Capturing the Milky Way

[Daniel Browning]

I always wondered why when Canon introduced the 20DA (Astronomy) that this was the first and last version

I think the primary reason they only did it was is because it failed to meet sales expectations. If they had made a lot of money, I'm sure they would have continued doing astronomy versions of newer cameras. I think the reason it failed is twofold: the market is small, and Canon crippled the product. By cripple, I mean they went to a lot of work to slightly modify the IR filter rather than get rid of it altogether. Why did they cripple it? Because of the whiny panty-waisted worry worts. ("Oh noes! If Canon removes the IR filter, then the camera will be able to see through clothes! Wont somebody think of the children!!?!11oneone"). So, as per usual, fear trumps freedom, and no one can get unfiltered cameras. Any serious astronomer would still have to send in their 20Da to have the filter removed, and if they're going to bother doing that, why not just buy a (much, much) cheaper 20d in the first place? The only market for a 20Da is astrophotographers that *don't* want to image infra-red, making the market that much smaller.

I now understand that this community has moved to use purpose built video cameras for their telescopes

Actually, we still use DSLRs and purpose-built CCDs. The video cameras are primarily for planetary imaging.

[Jon Ruyle]

Here is one I took last month from my front yard of the saggitarius/ scorpio area.


It was only a 30 second exposure, taken at 16mm but cropped. Longer than 30 seconds would have caused the stars to blur (even more than they already are)


I keep planning to try a longer exposure with a tracking mount, but I've had clouds at the other new moons this summer


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[Rocco]

What ISO are you guys using? I can

[Daniel Browning]

What ISO are you guys using? I can't see myself going above 1600.

Under dark skies, almost always 1600.


ETTR then ITTR. Increase your exposure as much as possible without causing other problems (e.g. too much motion blur), then, if you still have room on the right of your histogram, use "ISO To The Right" -- increase your ISO as much as possible without clipping any desired highlights *or* going over the maximum useful ISO setting. For a given (fixed) exposure, high ISO has *less* noise than low ISO. That may seem counter-intuitive, but it's true. The maximum useful ISO on any Canon camera is never more than 3200, and usually no more than 1600. (That's because 6400 and above is a braindamaged digital operation in the camera.)



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Thinking I'll try 17mm, 1/30 sec @ 1600 ISO and see how that fares. WB a concern at all? I suppose I can just adjust that later in LR.

I usually go with daylight, then play with it in post to see what looks best.

[btaylor]

1/30 sec is not going to be long enough.


My typical settings are ISO 3200, 10-30sec exposure, f/4.0 -f/5.6 depending on the level of exposure I want to achieve.