It’s hard to believe that is has been over a year since I posted the original “Having Fun in the Dark!”, so much has changed since then. Through the trials and tribulations of 2020, photography has become my escape. I guess there are far worse addictions! What began with a practically spontaneous attempt to capture the Milky Way, has become an obsession to capture Deep Sky Objects (DSOs), such as galaxies and nebulae. They present a new and interesting challenge. First of all, they are very far away, making them very faint. The Andromeda Galaxy (M31) is over 2.5 million light years from earth and it’s the Milky Way’s closest neighbor. Additionally, they appear to be in constant “motion” across the night sky, transiting with the earth’s rotation. This motion makes finding the proper exposure balance critical.
I shot my first Milky Way attempts in September 2019 and quickly learned that I have a lot to learn!
The Milky Way as it appeared over the Neuse River in September 2019.
Fortunately, the summer of 2020 provided the perfect reason to learn more about deep sky photography when Comet F3, aka NEOWISE, appeared in the early morning skies of July. If anything, imaging a comet proved much more challenging than the Milky Way. Heck, just finding the darn thing was very difficult during my first shoot. Luckily, the weather cooperated and afforded me several more opportunities to try. The comet became an early evening object later in the month, making shooting more convenient; however, the predawn images are far more appealing to me.
Comet F3 “NEOWISE” in the predawn skies above Chocowinity Bay. July 2020
Comet F3 “NEOWISE” shines over Blounts Bay just after sunset. July 2020
A closer view of Comet F3 “NEOWISE”, notice the egg shaped stars?
Sometimes you just get lucky! One evening after shooting images of the comet, I turned around and there, in all of its glory, was the Milky Way! I quickly adjusted my gear, trying to recall all that I had learned since the previous September, and caught perhaps my best astroimage to date.
The Milky Way creates and nice frame for Jupiter over a quiet Camp Boddie, NC. July 2020
Andromeda has become my target of choice for the winter, primarily because I can shoot it from my deck. We have a perfect view of the Polaris (The North Star), which is critical for aligning the star tracker (more on that later), and Andromeda is just about straight above us. Locating it in the view finder proved to be quite a challenge during my first few attempts, but I am getting better at it.
My first attempt was a “proof of concept” shoot using just my camera, tripod, and 85mm lens. The results were far from impressive, yielding the image below, but it sure got me excited about the possibilities. Once again, I have a lot to learn!
The Andromeda Galaxy (M31). When I see this image now, I cringe!
The trick, it seems, to deep sky photography is balancing exposure time (you want as much as you can get!) with the “noise” generated by low light conditions. Remember, long exposures create egg shaped stars and egg shaped stars are just gross. Even with the relatively wide angle of my 85mm lens, any exposure greater than 2 seconds started scrambling eggs. Enter the Star tracker! Technically, it’s a German Equatorial Mount. When properly aligned with the polar axis, it moves the camera in perfect unison with the Earth’s rotation. No more eggs! It’s a little more complicated than that, but with the star tracker and the same 85mm lens, the results are dramatically better. They are still a long ways from good, but better.
Andromeda, “tracked and stacked.” December 22, 2020.
I still have SO much to learn about this stuff, but that is 90% of the fun! I tried again on December 29th, this time with a 200mm lens, but the moon was full and created far too much light pollution to get good results. I am planning to try again soon, hopefully with clearer skies and less moon.
Andromeda shot at 200mm during a brilliant full moon, December 29, 2020.
My hope is to create at least one good image of a galaxy and one good image a nebula in 2021. I know those don’t sound like lofty goals, but they will be quite a challenge. I am at the very beginning of this journey, so stay tuned!
Since I don’t want to end this post with a bad image, here is that brilliant full moon that ruined my galaxy shoot. Happy New Year!
