My First Astro Photos

[Jabroni (Jason)]

Here are my first (well aligned) shots. I'm using an Orion ED80T CF, HEQ5 Pro, Starshoot Autoguider and Nikon D7000.

Shot from my balcony (about 7km from the city), with 10 x 3min exposures. I've stacked them, adjusted levels and cropped a little.

The original shows stars in the centre are in focus, but stars at the edge are out of focus. Is this what a field flattener is for? Do they work on refractors?

Any tips for improvements?

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by Jabroni

Here are my first (well aligned) shots. I'm using an Orion ED80T CF, HEQ5 Pro, Starshoot Autoguider and Nikon D7000.

Shot from my balcony (about 7km from the city), with 10 x 3min exposures. I've stacked them, adjusted levels and cropped a little.

The original shows stars in the centre are in focus, but stars at the edge are out of focus. Is this what a field flattener is for? Do they work on refractors?

Any tips for improvements?

Very nice. Yes you'll need a field flattener. Field curvature causes that. William Optics does some for the ED80. I use the P-FLAT IV, other use the III. There are many around.

[Poita (Peter)]

I use this one and it is a wee ripper.
http://www.astronomics.com/main/prod...oduct_id/AT2FF

[Jabroni (Jason)]

I picked up an Orion field flattener from Sirius.

Here's a shot of the tarantula nebula from last night:
http://jabroni.org/astro/image.jpg

And the full frame image:
image_full.jpg

I'm pretty happy - the stars look round everywhere now.