M20 & M8: Nebulae in Sagittarius

M20 The Trifid Nebula on the left and M8 The Lagoon Nebula on the

right are roughly 4-5000 light-years away and reside in the

constellation of Sagittarius. This is a 60 minute exposure on hypered

Fuji 400 film at f/8 with a 4-inch Takahashi refractor.

Hi, lovely picture and colors.Would like to ask technical question - how did you keep stars in place(with long exosure they should show traces of movement)

thanks

edvard

Amazing - no better words! Compliments William!!!

The telescope mount is motorized and tracks at about the same rate as Earth's rotation. However, during exposure there are small "periodic errors" inherrent in the tracking gears and small corrections to the system must be made throughout the entire exposure. Corrections are made either with an auto-guiding system, or manually with a hand controller (while staring at a star through a "guiding eyepiece"). It is actually much more complicated than this but in general, this is the way it is done. Thanks for asking!

I used to own a Meade 8" and a Celestron 10". This is better than any image I captured. It is a very tricky procedure. Then you have satellites, clouds, airplanes, etc. to contend with, not to mention humidity and bugs. So this is a single photo and not multiple stacked photos? Thanks for sharing.

These images fascinate me, marvelous work.

Wow. You've got some excellent astro pics here William. This one is especially striking. The image does a wonderful job of showing how large, beautiful and diverse the universe is.

Extraordinary, bravo  ... we really have to find new places to spend our vacations one day .. : -)