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Five-second exposure of Orion rising, with 50mm lens at f/1.8, ISO 400, Canon Digital Rebel.

SHOOT THE STARS

Astrophotography with your digital SLR camera. By Michael A. Covington

Today’s digital SLR cameras can easily photograph more stars in the night sky than you can see — as well as picking up star clusters, nebulae, and galaxies.

Here’s how to shoot the stars with just a camera and tripod.

Photography by Michael A. Covington

1. Choose your weapons.

A digital SLR (DSLR) camera is best because of its low-noise sensor (Figure A). A point-and-shoot digital camera may work if it has a fast lens

(low f-number).

Film cameras work too, if you can get someone to make good prints from the resulting negatives, or if you use slide film so you can see directly what you got.

2. Set up a manual exposure.

Use a 50mm f/1.8 lens if you have one, or set your zoom lens to medium-wide. Put the camera in manual (M) mode, with the aperture at the lowest f-number and the speed at ISO 400. Choose manual focus, too.

If your camera has long-exposure noise reduction (Figure B), turn it on. (On Canons this is deep in the custom settings menu.) This will compensate for “hot pixels” by automatically taking a second exposure just like the first, but with the shutter closed, and then subtracting.

3. Aim at a clear, starry sky. Put the camera on a tripod and set an exposure time of 5 seconds. Choose delayed shutter release (Figure C) so your finger won’t shake the camera. Take aim at the sky, and shoot.

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