Re: folly of astrophotography

From: Mitch Alsup (MitchAlsup_at_aol.com)
Date: 11/19/04 

Date: 19 Nov 2004 11:36:40 -0800

I have been an avid amateur astronomer for 40 years, and until
a few weeks ago I though I'd never end up photographing anything.
With the acquizition of an advanced dSLR, this has changed, I
am going to give it a try. But not with my eyes closed!

One of the strange things I learned in the first few weeks of
dSLR ownership, is that digital changes all the rules. A) each
'shot' is free, however, b) the cost structure to be able to take
that shot is quite steep. The other thing I have learned is that
even with an excellent camera and all the electronic gizmos that
take the hard work out of the picture taking process, one shoud
not expect more than 10% of their shots to be keepers. With the
added difficulty of astronomy of extrememly dim objects and the
problems of tracking that object during the course of the exposure
this 10% will drop into the 1% (or less) range. Even short exposures
are subject to the camera movements setting up vibrations in the
telescope that blur the very detail one is trying to capture.
Indeed, some of my bets images of terrestrial subjects are long
exposures of landscapes taken at twilight. The longer exposure,
it seems, the better the image. I believe that the camera movements
are setting up lens/tripod vibrations that take a few seconds to
damp out.

In general, I fully agree with the new amateur astronomers would
do themselves well by staying away from astrophotography (film or
digital) until they get a few years under their belts and understand
the delicacy one needs to focus a telescope without inducing large
vibrations and the delicacy of focusing at all. In addition to the
polar alignment issues, and all the other stuff, its a simple time
issue. If it takes 1/2 the night to set up all the gear and the
results don't turn out so well, it sericously degrades the astro
part of the equation without making the photography part any fun
whatsoever.

Mitch

Quantcast