RTR-Starry night's Photography-Camera under $300?

[blmkid]

Would like to capture the starry night's over RTR. I have a Canon Power Shot A1000 IS . Don't think it will work too well.

Any suggestion's for a camera unit under $300 ? Wide angle lens or use camera's panoramic setting? I have a tripod.

Would like to view them on a 50" TV back home and view them as a slide show. 

Don McLean's, "Starry Starry Night" : 

[size=medium]Thanks.

 

[Ballenxj]

You ask a lot for trying to stay under $300.
 Check ebay or CL for an older classic model Canon 5D which is full frame, so you can get away with not having to buy an ultra wide lens?
You might get lucky and find one with the appropriate lens?
Perhaps do a google search for what you need? I just did one with your requirements and this site came up first.
Link ----> https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-low-budget-Camera-recommended-to-shoot-stars-in-the-night-sky

 

[sometimesido]

don't need to go all that fancy.

go to Canon Refurbished website and order the cheapest DSLR with kit lens. should be under 300. comes with canon warranty.
do your homework on night time photography online.

don't need a full frame or ultrawide lens, which are both very expensive, to do star photography, especially when you're a beginner.

look, just search for kit lens astrophotography.

even the most cheapest Current dslr still photos would look great on your TV.

here's even a video:

when your skill catches up and you really like doing it, then you can spend the extra money.

 

[jonsun]

KEH.com has good used DSLR's for cheap....I mean even under $100. and they are GOOD. It's definitely not junk. Bought from there over 6 times.

Umm works much better if you can get an "astro" version with the IR filter removed. Canon has made a few models (20Da and 60Da). you want a fast lens most of all. the 50mm f/1.8 for instance is a good economical choice. Or a kit lens @ 18mm wide open.

in order to get a proper nightscape you need remote shutter and a tracking mount....which blows your budget alone. Maybe look at a "barn door mount"

you want at least 90 second exposures to show any detail. Ideally 10-15 minute if you got the mount for it. and at least 8-10 total exposures averaged in pixel math. Do not use low light/noise reduction mode, use true dark frame subtraction in sum or average (8-10 exposure total). Its much better in the end and not making you stand out there until 4am.

just in case you dont know, shoot in RAW. Try pixinsight free trial for processing.

 

[jonsun]

I did this with an old 350D from KEH that I removed the IR filter myself and a kit lense to give you a framing idea of 18mm

[img=500x347]https://farm5.staticflickr.com/4111/5061613791_069b5bedef.jpg[/img]

 

[Ballenxj]

I did this with an old 350D from KEH that I removed the IR filter myself and a kit lense to give you a framing idea of 18mm

That's pretty good Bardo. So now your camera not only is improved for shooting night skies, but infrared too. 

 

[akrvbob]

90 second exposure will be a star trail, not a star shot. Especially with a normal lens. Wide angle hides the trail so you don't see it as well.

 

[jonsun]

90 second exposure will be a star trail, not a star shot. Especially with a normal lens. Wide angle hides the trail so you don't see it as well.

Not if youre tracking

one decent van alternative for a mount is the CG-1 or 3 (sometimes called EQ-1 or 3) with stepper motor. It's what I have now. It's kinda a classic at this point.
 

https://www.telescope.com/Orion/Mou...055.uts?sortByColumnName=SortByPriceAscending

with this motor kit

https://www.telescope.com/Orion-EQ-1M-Electronic-Telescope-Drive/p/7826.uts



It's even camera ready, just screw it on the adapter.

 

[jonsun]

Here's a 20D (the pro version of my camera circa 2005) with charger and battery for $76.00

https://www.keh.com/shop/canon-eos-20d-8-3-megapixel-digital-slr-camera-body-only.html

Then you either need to hardware to connect it to a laptop or a cabled shutter button (which you can make yourself if youre really frugal), plus a compact flash memory card and honestly a power supply instead of battery. You dont want to be in the field and have the camera die. holding the shutter open kills batteries pretty fast.

