Astrophotography and the K10D

OK, most here remember my moon shots from a few weeks back - now here is something different. I've

been planning this night for weeks and I'm completely amazed the weather held out for me. It was just

about as perfect as a stargazing night in february could be.

 

I learned a bit more about the local observatory's setup tonight so I can be better prepared for similar

ventures in the future.

 

I purchased an intervalometer from a Hong Kong vendor on eBay and it arrived just in time for our night

out. It functioned perfectly! My next purchase may be an Oly right angle finder like Godfrey's (he's

seriously gonna think I'm a stalker) for a little better control in focusing.

 

This is where I'd like to thank Pentax for that stupid pop up flash. I have had 2 issues with it being in the

way recently. The first was when mounting an Asahi Auto Bellows M where I have to walk in onto the

mount a little at a time. The second was tonight when the T-Mount reducer that was on the telescope

would not mount up because of about a 2mm conflict at the flash protrusion. We were able to remove the

reducer to make clearance, but we went from f/11 to f/13 and had to refocus the telescope (which the

operator had taken about 1.5 hours to do the night before).

 

I was surprised when the operator asked "WHY?" when Maria asked if she could shoot at 800 for 120

seconds instead of the 1600 for one minute that he prescribed when we came in.

 

My dad shot first at 1600, then Maria at 800, then mine at 400. We had these guys about 20 minutes into

overtime by the time we were done. As I get the other shots from the shooters, I'll post 'em here.<div></div>

it may be a little on the soft side, but i'm still pretty darn impressed...

 

and jealous of the toys you get to play with ;)

thats cool

 

I want to try to take some Night time shots of the moon when you see some clouds around it but I havent figured how to get the clouds in the shot.

Good stuff Matthew. I'd love to do some of this sort of thing. We have no place with a telescope here but with my own unit. Another thing on the long list...

 

Also I have a solution for you on the bellows. I added one of these http://cgi.ebay.com/T2-T-2-T-MOUNT-adapter-for-Pentax-K-Film-Digital-SLRs_W0QQitemZ200198590808QQihZ010QQcategoryZ30059QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

and it gives that extra little bit of space needed to clear the flash housing. Another way to do it is add a short section from a screwmount extension tube to the back of the bellows. The same can be done with a K mount bellows.

 

Chris, You should practice with multi exposure mode in-camera. You can take a perfectly framed shot of the moon and then sandwich a shot of moon lite clouds over the same frame. Sometimes you have a great full moon that is nice and clear, then you would have clouds on the horizon that you can overlayer to get the effect you want.

Thanks for the comments, guys. The local observatory is run by Wichita State University,

and this wasn't completely free to me. It cost me $12 for the three of us to get in...

 

I'm know that some of the apparent 'softness' is because the stars are blown out

(especially the quad in the middle - which was identifiable as 4 separate stars in shorter

exposures). Next time, I will try several different exposures for the stars and the nebula

then stack them.

 

I'm looking for some terrestrial objects to shoot with the 500mm with the moon

rising/setting behind it, and I'm scouting locations to try out the intervalometer on the

upcoming lunar eclipse.

 

One of my problems with the bellows is that I'm already running the lens as close as I can

get it to the body to get the magnification I want, so an extension tube would give me

trouble too. Of course, the focus and exposure would change with an extension on the

telescope too, but I did ponder the use of a TC myself...

Matthew, very cool stuff to share here. Please have a shot or two on the setup with the bellow and intervalometer. Novices like me have no idea how those things work together. A picture or two would make our LBA and gear thought go through the roof.

 

I don't know if it has passed your birthday as I remember the post about 2/9 on EskimoJoe from Maria. Happy Birthday to a wonderful and always intriguing Matthew. By the way, I look up the place of the restaurant and find it perhaps too far for me to visit the place that I am now visiting for this weekend, Washington DC in Gorge Town area and I did not post my whereabout until now as my company business meeting is planned shortly last week. It would be fun to see any of you in nearby places to Washington DC area. I don't have a car until my manager arrives later on Sunday and Monday is all business related work. But I do have today to visit the capital and other interesting areas with bus and metro. I hope I manage to take some shots of this wonderful area.

Thanks, Hin. My birthday was the 2nd, my brother's the 13th and my Dad's the 17th. We

just kinda made a weekend celebrating all three. We did a hockey game Fri. night, a train

show Sat. morning, had cake and ice cream after lunch, and went out to the observatory in

the evening. It was a LONG day. Yes, there are train and hockey pix to come...

For a first attempt, I think it turned out pretty good. As you said, you've learnt a few things to make the results next time better. And speaking of next time, maybe you should try going for something bright, like a planet (Jupiter or Saturn are my votes), or the Andromeda galaxy. Faint objects, like nebulae, are tough to shoot.<br>

<br>

Looking forward to seeing the other pics, Matthew. And $12 doesn't seem that much to me; it's not even enough to pay for the telescope operator's time.<br>

<br>

I keep meaning to get a T-mount adapter to do some astro photography too, but I keep putting it off. I think I'll get one soon to make use of the upcoming clear Spring skies (one can dream!).<br>

<br>

Regarding focusing, this is where the K20D's live-view focussing comes in; especially if you can zoom in with live-view. Not that I'm trying to implant any subliminal K20Desires™ in you... (Maria would not like me to do that, I'm sure!)

Until I get my own telescope, anything not within the earth's orbit will be photographed at

the observatory. <a href="http://webs.wichita.edu/lapo/events.html" target="new">Here's

the schedule.</a>

<i> Here's a summary on our shooting. I realize that the first image being captured in

jpeg doesn't exactly make it fair, so I want to point out that variable. Maria's battery died

on her 3 minute exposure, so her EV was lower than the first and last.</i><p><p>

 

<center>

<h1>Orion Nebula: February 9, 2008</h1>

<h2>Images captured with 3 different Pentax K10D's</h2>

<h3>Note: 1st and last exposures had the same EV, the 2nd had a lower EV.</h3>

<table>

<tr>

<td>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/nebula/nebula1600.jpg">

</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>

<center>ISO 1600, 90 sec. (jpeg capture)<br><br><br><br></center>

</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/nebula/nebula800.jpg">

</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>

<center>ISO 800, 120 sec. (RAW capture)<br><br><br><br></center>

</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>

<img src="http://71.158.200.250/nebula/nebula400.jpg">

</td>

</tr>

<tr>

<td>

<center>ISO 400, 360 sec. (RAW capture)<br><br><br><br></center>

</td>

</tr>

</table>

</center>

Great stuff Matthew!

 

I'll need to get a photo up of the telescope I have at home and see if youguys can help me get all the stuff I need to connect it to the K10D.. It's not a great telescope but, looking through it at the moon I can see great detail. More so than any lens I have.

The tracking system for the telescope is as important as the optics, if not more so. You might be suprised what you can see with a 300mm - 500mm lens (and maybe a TC) and a long exposure. The ETX-90 telescope ($600) is designed with the amature astrophotographer in mind, but I have seen nice pix from cameras with $100-$200 glass that were hose clamped onto the body of an ETX-60 ($125). The orion nebula is quite large, it just isn't very bright.