Friday, March 2, 2012

Buttonwood Inn Astronomy Update

Although the nights recently have been cloud covered and full of snow (no complaints of course), about two weeks ago, on a Thursday night, I pointed the Inn's telescope toward the Constellation Orion, specifically looking for the Orion Nebula.

Meade 10 Inch
 I am really new to the whole digital image thing but I have always wanted to try my luck at taking pictures with a decent single lens reflex camera hooked directly to the telescope's viewfinder which is called prime focus coupling.

With today's cameras you can fairly easily see the image of the object you are trying to photograph directly in the eyepiece of the camera, or, in the case of some digital cameras with LCD screens, you can view the image directly on the screen and make some adjustments and view the "live" image before taking the actual photograph.

There are other methods, such as using the telescope's eyepiece as you would normally view the night sky and then, using a special mount, attaching the camera with it's lens so that you focus on the image in the eyepiece. Here is an example of that type of device.

When all is said and done, there are certainly other factors affecting the final image, some camera related, and others telescope related, which we I hope to discuss in future blogs. For the time being, here is a quick single image shot I took on that Thursday night two weeks ago and although it is certainly not a "Hubble telescope" quality image I was still excited about the fact that it worked. Hope you enjoy it.

Orion Nebula Canon T3i Prime Focus Meade LXD 10 inch

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