This is Jeanette's fault. She's been posting so many gob-smackers lately that I thought I better dig out the nifty 50 and camera mounting gear I'd assembled but never used for widefield (there's never enough time dammit!).
So last weekend at Cambroon I shot some frames near Antares and Corona Australis to "get a feel for things".
This is only 3 x 3 min subs, ISO 800, Canon 450D + Canon 50mm F/1.8 ("nifty 50") at F/3.5. I'm not convinced all the luminosity around the blue stars is nebulae - more likely lack of dew control (which was me blasting the lens with a hair dryer from time to time ). One other very badly affected frame thrown away.
Still, promising enough to perhaps try a bit at Astrofest if I get dew control sorted.
Bit bigger version with full screen option available here
Looks great Rob... jealous of the skills mate! The fifty has got to be a good lens for wide field, might even be nicer stopped down to 5.6 or 8 even? Thanks for sharing it
3x3
That's expletively awesome.
Looks like it'll be Nifty 50's at 20 paces at AF. Up for the challenge Rob?
Don't think I'm too much competition JJJ, especially if you bring out the big guns like the Tamron. Fingers crossed we get super clear skies to have a go though!
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Originally Posted by multiweb
So cool! You've got the prawn also in the lower right. Nice.
I'd like to say that was careful planning Marc, but its more to do with the what the FOV was when I roughly pointed the whole thing at Antares
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Originally Posted by Lester
Very nice image Rob.
Thanks Lester - thought it was worth sharing the more I looked at it
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Originally Posted by danielsun
Beautiful work Rob, very nice!!
Thank you sir!
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Originally Posted by oosh
Looks great Rob... jealous of the skills mate! The fifty has got to be a good lens for wide field, might even be nicer stopped down to 5.6 or 8 even? Thanks for sharing it
Thanks Jason. I'm sure you could do some real widefield damage with the 7D and some of the glass you have if you can get access to an equatorial mount.
Resistance is futile Ross - you will be assimilated....(pardon my Star Trekese). Why not though when you don't have to worry about guiding etc.
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Originally Posted by CoolhandJo
Wow. For a quickie it's great!
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Originally Posted by atalas
Very nice Rob.
Thanks Paul and Louie!
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Originally Posted by [1ponders]
I don't know Rob..... could be
Nifty fifty at fifty paces. Bring on AF!! Modded Canons Rock
I'm just wondering how expensive the damage will be if we try to do fifty paces through the imaging field at AF though Paul
I never got the 450 modded, so I can't hope to keep up with your 20D me thinks.
Looks great Rob... jealous of the skills mate! The fifty has got to be a good lens for wide field, might even be nicer stopped down to 5.6 or 8 even? Thanks for sharing it
Actually I'd appreciate yours or other people's thoughts on how far to stop down Jason. I'm a newbie at this sort of thing. I gather stopping down should make things sharper, but likely to require longer subs with all the requisite problems (noise, dew, tracking)?
Actually I'd appreciate yours or other people's thoughts on how far to stop down Jason. I'm a newbie at this sort of thing. I gather stopping down should make things sharper, but likely to require longer subs with all the requisite problems (noise, dew, tracking)?
I'm actually a little reluctant to say much since my photog experience is strictly terrestrial based... so far Each lens is different, too, though I find around f8 - f11 to be the best among most lenses. Again it's different with lenses closer to telephoto lengths, so I'm not sure. What I suggest is just to google a review for the specific lens, find out where people find it's sharpest, or even test it yourself against a detailed brick wall or something similar with different aperture settings (and a tripod)
But yeah, stopping it down will either way mean longer exposures, more dew, more tracking issues.. all that fun stuff that you guys get to experience
Thanks guys and gal for those helpful hints. I really didn't look too closely for coma last night, but zooming in now the right hand side shows a fair bit in both corners. All good to be figuring this stuff out now. I've been so excited using this lens on the kids (nice for portraits and natural colours without flash) I forgot it was originally purchased with astro in mind.
Either that or the 4 of us will be back to back 20 paces at AF....
Definitely worth giving it a go Mark. MIght be fun for the students to have a go sometime too.