Andromeda

and another cheeky Milky Way shot




Andromeda and another galaxy above it with the sexy name M32. This is a 30 second single exposure using a DA*300 on my K-5iis at f5.6 ISO 800 and it's uncropped

Hi
The first one is excellent

Wow! 2 great shots, the one of Andromeda is superb!

Just like the opening scene of a movie set in deep space! Nice work Steve

Impressive images Steve. Well photographed.

Best regards

Cheers for the positive comments guys

Great stuff - how come you kept the stars as dots with a 300mm lens on and 30secs? Did you use the OGPS thing?

I love these....Is the Andromeda one really uncropped? Not through a telescope?
I cant even see andromeda without a telescope.
What lens did you use for the milky way shot?

Ive had a look on your flikr link, and the others are stunning as well. The andromeda with the 50-135....you can really see the spirals of the galaxy in that one.
Brilliant.

I thought 30 seconds was the maximum you could get away with WITHOUT the stars growing tails?
Whatever, they are impressive

For fixed cameras the maximum with out trails is highly dependent on the focal length (the '500 rule' gives a rough idea of this - a 300mm lens on APSC it works out about 1 second).
The brilliant shot of Andromeda with a long lens must have been taken with a tracking mount as this is well outside the limit for trails at 450mm EFL. I suspect the movement needed is beyond the range of astrotracker (O-GPS). If not it's even more impressive than I thought!
Taken as single shots they must also have needed some real good dark skies!

All done without the use of a tracking mount the Astrotracer really is that good. I started with the DA*50-135 to get Andromeda in the centre of the frame and then zoomed to 135 and again made sure it was central. Then popped on the DA*300 and took the 30 second exposure, initially when you look at the picture on the back of the screen it is only an orange fuzz but once you let Lightroom at it the full ellipse appears.
The uncropped shot really is uncropped and a single exposure. I did try to do a 10 second shot with the 1.4x TC on but I couldn't see Andromeda in that one because I'd moved the angle of the lens, couldn't find it again and as it was quite late and I had work the following morning and a 1.5 hour drive home I left it for another night.
But when I got the shot home and put it through LR I had only just missed it, there was a large fuzzy lump on the far right of the image so if I'd taken with a much higher ISO I might have seen it and been able to adjust accordingly, Lessons learnt
Oh yes, one more thing. You can actually focus on a bright star with the Pentax K-5iis and K-3 through both lenses mentioned, it's incredible

Oh, just remembered, the Milky Way shot was with an old Pentax A 28mm f2.8. It has the old ability to turn it to infinity and it's at infinity, why aren't modern lenses like that

Highly impressed!

Thanks for the extended info Steve, much appreciated.
I started a thread a couple of weeks ago regarding a suitable lens for milky way shots, and asked if the A 28mm 2.8 would be a good choice (i sold the one i had as i wasnt seeing much use), i now think i need to get one again.

Well impressed 1 1/2 hours drive to a dark site i go out to a dark site with my
Telescope with some friends
I must try taking the camera and some lenes and have a go I have also a tracking mount