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How do I shot stars? Anonymous
Picture related and taken like 5 minutes ago.
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>> Anonymous
Do you want star trails or just stars.
>> Anonymous
I would love to hear some technique advice on the subject, in general terms. Though if you mentioned it, star trails would be nice to do, but I guess it all comes down to longer exposure time and the sheer amount of luck.
>> Anonymous
>>44495
Aside from exposure time, it's not so much luck as it is location. The closer you are from the equator, the faster the stars move across the sky or so this is what I believe. A lot of great star pictures are taken up north because of the distance away from the equator and also lack of light pollution. It's definitely a killer of good star pictures. There's so much light around nowadays. You'll have to be miles away from any somewhat populated city to get a good view of stars period.
>> Anonymous
You need a mount that tracks with the movement of earth, or you get star trails.
>> Anonymous
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Taken from outside my home - aprox 30 miles S of Buffalo, NY

Exposures of 30 secs can get you GOOD results if you have clear skies, no haze and no / negligible light pollution.

Camera was set on a tripod, self-timer used to activate the shot / minimize jostle.

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>> Anonymous
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>>44955

Version w/ stars labeled

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>> bibliophile
astrophotography is 2 parts
one is simply knowing and having the stuff to do it
two is knowing basic composition in regards to star pictures

required:
camera with a bulb feature or very long possible shutter speeds, 30+ seconds

Tripod

Nice to have:
remote
watch with second hand or stop watch
a chair
moonless night no, few choice clouds, no light polution IE way the hell out of town. Places ND are great for this, or statepark if you dont live somewhere the middle of no-where is 30 minutes out of town. State parks often allow for better composition

Composition wise, your photo is a bunch of dots, nothing all that great. Before you go and take your astro photography go out and scout good compositions in the daylight in relation to sky lines.
>> ac
>>44968
Still a hell of a lot better than the watermarked shot that one guy posted with one dot where he was all like "MY CAMERA IS TEH AWESOME! IT CAN BE MAKES DOT PICTAR!"

Also, Buffalo represent.

(I have nothing useful to add to this thread)
>> Anonymous
>>45031
Believe me... where I live now I can see so many stars on a dark night that I have a HARD time picking out most constellations.

...Unlike where I grew up (West Babylon, Long Island) where picking out the constellations is easy 'cause that's all you can see.... except for the moon, of course.
>> Anonymous
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>>44956
You can see the Pleiades constellation near the top right.

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>> Anonymous
>>45102
Anonymous is right! Thanks! Didn't get that far into labeling it at the time.... Guess I should look a little harder next timer.

Thanks!
>> Anonymous
is it at all possible to shoot stars with a non-dsl consumer camera? I tried take some pictures with my canon powershot a week ago but not even the moon looked any good on the pics, very blurry with too much light on the moon but too dark everywhere else
>> ac
>>45106
When shooting pictures of the moon, you can't trust your camera's autoexposure. You going to have to put it in manual mode.

See, the autoexposure hardware takes an average. It always assumes that the picture you want is an average-bright scene. It sees pure black over most of the frame, so it assumes that it needs to stay open for a long-ass time to give you a good exposure.

So, give it a hell of a lot less exposure and it will be less blurry (because you'll be using a faster shutter speed) and the moon will be clearer (because you'll be exposing for the moon rather than for the inky blackness of space, so the moon won't be completely washed out)

If you just use your camera's autoexposure setting on the moon, a DSLR will give you just as shitty a picture as a consumer point & shoot.
>> ac
>>45106
Oh, wait, stars.

For stars, you're gonna want longer exposures, but again don't trust autoexposure. Most autoexposure systems don't trust themselves enough to expose as long as you'd need for good star pictures. And make sure the moon's *not* in the shot, 'cause it'll wash 'em out.

With a P&S, you might be hampered somewhat by zoom range, too. I know you can snap an SLR body onto a good telescope to use it as a lens, but I'm not sure how well that would work with anything less than an SLR.
>> Anonymous
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(This poster shot the following)
>>44955
>>44956

If you don;t mind the wait, get an old 1970's 35mm cam with a bulb and shoot that way....

Pic related / pic data:
~45 min exposure / 50mm / f22 / Minolta SR-T 101 / iso 200 Kodak (I think) / Scan is from the print
>> Anonymous
(Oops! Forgot)
Also shot from my house, this time facing North towards Buffalo. (Hense the NASTY light pollution.)
>> Anonymous
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>>45105
Couple other stars I can point out...
>> Anonymous
>>45122
And a spelling correction: "Gemesia" should be "Gomesia"
>> Anonymous
>>45122
>>45123

(BLINK-BLINK) All Hail Anonymous! I may just have to update that picture, then.
>> Anonymous
>>45129
Just use Cartes du Ciel:
http://www.stargazing.net/astropc/

It's what I used, and it's free. Dang good sky chart program.
>> Anonymous
>>45140

looks like a nice program, im also gonna check it out! But im very newbie in astrology, the other day I was commenting about the bright north star in the sky and a friend told me it was venus and not a star at all!
>> Anonymous
Uhm.....
>>45184But I'm very newbie in astronomy

..fixed.
>> ac
>>45189
Well, if he doesn't know the difference, presumably he's a newbie at astrology, too.
>> Anonymous
>>45190
Good point.
>> ME-tan !AW11phd3JE
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Eclipse

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>> Anonymous
>>45299
Nice shot... though for an ISO 400, seems a bit grainy (see lots of isolated red pixels). Might be from the overexposure in the original pic... Does Anon poster normally see that type of grain in everyday photos with the FinePix?