First light (imaged) through my Meade 12" with my new DSI-III astro-imager

[mckitterick]

Can you guess what this is?


No, it's not an astro image.

It's part of the house across the alley, siding and window trim. The Deep Sky Imager is a royal PITA to focus, so it's best to set up the focus during the day on motionless subjects using an eyepiece and locking ring (making them "parfocal") and then finding the camera's focus. My first attempt with the Moon led to frustration, as the camera's focus is about 15mm different than the eyepiece that the manufacturer recommends using to focus an object.

In case you haven't seen it yet, here's the telescope:


And here's the astro-camera (a replacement for the broken one the retailer sent last winter):


Now I'll be able to image astro-things much more simply... hopefully starting tonight! Then you'll get fresh amateur astro-images on a regular basis. Hoo-boy, amateur photos! I bet you're thinking ;-)

Best,
Chris

Comments

[steve98052.livejournal.com]

Very cool. I look forward to astronomical images from your new toy!

[mckitterick.livejournal.com]

Good to hear! They won't be as pretty as the professional shots I post, of course, but it's so fun to take one's own shots. When I was a little boy, the first deep-space object I photographed was the Andromeda Galaxy. I developed the film myself. As the galaxy began to appear on a piece of photo-paper, it was like magic. Sure, it was fuzzy and barely recognizable, but I took that shot!

Digital photograph is about a million times simpler. Sort of.