Camera Labs

A single Perseid from last night (bottom left). Just trying out the kit well in advance of next week's maximum. If we get clear skies I'll take the setup over to a dark part of the Forest.



Greg

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Nexstar 11 GPS, 2 x Sky 90, M25C, MaximDL, Photshop CS3, Noel Carboni's Photoshop actions, 7 foot Pulsar fibreglass dome, Canon 40D, 100mm macro lens, 28-200mm zoom lens, 17-55mm f#2.8 zoom lens, 100-400mm zoom lens, 1.4x converter, 2x converter.
http://www.newforestobservatory.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12801949@N02/

Ooh, you got a clear sky? I can't remember the last time I saw one at night. That reminds me I've also been meaning to grab the milky way too.

So far I've managed to miss everything of interest due to weather...

_________________
Canon DSLRs: 7D, 5D2, 1D, 600D, 450D full spectrum, 300D IR mod
Lenses: EF 35/2, 50/1.8, 85/1.8, 135/2+SF, 28-80 V, 70-300L, 100-400L, TS-E 24/3.5L, MP-E 65, EF-S 15-85 IS
3rd party: Zeiss 2/50 makro, Samyang 8mm fisheye, Sigma 150 macro, 120-300 f/2.8 OS, Celestron 1325/13
Tinies: Sony HX9V.

Last image in the log book was a month ago It's been BAD
Greg

_________________
Nexstar 11 GPS, 2 x Sky 90, M25C, MaximDL, Photshop CS3, Noel Carboni's Photoshop actions, 7 foot Pulsar fibreglass dome, Canon 40D, 100mm macro lens, 28-200mm zoom lens, 17-55mm f#2.8 zoom lens, 100-400mm zoom lens, 1.4x converter, 2x converter.
http://www.newforestobservatory.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12801949@N02/

Very nice Greg. Somehow we have clear skies here only when I work night shift or when it is full moon.

What's your setup Greg ?

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Radu
Canon PowerShot S100
Canon 50D , SIGMA 10-20 f3.5 ,Canon EF 24-105 L IS USM, Canon EF 100/2.8 macro Canon EF 50/1.4 ,Canon EF 85 f1.8,Canon EF-S17-85 4-5.6 Old Tamron 28-300 inherited from my Canon Rebel G film camera
Canon580EXII
http://www.errre.net

Hi Radu,
For deep-sky work the setup is in the signature. For this meteor work it was Canon 5D MkII, 15mm fish eye lens, remote timer controller and the AstroTrac for tracking.
Greg

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Nexstar 11 GPS, 2 x Sky 90, M25C, MaximDL, Photshop CS3, Noel Carboni's Photoshop actions, 7 foot Pulsar fibreglass dome, Canon 40D, 100mm macro lens, 28-200mm zoom lens, 17-55mm f#2.8 zoom lens, 100-400mm zoom lens, 1.4x converter, 2x converter.
http://www.newforestobservatory.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12801949@N02/

VERY impressive, cybermystic
It gives me something to aspire to this weekend.

Since the forecast is good, I'm going to try for the SW (for me, at midnight) section of the Milky Way, since it has some interesting deep-sky targets like the Triffid and Lagoon Nebulae, and see what I get. I don't have any sort of tracking (yet - got to get cracking on that barndoor mount), so I'll probably have to try for 15-25 10 sec. exposures and go the Iris route. I'll be using my Oly E510 with the kit lens set at 50mm, so I'm not really expecting a whole lot.

Floyd.

Good luck Floyd - have to try these things out to see what the results come out like
Greg

_________________
Nexstar 11 GPS, 2 x Sky 90, M25C, MaximDL, Photshop CS3, Noel Carboni's Photoshop actions, 7 foot Pulsar fibreglass dome, Canon 40D, 100mm macro lens, 28-200mm zoom lens, 17-55mm f#2.8 zoom lens, 100-400mm zoom lens, 1.4x converter, 2x converter.
http://www.newforestobservatory.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12801949@N02/

Thanks Greg.
I'll certenly go out in non light poluted location to see them with the Bresser 10x50 binoculars.No lens that I have will do for taking shots I'm afaid.
I've seen the Leonides twice in a location tens of kilometers from any light, and it was spectacular indeed.

