Stars / Astronomy / Astrophotography / Telescopes / Astro

That's nothing, I took a much clearer picture the other day.

I actually spent some time this afternoon watching the ISS live stream as it passed over Patagonia at dawn. Now that was cool.

What’s with the space noodles though?

Last night’s good ISS pass

1 Attachment

This thread made me think about getting binoculars for casual skyward ogling. Does this advice seem reasonable: http://binocularsky.com/binoc_choosing.php ?

How long an exposure was that? I know next to nothing about photography but it's interesting that you got the long streak up the middle of the photo without the rest looking over-exposed.

That was 133 seconds at ISO100 and probably f5.6. I did some test shots beforehand to get the right sort of exposure but it was still a bit darker than I had intended.

That all looks reasonable to me. I had some cheap 10x50 Lidl specials that were bearable, but I now have some Opticron 8x42 binoculars that are in a different league - not crazy expensive though.

Binoculars are a great place to start, learning to read a sky chart like this:

https://heavens-above.com/skychart2.aspx

will make things go a lot more smoothly as well.

Never get more than 7 x 50. Greater magnification, greater movement.

But also more magnification, darker background...

10x should be OK hand-held for most people.

Thanks for the comments. So I gather something in £150-200 range would already by pretty decent. A lot of my garden is shielded from direct street lights etc. so as the sky actually looks dark occasionally, it'd be nice to see a bit more of it.

One more ISS (sorry)

https://photos.app.goo.gl/8Mht5h3bw21qqgNRA

I’ve got a set of Nikon 8x42’s and they’re great. Cost about £100.

Use them mostly for bird spotting though, not star gazing.

It’s a dangerous game though, because there is always the next best pair....

First Dabble into sky photography. Should probably get some editing software in the future.

Orions Belt,
Big Dipper,
Something very bright which I'm assuming is a planet. It was due almost exactly west.

3 Attachments

Ha, yeah I'm trying not to do the man math thing. Pentax 10x50 for £150 look well regarded, but alternativaly I'm still considering something wider for more generic use.

Venus just below the Pleiades to the right of Taurus, the bright red star being Aldebaran.

just outside and a wafer thin crescent moon setting in the western twilight, with Venus above it, stunning

Yeah, the Moon and Venus are looking crispy right now.

Got a good view of it leaving wales with clear sky's . Same again 8.30 pm tomorrow.

Cleyspy have some good bargains The @opticronuk Alpha ED 8x42 & 10x42 was £249.99 but now is £169 with free delivery!

Nice evening sky, earthshine on the moon

1 Attachment

From Cardiff, Nikon D500 500mmf4+1.4x conv:

https://twitter.com/CardiffOTT/status/1243685786165415938

Incredible. Round the world every 90 minutes.

I am still grateful to the cyclist who made this from some of my ISS shots. Could be a repost, but it’s worth a reminder.

1 Attachment

Anyone see the starlink this eve?

Broken cloud here in Surrey but was tipped off.

Looked up and shat myself at the Alien invasion overhead.

Currently 360 odd of the bastards up there in low orbit atm.

They plan 12,000. With a possible extension to 42,000.

WHO THE FUCK SIGNED THAT OFF?

You wont be able to see anything else.

It's not good, possibility that it'll limit usable telescope time at the major observatories, they won't be able to operate close to sunset and sunrise as there will be too many visible reflections in the sky... Seems crazy to me...