(entries are sorted by the date last changed or published)
RC8 for the range from 1625mm at f/8 to 1050mm at f/5.2 It happened to me to meet two guys who were photographing on the same place as I once did. They both were using RC8 (8" Ritchey-Chrétien, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ritchey–Chrétien_telescope) telescopes....
I once was astrophotographing with two other guys who used monochrome cameras. The cameras had active cooling and were attached to motor-driven filter wheels. At this time I already heard of such cameras but still did not consider them as an upgrade, since the...
Testing Routers as WiFi Extenders with ZWO AISAIR Pro Some while ago there were a few cloudy nights in my place again, and I took some time to tinker again. Like some other users, I also suffered from a weak WiFi performance of ASIAIR Pro and over time collected a few...
Using equatorial mounts requires using counterweights to achieve a balanced distribution the weight regardless of the rotation of the mount and the sizes of the payload. Counterweights are usually cylindrical and are placed on a bar along the RA axis. Their weight...
Made in Germany. Shipped from Germany About Photastro Photastro is a new shop on Internet. It has been started in the Fall 2021 as a small business ran by one person in the spare time aside. The famous recent pandemic has changed my sabbatical plans in the year 2020,...
La Palma - the island of volcanoes, dark night skies and tropical green tales. Fuerteventura - the most flat island of Canary Islands and so the driest one. Like on all other Canary islands, there are a lot of wind from the Passat trade winds stream on Fuerteventura,...
The page shares my experience in starting with astrophotography. If you are interested in this, this page might help you to start on the right end, save some time and potentially money too.
A Photographer Perspective As a photographer you probably own some interchangeable lenses. Depending on the focal length and the optical quality of that lenses, they most probably can be used for astrophotography with a good results. In astrophotography, optical...
Compensation of the Earth Rotation Star Trackers Start Trackers have only one axis. They provide a motorized system rotating a camera holder on this axis in the opposite direction to the rotation of the Earth. In order to put this axis in the right direction, an...
If Astronomy is not your hobby, you do not need to dive in all details of this science for astrophotography. Still, a basic knowledge and understanding is almost mandatory. Astronomy is not my hobby, and I collected a list of highlights which I found important to know...
Many things you know from the daylight photography are different now! Seasonality Unlike the regular photography, the selection of your astrophotography objects is strictly driven by time and your location. On top, it is timed by the moon phases. There are some...
When you start as a beginner, steps of alignment appear pretty unusual and unclear. There is a polar alignment to align the RA axis of your start tracker or equatorial mount with the rotation axis of the Earth. If you use an equatorial mount, in most cases you need to...
Why and When a Computer-Based Control is Needed in Field When using a star tracker, you only need to do a polar alignment and setup a multi-exposure sequence to start shooting. This can be done either directly in the camera, with an intervalometer or in the app...
Making pictures of the sky objects is driven by annual seasons as objects move, or better, the Earth travels around the Sun. Your view of the sky is defined by your location. The majorty of "a must" astrophotography objects are located in the belt of Milky Way. The...
Which Path to Go and Why I own the Star-Watcher Adventurer Mini since 2017. Again and again, I thought of upgrading it, and then decided to keep it while creating a Go-To setup. In parallel, I wanted to enhance the Star-Watcher Adventurer Mini with an automated...
In regular photography, many people rely on auto-focus in most cases. The auto-focus as it is known available in DSRL and mirrorless cameras does not work in for astrophotography. Bahtinov masks have been invented in 2005 and are very popular today. I found out that...
Are you tired of shaking preview picture when you adjust the focus? Did you notice how sensitive the adjustments are and how hard it is to hit the right position? You heard of motorized focusers and were disappointed that all of them are made to work with telescope...
I spent some time to filter and to sort tons of various apps, web sites and desktop software for astrophotography. In my opinion, only the choice of messaging apps is larger 😉 Ratings are always subjective and real unbiased and good reviews take a long time. This...
This is my biased, but categorized, but not "prioritized" list of interesting information sources about astrophotography. Well, the only part which is "prioritized" are books in the first section. Books I learned for myself that astrophotography is one of those...
Cameras and Lenses  Currently, I use the following gear most of the time: Canon EOS 100D camera, astro-modified, and sold, replaced by: Canon EOS 800D camera, astro-modified, as a main camera ZWO ASI294MM Pro, ZWO 8x EFW, Baader LRGB and CMOS-optimised HSO filters,...
The benefit of a custom landscape is that you can directly see which parts of the sky are obscured by trees, houses, hills at a given time and date on your favorite location. This is a big time saver in planning your day. There are quite some guides on the Internet on...
A direct connection via an EQDIRECT cable from a computer to the mount Why The EQMOD project implements a ASCOM compatible driver for the Sky-Watcher and Orion (same hardware and software) mounts which can communicate directly with the mount. It also provides various...
It will be interesting to watch the development of the regular photography gear over time. In a saturated photography market, many established photography brands are searching for attractive niche segments. Astrophotography seems to be one. The evolution of cameras in...