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Old August 15th 06, 04:34 PM posted to sci.astro.amateur
Brian Tung[_1_]
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Default Astrophotography on a Shoe String?

bucky wrote:
I want to do time lapse Astrophotography on a tight budget.
Things such as galaxies and nebula.

What telescope/mount/guidance would be cheapest,
but still be able to take good 30 minute plus time lapse photographs?


Do you really mean time lapse, as in taking a sequence of snapshots that
are then registered and sequenced to form a short movie, or do you mean
time *exposure*, in which film or an electronic detector (CCD, etc) is
left exposed to the sky for a long period of time to image dim fuzzies?

If the latter (as I suspect), you may want to try piggy-back photography
first, which uses the camera's own lens, with the camera mounted as a
piece on top of the mount (either directly, or on top of a mounted
telescope). Decent shots can be had with just a few minutes of exposure
in this configuration.

You may want to take a look at Michael Covington's book on astrophoto-
graphy, if it's still available.

--
Brian Tung
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