Photographing the Moon with a telescope...

[asterixsg]

Thanks to my friend Weixing, who taught me everything about using a telescope to shoot the moon. This one is for you, Weixing.

Appreciate your help and patience in helping a newbie like me.

Ever since I saw Saturn with its rings, I have been hooked. Hopefully, one day soon I will be able to photograph Saturn too.

Moon, photographed with a Canon 30D mounted on a Celestron 6SE telescope.

[deckard]

great next time aim for mars and its moons.

try venus, the brightest one in the night sky.

while you are at it. try to get the horse head nebula right in the centre of the orion contellation.

good shot and good try. mount your camera on the pentax telescope at the science centre. sure get power shots!

[Francis247]

Great to see your work.
Looks good but a bit tight.
Hope that you can realise your dream one day.
Thanks for sharing. Look forward to more of your shots.

[asterixsg]

Thanks guys, for the encouragement.

Deckard,
I was able to see Jupiter and its moons too. But too small to photograph if I mount the camera directly onto the telescope.
We will try another method and hopefully, I will get Saturn and Jupiter's images to post here.
Saw the swan nebula too, using one of Weixing's eyepiece.
Man, this sure is addictive. Couldn't sleep until 5 this morning

Francis,
With a focal length of 1500mm, it sure is a tight fit on a 1.6x cropfactor sensor. And focussing is so difficult - I still haven't got the hang of it. Even the slightest of vibrations causes a shake. This was only my first attempt and I was too excited, so posted this image.
Will keep trying and will post better images later.

[dOlBy]

What adaptor did you use to mount the Canon 30D onto the Celestron 6SE telescope

[asterixsg]

Originally Posted by dOlBy What adaptor did you use to mount the Canon 30D onto the Celestron 6SE telescope

I used a T-Ring for the SLR and a T-Adaptor for the telescope.

[cantaresg]

Originally Posted by deckard great next time aim for mars and its moons. try venus, the brightest one in the night sky. while you are at it. try to get the horse head nebula right in the centre of the orion contellation. good shot and good try. mount your camera on the pentax telescope at the science centre. sure get power shots!

If you are taking the picture in Singapore, there is little point in doing so actually. The skyglow is quite bad here, and before you can get a successful picture, you'd find that you have overexposed due to the citylights.

But if you are able to, try to capture the entire Orion Nebula. You may capture some things that are not visible in naked eye.

[etegration]

Originally Posted by asterixsg I used a T-Ring for the SLR and a T-Adaptor for the telescope.

how does that actually looks like? i mean the adaptor?

[asterixsg]

Originally Posted by etegration how does that actually looks like? i mean the adaptor?

The images posted below are not mine. They are directly linked from www.telescopes.com

The T Adaptor looks like this.



and the T Ring looks like this.



And the whole setup looks like this.



Actually the last photo is a bit misleading. You don't attach any lens to the camera. The T Ring is fixed to the Camera. The T Adaptor to the telescope.

My T Adaptor is a bit different than the one shown in the image. But I posted these images, to illustrate the concept.

[etegration]

Originally Posted by asterixsg The images posted below are not mine. They are directly linked from www.telescopes.com

interesting! thanks for sharing the setup.

[asterixsg]

Blessed with some relatively clearer skies and with Weixing's help, managed to take some more shots of the moon a few hours back. Very excited to be able to shoot these images, so decided to share. Hope you like them.

#2


#3
You see the crater with a small hill inside - on the right hand side of the image. That's mine
I believe people over the world have already staked their claims on all the craters on the moon. I will wait for the next meteor to strike the moon and stake my claim on it.



#4. Poor moon. It has taken so many beatings



That's it folks. Thanks for watching.

[swimaniac]

Great Shots. It was nice to meet you again last night.

Will you be there ahain tonight if the sky is clear?

[asterixsg]

Originally Posted by swimaniac Great Shots. It was nice to meet you again last night. Will you be there ahain tonight if the sky is clear?

Thanks. Not sure if I can make it tonight. Biking early tomorrow morning and I am terribly short of sleep
Will have an early night tonight. But this thing is too addictive
I tried my hand at HDR, but the image turned out extremely bad. Will post for help in the Digital darkroom section later.

Cheers

[machiavellian]

very interesting!
i enjoyed the photos published.

HDR is actually quite easy, once you get the hang of it.

[asterixsg]

Happy Vesak Day to all.

[kcuf2]

oh man...ur shots are nice! u got any teleconverters or not?? maybe can try attaching teleconverters to it :P may make it much much harder to focus but maybe u will be able to spot another crater within a crater and u can stake ur claim on it lol..

[weixing]

Hi,
So you capture the "Blue Moon" (second Full Moon in a month)... nice...

Have a nice day.

[asterixsg]

Coming from the teacher. Hey, thanks bro.

I now have a tiny problem. All my calculations have gone haywire. With the 1500mm focal length on 1.6 crop factor camera, the moon is an EXACT fit. But composing it is a pain. The viewfinder only shows approx 95% of the image - so its a hit n miss for the top n bottom as most of my shots got cropped.

And the tracking isn't perfect yet. 3 star, 2 star alignment, checked coordinates, time, tracking rate etc. - tried everything last night and yet the mount doesn't track too well.

Tried the eyepiece you gave and I found how much dust is there on my camera sensor.
Time for a spring clean this weekend.

[Umeiko]

Originally Posted by asterixsg Blessed with some relatively clearer skies and with Weixing's help, managed to take some more shots of the moon a few hours back. Very excited to be able to shoot these images, so decided to share. Hope you like them. #2 #3 You see the crater with a small hill inside - on the right hand side of the image. That's mine I believe people over the world have already staked their claims on all the craters on the moon. I will wait for the next meteor to strike the moon and stake my claim on it. #4. Poor moon. It has taken so many beatings That's it folks. Thanks for watching.

Love your shots. Guess we don't need to be astronaut to fly there to view the moon in such level of details.

[asterixsg]

Went last week to Mersing to chill out. Instead, woke up at 3 am to shoot the moon. After I finished mounting the telescope and started to track the moon, I attached my camera. Only to find that the whole sky was filled up with clouds. Where they came from in 15 minutes or so, I have absolutely no idea.

Quickly took a few photos before the moon was engulfed by the clouds.

This one was taken just as the clouds started to devour the moon.