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Radu
Canon PowerShot S100
Canon 50D , SIGMA 10-20 f3.5 ,Canon EF 24-105 L IS USM, Canon EF 100/2.8 macro Canon EF 50/1.4 ,Canon EF 85 f1.8,Canon EF-S17-85 4-5.6 Old Tamron 28-300 inherited from my Canon Rebel G film camera
Canon580EXII
http://www.errre.net

Hi Radu,

Don't you have a 50mm lens? Still gives you a pretty huge FOV when pointed skywards. Anything under 50mm will be a bonus.

Greg

_________________
Nexstar 11 GPS, 2 x Sky 90, M25C, MaximDL, Photshop CS3, Noel Carboni's Photoshop actions, 7 foot Pulsar fibreglass dome, Canon 40D, 100mm macro lens, 28-200mm zoom lens, 17-55mm f#2.8 zoom lens, 100-400mm zoom lens, 1.4x converter, 2x converter.
http://www.newforestobservatory.com/
http://www.flickr.com/photos/12801949@N02/

Thanks for the tip Greg
I haven't thought that 50 mm is workable for this.
I'll give it a try, if the weather is going to br right

_________________
Radu
Canon PowerShot S100
Canon 50D , SIGMA 10-20 f3.5 ,Canon EF 24-105 L IS USM, Canon EF 100/2.8 macro Canon EF 50/1.4 ,Canon EF 85 f1.8,Canon EF-S17-85 4-5.6 Old Tamron 28-300 inherited from my Canon Rebel G film camera
Canon580EXII
http://www.errre.net

Sky was clear enough so I had to have a go this evening. My ever remaining problem of light pollution is present, and I left it a bit late to go and find a dark spot further out.


35mm, 10s, f/2, ISO1600, light pollution filter
This was a chance shot with a streak right in the middle of the image. At the time I was actually trying to catch the milky way around Cygnus. To the top-left end of the streak is Epsilon Cygni.


8mm fisheye, 30s, f/5.6 or 8, ISO1600, no filter.
Here's a bigger sky shot of the milky way running top-left to bottom right. If you look really carefully just left of top-middle, there's another streak entering shot. Also, if I'm going to have light pollution, I might as well make it look nice! White balance set on the cloud at the bottom gives the sky a purple-blue cast I quite like. Not so sure about the low pressure sodium on bottom right.

_________________
Canon DSLRs: 7D, 5D2, 1D, 600D, 450D full spectrum, 300D IR mod
Lenses: EF 35/2, 50/1.8, 85/1.8, 135/2+SF, 28-80 V, 70-300L, 100-400L, TS-E 24/3.5L, MP-E 65, EF-S 15-85 IS
3rd party: Zeiss 2/50 makro, Samyang 8mm fisheye, Sigma 150 macro, 120-300 f/2.8 OS, Celestron 1325/13
Tinies: Sony HX9V.

Nice shot popo, I like the wide angle sky shot.

I'm hopping to get one on the 12th of August (it's the best time of the year to shoot them here in Canada) I hope the weather will permit it

popo, how do you know the name of that star?
Have you got a program for it, or are you an astronomer?

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Ruben

Panasonic DMC-FZ18, Panasonic DMC-FZ28, Canon G5, Canon 350D, Canon 50D + BG-E2N
Tamron 17-50 2.8, Canon EF 70-200mm f/4L USM,
Canon 18-55 II plus lots of Minolta MD/M42 lenses and bodies

I basically look for patterns in the sky and match them up with a star map. Some are more familiar so don't need that. When I do look things up, I use Celestron's bundled version of "The Sky" which they supply with their scopes.

_________________
Canon DSLRs: 7D, 5D2, 1D, 600D, 450D full spectrum, 300D IR mod
Lenses: EF 35/2, 50/1.8, 85/1.8, 135/2+SF, 28-80 V, 70-300L, 100-400L, TS-E 24/3.5L, MP-E 65, EF-S 15-85 IS
3rd party: Zeiss 2/50 makro, Samyang 8mm fisheye, Sigma 150 macro, 120-300 f/2.8 OS, Celestron 1325/13
Tinies: Sony HX9V.