Re: [APML]: telescope photography

[cvedeler@bio2.edu (Chris Vedeler)]

I'm not familiar with the Meade 114EQ-D scope, but I think I can offer some
general advice.

First of all, you will absolutely need a tracking motor if you want to do
almost any astrophotography through this scope.  Exposure times will be a
minimum of a minute or two at f/8 of anything but the bright planets and moon.

To photograph the Orion Nebula, you probably don't want to use an eyepiece
at all.  Use the scope at prime focus by simply attaching the camera to the
scope without an eyepiece.  This is like using your telescope like a
telephoto lens and is the best way to photograph deep sky objects (objects
outside the solar system.)  At f/8 you can get a nice image of the Orion
Nebula in about 5 - 10 minutes with some 1000 speed film.  Longer exposures
will show more of the fainter detail.  

If you don't want to invest in a tracking motor, you can probably still take
some nice shots of the moon or even a low magnification shot of Jupiter or
Saturn as exposure times are in the order of fractions of a second to a
second or two and the motion of the Earth won't have time to blur your shot.

Most beginners don't realize that for astrophotography the mount is actually
more important than having high quality optics.  Even cheap optics if
properly tracked can give OK images but perfect optics not tracked properly
will give very disappointing results.  Get the best mount you can afford,
then think about the telescope.  Accurate tracking is the most important
thing in astrophotography, next is focus, and then comes quality optics.
When you can get all three, you can get some prize shots like what you see
in the magazines.

Hope this helps,

Chris Vedeler
http://www.isomedia.com/homes/cvedeler/space.htm
Tucson, AZ

At 03:13 PM 2/19/98 -0500, you wrote:
>
>I'm really new to astrophotography and I'm probably going at full steam,
>but just want to know my limitations. I've been looking at getting a
>universal camera adapter and T-ring to hook up my Ricoh camera to my
>Meade 114EQ-D F/8 telescope. It's an equatorial mount with no tracking
>motor at all.
>What I would like to know is, can I use my camera on this department
>store telescope? If I can, with a 25mm eyepiece in the focuser, how long
>would the exposure time be for a picture of the Orion Nebulae? The same
>question for a 10mm eyepiece. Would I need to get a tracking motor for
>the scope to do what I would like to do, which is get closer photos? I
>plan on picking up a book or two at the library on astrophotography, but
>figured I'd ask the group also.
>
>Thanks in advance,
>Jim Fedina
>
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