you take an equal amount of darks or less, because thats a lot of effort. Also do you take bias shots ?

Sorry for the questions, I am just getting into this and want to be producing amazing images like yours.

Cheers
Orestis

[Poita (Peter)]

101 shots. That is awesome and shows what you can achieve with a straight camera. Kudos!

[Larryp (Laurie)]

Good stuff!

[swannies1983 (Dan)]

Well done Tim

[stardust steve (Steve)]

Good on you for having a crack at a DSO on a tripod. If you are looking to take the next step, keep an eye out for an EQ3 with tracking motors ( you only really need the RA motor drive. They can be found reasonably cheap and will take lens only images to another level.
I have one and live it. It's light, portable and reliable and yields great results

Edit - I have even used my swed 80 pro with decent results on one

[tah997 (Tim)]

Vasya - Thanks, yeah I tried M31 once, but it was just too low on the horizon and light pollution from Sydney killed it.

Orestis - Nah I don't take an equal amount of dark shots, mainly due to time and battery life. I usually take 20 darks of each ISO setting after I have taken the photos for that ISO setting. Bias frames, I just use a library of bias frames I have previously taken. I'm not too wound up in keeping everything the same temperature at the moment, however I do appreciate that cooling the CCD does considerably improve results. As for, "putting my mind to it", they are generous words, the self timer and Deepsky Stacker does all the hard work.

Steve - thanks for the info about EQ3 mounts.