 

[jonsun]

If you really want to do great wide fields go full frame - 5D for $319

https://www.keh.com/shop/canon-eos-5d-12-8-megapixel-digital-slr-camera-body-only.html

 

[MrNoodly]

Just about any camera that lets you manually set exposure time, aperture and ISO will work. Of course, the more megapixels, the fewer stars that will be lost.

 

[jonsun]

more megapixels = lower quantum efficiency and oversampling (above ~400mm). Most science grade cameras bin the pixels to make them larger but fewer. To make up for resolution a process called dithering and pixel averaging in post processing is done.

 

[blmkid]

Just about any camera that lets you manually set exposure time, aperture and ISO will work. Of course, the more megapixels, the fewer stars that will be lost.

Glad you mention ISO. 'Cause I had no clue, so I found a link to study on. Understanding ISO-A Beginner's Guide: https://photographylife.com/what-is-iso-in-photography

thanks

 

[rm.w/aview]

When you capture the RTR Starry Nights, careful of the relatively bright light sources during long exposure, but still include the subtle lighting of some camps. Or maybe delicately "color" a dark & vacant camp with a flashlight. Look forward to your shots.

 

[rm.w/aview]

Here's a 20D (the pro version of my camera circa 2005) with charger and battery for $76.00

https://www.keh.com/shop/canon-eos-20d-8-3-megapixel-digital-slr-camera-body-only.html

Then you either need to hardware to connect it to a laptop or a cabled shutter button (which you can make yourself if youre really frugal), plus a compact flash memory card and honestly a power supply instead of battery. You dont want to be in the field and have the camera die. holding the shutter open kills batteries pretty fast.

Do you think that this would apply to mirror-less cameras as well? I'm thinking that the drain may still exist but be far less. (I've yet to go beyond 60 second exposures)

 

[jonsun]

yeah cause you will generally use the mirror lock function to cut vibration down anyway. Its the actual exposing electronically (thats also where the excess thermal noise comes from)

 

[jimindenver]

There are a lot of older cameras that will do it as mentioned above. Use a low ISO or you will see a lot more stars than there are due to noise. There use to be a category of camera called Pro-sumer. They had all of the manual settings and above average picture quality, some only differed from their DSL counter parts by being a fixed lens camera. A example is the Olympus C-8080. It can be had for a fraction of the cost new and is still more camera than the average photographer needs.

I will say that there is a fair amount of light pollution at the Q. I did not see the Milky way there, in Yuma or Ehrenberg. I finally started seeing it at the Grand canyon.

 

[jonsun]

ISO (gain) should be set to 1200-1600 for 12-bit cameras. Thats a 1:1 gain ratio. For newer 14-bit ISO 400-800.

Signal to noise ratios are wildly different in low light/astrophotography. This is why you do dark frame subtraction (not internal noise reduction) with a series of averaged dark frames matched to same length and gain to the light exposures.

For doing this try the free program deepskystacker

Another great piece of software is backyardEOS or astrophotogrpahy tool.

Or pixinsight does it all including processing (no need for photoshop)

 

[akrvbob]

Not if youre tracking 
one decent van alternative for a mount is the CG-1 or 3 (sometimes called EQ-1 or 3) with stepper motor. It's what I have now. It's kinda a classic at this point.
https://www.telescope.com/Orion/Mou...uts?sortByColumnName=SortByPriceAscendingwith this motor kit
https://www.telescope.com/Orion-EQ-1M-Electronic-Telescope-Drive/p/7826.uts
It's even camera ready, just screw it on the adapter.

And he's going to find all that for $300, including the camera before the RTR and also learn how to use it all? And he's going to fit it all in the van to take a few pictures in his life?

Or, he could just keep the exposure to under 30 seconds on a good used camera.

 

[jonsun]

Already posted all of it for under $300. He has over 2 months to practice....so yeah