Rick Lawn
Composer • Author • Performer • Educator
Astrophotography
Over my lifetime I’ve become addicted to several hobbies. While I was fascinated by the night skies and sunspots when I was a kid, lying on my back in the summer months looking through a cheap Tasco refractor telescope, I didn’t become more serious about astronomy until around 2006 or so. I started with a used Celestron 8” Schmidt Cassegrain go-to scope that a dragged to a nearby park. I quickly became more interested in photographing objects than just looking at them through the eyepiece. I used a Philips webcam than I modified to take movies of the moon and planets and learned a little about post processing the images with various software. But the images weren’t very good as you can see.
With job and at-home responsibilities I never was able to carve out enough time to devote to this interest and rather than let this scope, which was by now old technology, I sold it and regrettably all the accessories. I wasn’t too sad though as the scope was old and not upgradeable to take advantage of all the modern innovations.
Fast forward to 2022 when my interest in astronomy, particularly astrophotography once again was rekindled with the purchase of some new equipment. I quickly learned, however, that the telescope that gets used the most isn’t the one that is heavy, bulky and difficult to drag around. My tree covered neighborhood mandates that I have to go elsewhere for darker and unobstructed skies. Once again, I sold most of my equipment and to keep my intest moving forward I purchased one of the new, easy to use and move around “smart, electronically assisted” scopes. I bought the first version Vespera. I also briefly used a ZWO SeeStar S50. What follows are a few images of deep sky objects captured recently with these scopes.
I quickly learned that while there is an element of instant gratification when using one of the “smart scopes” controlled with an iPhone or iPad app, the images are small and lack the detail that real telescopes are capable of.
After more research I acquired a small, lightweight, portable equatorial mount, Sky Watcher Star Adventurer GTI and a used Apertura 72mm refractor. I added an ASIAIR and guidescope and camera specifically for controlling the camera, planning my shots, polar aligning and and guiding the scope to avoid star trails due to the earth’s rotation. I also bought an Apertura AD8, a highly recommended manual 8" Dobsonian telescope.
Both were excellent choices for an amateur like myself. I continue to gravitate towards astrophotography because of the lasting value of the experience. I recently bouth a new Celestropn Evolution 8" SCT scope that has a more robust, heftier mount and tripod that will be most appropriate for planetary imaging. Now all I need is decent weather!
