Scorpius, Southern Sky & SMC

[middy]

Had my first dark sky experience on Saturday night out at Mark's (mhodson) place at Glenore Grove. Also there was Andrew (astro_south) and Darren (dhumpie).

Took the StarTracker with me to do some widefield shots, but realised I had left the ball mount at home attached to the telescope. Andrew just happened to have one attached to his scope that I borrowed and fitted to the StarTracker, but it wouldn't tighten up properly and the camera kept flopping around. The upshot of all that was that I was limited in the areas of sky I could photograph.

Here are the images I managed to get. They look a bit noisy and I am not overly happy with them but here they are anyway.

1. Scorpius region, 19 x 64 sec, f4.0, ISO 200
2. Southern Sky, 18 x 64 sec, f4.0, ISO 200
3. SMC + LMC, 4 x 64 sec, 10 x 32 sec, f4.0, ISO400

All images dark frame subtracted (SMC+LMC only had 2 dark frames because the batteries ran out in the camera).

[Edit] Oh yeah, forgot to add we also caught an Iridium flare as well. Not deep space I know, but added the photo to the end of the list

[RB (Andrew)]

Sounds like you had an enjoyable night Andrew and you got these nice images too.
I hate it when you travel to a dark site and find you've left something at home, arrrggh !

The images are nice, which lens were you using?
You might like to try a higher ISO next time just to see if you can eliminate some of the noise.



Oh and I love the Iridium flare, well done.

[RB (Andrew)]

Oh ok I just read your signiture, so I assume these were with the Kodak Z730 camera.

[middy]

Originally Posted by Rocket Boy

Oh ok I just read your signiture, so I assume these were with the Kodak Z730 camera.

Correct.

Originally Posted by Rocket Boy

You might like to try a higher ISO next time just to see if you can eliminate some of the noise.

Wouldn't a higher ISO give more noise? I usually shoot at ISO 400 at home, but I thought I'd try ISO 200 to see if there was less noise.

[RB (Andrew)]

Originally Posted by middy

Wouldn't a higher ISO give more noise? I usually shoot at ISO 400 at home, but I thought I'd try ISO 200 to see if there was less noise.

Generally yes but I assumed you where using a DSLR and hence where able to go higher. For your camera I think ISO 400 would be max although I don't have experience with this particular model, I have an old Sony DSC70 and it's similar in this respect.

With a DSLR, using a lower ISO with shorter exposures you run the risk of underexposure which can also give a noisy image.

Cheers

[middy]

Originally Posted by Rocket Boy

... For your camera I think ISO 400 would be max although I don't have experience with this particular model

Kind of correct

ISO 400 is the max at 5 MP, but if I drop it to 1.8 MP (1552 x 1164) it will let me select ISO 800. Maybe I should try ISO 800 one day. I usually like to go for the highest resolution, but then I am reducing the image to 800 x 600 at the end anyway so I guess it doesn't really matter. It's just the thought of having a 5 MP camera and only using 1.8 MP

[EzyStyles (Eric)]

great widefield shots andrew.

[Dennis]

A nice productive evening Andrew, with a set of very memorable images. When you upgrade to a 16" RCOS on a SBIG Paramount with an ST10XME, you will look back fondly and treasure these images.

Cheers

Dennis