Astronomy Adventure – DSLR Astrophotography

The whole point of my astrophotography effort has been to show that you could get some decent photos with a minimum investment of under $500. That included a decent 4.5 inch telescope with a alt-azimuth tracking mount and the use of my iPhone as the camera. When I was out West in August for the total solar eclipse, however, I began to try astrophotography with just my DLSR camera. The skies were incredibly dark out there and the Milky Way was a wide ribbon that wrapped across the sky. Compared to the high ambient light area I live in, it was quite a treat. Unfortunately, my efforts were somewhat stymied by being slightly out of focus, but, even so, I found the results astounding. The photos also prompted me to get a little more familiar with using levels and curves in GIMP a little more productively. All the  original photos were 8 second exposures at f4.5 and high ISO.

Proving the old astronomy adage, dark skies are even better than more aperture. Too bad we are losing them at such a fast pace.