90 MilliMeters » Astrophotography http://www.90mm.us Backyard Astronomy with Small Telescopes Fri, 03 Sep 2010 01:55:23 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.0.1 First Notes http://www.90mm.us/2009/08/25/first-notes/ http://www.90mm.us/2009/08/25/first-notes/#comments Wed, 26 Aug 2009 00:32:18 +0000 Dan http://www.90mm.us/?p=1  

It’s been hot and hazy for the past week and the skies are murky at best. After a long hiatuses, I’m anxious to get back out under the stars. Since the skies are a bit hazy, I stroll outside around 10:00pm local time and behold, the skies are a little better than I thought.

Since photography is another passion of mine, I always wanted to try shooting the night sky. I don’t know why I haven’t tried it before, just busy I guess. So, I grab my DSLR and tripod and make my first attempt at astrophotography.

Not knowing what to expect, I setup my camera in manual mode, a Pentax*ist DS (a 6.1 megapixel camera) with an smc Pentax-DA 18 – 55mm lens set at 24 mm;  f/4.0; ISO 3200; tungsten white balance.

First test - image 1

First test - image 1

 
And this is what I got. It’s just a random shot of the night sky here in Harleysville PA where I live. The exposure for this shot is 8.9 seconds at f/4.0, 24mm, ISO 3200.
You can view this and four additional images in the First Attempt gallery.
]]> http://www.90mm.us/2009/08/25/first-notes/feed/ 0