Ok, let’s get something out of the way first, photography and especially astrophotography is not cheap. It is a nightmare rabbit hole which never seems to end (see my last post from over two years ago). But that being said you really can take amazing astro photos with just an everyday DSLR or Mirrorless interchangeable lens camera and a tripod. Watch some of Richard Tatti’s YouTube videos and you can see what can be achieved without too much fuss. But to take the next step to get images even more spectacular a bit of extra equipment can help.
Canon R8, RF35mm 1.8 macro, ISO1600, f/2.8, 121 seconds, MSM Nomade tracker
The major problem we face is the night sky is, well, dark. This means that to get as much light as possible we want to use extended exposures times. Rather inconveniently (for this purpose, it is rather convenient on many other levels), the earth moves which make the stars appear to move from our point of view (the stars move as well, but that is me being pedantic and really does not impact what we are trying to achieve). This means that depending on lens focal length and sensor size we are often limited to shutter speeds as short as 10 seconds, and rarely more than 30 seconds with a very wide lens if we don’t want the stars turning in to curving lines rather than pinpoints of light. There are heaps of apps out there which can tell you the optimum shutter speed to use for your camera lens combination (I use photopills).
However if we don’t want to be limited by this we need something that can rotate our camera in such a way that it cancels out the rotation of the earth. Luckily equipment to do this is available and for nightscape photography generally is called a star tracker. They come in all sorts of shapes, sizes and capabilities, but essentially do the same thing. You point them at the celestial pole (so they are aligned with the earths rotation) and then mount your camera on it and they slowly spin your camera in the opposite direction to that the earth is moving. Currently I use an incredibly powerful unit called the Benro Polaris which can not only track the stars, but point the camera automatically at particular stellar objects and automatically create panoramas while tracking the stars. It is very cool, but it is not particularly small, simple and definitely not “cheap”.
I have wanted something much cheaper and portable that I could use with a small camera and lens for those times I am travelling or just don’t feel like dragging out the big guns. For this reason I have decide to give the new Nomade (their spelling not mine) from Move Shoot Move a try. Up front declaration, I bought it and have absolutely no association with the company or any contact with them other than paying for the unit.
From bottom to top, my leofoto tripod head, the nomade traker (the black box with orange switch), and MSM Z-bracket, a 3-legged thing ball head, Canon R8 with 35mm lens and a Hahnel remote camera trigger.
The set up above was essentially all I used (along with my phone) to take the image at the top of the blog. I won’t quote any prices, but this whole set up is way cheaper than the rig I use for most of my photos.
So what is the process using this.
Level the tripod. Really this very important and if you don’t it will create lots of grief in the next step. I use a tripod with a levelling head, have done so for years because I love them and use them in all my photography. They just make life so much easier, especially for panoramas.
Align the tripod head with the south celestial pole (because I am in Australia, in the Northern hemisphere it is the north celestial pole which is so much easier because of the presence of the Pole Star). Now this is generally a pain in the butt to do in the southern hemisphere because we don’t have nice bright polestar to point at. We can align using a group of stars called the Octans, but they are very faint and you essentially need a small telescope (which I did not buy for this tracker) to align with them and it takes a bit of practice. But all is no lost, we can use one of a number of apps on our phone to do the job in a way that is good enough for 2 minute exposure using 35 mm and wider lenses. The set up I use to do it is shown below, but really suggest you watch Richard Tatti’s excellent video on how he does it as it is a much better explanation of how to achieve it than I could ever give. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5D_n6ZtsZ4o The App I am using is called PS Align Pro, but Stellarium is another really good option that works. Honestly, it takes all of 2 minutes with a little practice.
The bracket I use to align my tripod head with the south celestial pole, this in was purchases through MSM, but there are heaps of brands that you can use.
The PS Align Pro app, if you use it this part is found in day time alignment as a little sun icon at the bottom of the screen.
3. Mount the tracker on the tripod. Important point here, while doing this do not bump the tripod, otherwise you will knock it out of alignment and will have to start again. This is one of the major challenges for someone as clumsy as me.
4. Mount your ball head and camera on the tracker as seen in the image above. I use a z bracket between the tracker and the bullhead as it makes it a lot easier to level the bullhead for panoramas, but it is quite OK to attach the bullhead directly to the tracker.
5. point your camera at whatever you want to photograph and have at it! Really it is that simple. As long as you do not move the tracker or tripod you can point the camera in any direction you want!
Once you have got it all set up I generally do some test shots at 30, 60 and 120 second to make sure I have not knocked anything off and to see show good the tracking is. 30 or 60 second images can give amazing results, but I have regularly used this unit now with 2 minute exposures when I want those really bright details and contrast. A remote release is useful, but I often use my phone for that purpose and many cameras also have built in bulb timers these days which let you go beyond 30 seconds.
And that is all there is to it. Yes, post processing of astro images is rarely “straight from the camera” and that is a whole other complex and lengthy topic (which I am willing to discuss if people are interested). But you don’t have to be a PhotoShop maestro to do it and if the original image is not good, well it is much harder to get a great outcome.
Let me know if this help you at all or if I can add anything else.