Astrophotography, Telescopes

astrophotography Part 1

I recently took the plunge and bought astrophotography gear including a telescope, a German equatorial mount, guide-scope and camera, and DSLR.  Getting serious about taking long exposure images of the night sky, and most importantly having them turn out decent, in most cases is an expensive endeavor.

Tripod mounted Nikon D60
Tripod mounted Nikon D60

I have enjoyed taking unguided images of the night sky for years. Its pretty simple. Get a camera, put it on a tripod, adjust the ISO and exposure length to the film or CMOS sensor and then see what you get. I have a page on this web site where I have listed tips on how to create those types of shots.  That goes back to the not so distant days of film and having to wait days to get your results.

While I was experimenting with star trail shots, various films, lenses, telescopes, ISO settings and exposures, I longed for the proper gear to take images of objects in the night sky to a much greater degree. By that I mean tracking faint objects of interest and taking multiple exposures that can then be combined or “stacked” using software such as DeepSkyStacker to produce a final image which is then processed in Adobe Photoshop or other photo editing software to bring out the fine details. Well, I’m finally at that point close to twenty years into this hobby.

In my next few blog posts I’ll outline the individual components of my new astrophotography rig. I’ll let you know what equipment I’m using, why I choose it specifically and how it’s worked out for me thus far. I’ll also share my first images and talk about what I’ve learned. 

Telescope

The telescope I choose is the Meade Series 6000 70mm Astrograph. This telescope is designed specifically for photographic use.  Its a Petzval design using 4 lenses and producing an extremely fat field of view and excellent color correction.

This apochromatic refractor employs FPL53 ED (extremely low dispersion) glass for remarkable contrast and sharpness along with almost no noticeable chromatic aberration or “color fringing.” It has a 350mm focal length resulting in a focal ratio of f/5. Trevor Jones from Astrobackyard.com did a detailed and thorough review of the Meade 70mm Quad APO in November 2017. 

Meade 70mm Astrograph Specifications

  • Optical Design: Astrograph
  • Clear Aperture: 70mm (2.76″)
  • Focal Length: 350mm
  • Focal Ratio: f/5
  • Optical Coatings: Multi-Coated
  • Focuser: 2.5″ Rack and Pinion
  • Dovetail: Vixen-Style
  • OTA Weight: 4.5 pounds
  • OTA Dimensions: 12.25″ x 4.5″

I choose this scope because it is ideal for wide-field astrophotography, compact and portable, and does not require a field flattener. Wide-field astrophotography is a good place to get your feet wet as it’s more forgiving than narrow field shots with longer focal length scopes where the tracking and guiding are extremely crucial to getting pin point stars and good images.

My first image through this telescope was not very well chosen object. Truth is I didn’t have a lot of time and so only spent about 4.5 minutes exposing the globular cluster M3 in Canes Venatici, the Hunting Dogs. This is a stacked image of 30 second guided exposures at ISO 1600 using a Nikon D5100 through the 70mm Quad APO. Not a very long exposure as astrophotos go to be sure. It’s a humble beginning to what promises to be a fun adventure into the art/hobby. Click on the image above to go to the gallery where you can then click to see the full size image.