Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

Below is an image I took early this morning of the North American Nebula in the constellation of Cygnus. This is image was created by stacking 9 frames that were each 3 minute exposures. The freeware stacking program Deep Sky stacker was used to stack the images. I used a 500mm lens at F 4.0 and a canon 5D Mark IV to take the individual frames. During a couple of the 3 minutes exposures satellites went by that can be faintly seen if you zoom in on the nebula. All comments, questions and suggestions are welcome.

(Download)

NMGal Loc: NE NM

Good catch.

Dixie Native Loc: Leicester, NC

Very, very nice!

lamiaceae Loc: San Luis Obispo County, CA

Wow, cool. Where were you to have a dark enough sky? I have to travel to even see but the brightest stars. A lot of light pollution in the Los Angeles area.

Oddly a dedicated fellow photographer pal was setting up to take photos of the Milky Way at the Trona Pinnacles when the Friday 7-5-2019 M7.1 Earthquake occurred! What a once in a life story!

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

The skies are not bad here in Grass Valley Ca. I can easily see the summer milky way and even spot the andromeda galaxy with the naked eye. There is a fair amount of sky glow to the south towards Sacramento however. Sounds like your pal got shaken up a bit on his outing.

Longshadow Loc: Audubon, PA, United States

J-SPEIGHT Loc: Akron, Ohio

Nice shot.

nimbushopper Loc: Tampa, FL

Excellent!

shangyrhee Loc: Nashville TN to Sacramento CA

Lovely North American Nebula !!! Thank you for sharing. Shang

manofhg Loc: Knoxville, TN

I'm curious what tracking equipment you used. I am considering buying the either the iOptron SkyGuider Pro or the Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer Pro Pack.

tony85629 Loc: Sahuarita, Az

Nice work!

Ballard Loc: Grass Valley, California

For this picture I used the 500mm canon lens and DLSR piggy backed on a 5 inch refractor on a 25 year old Losmandy G11 mount that I upgrade with DC servos. The Refractor was used as the guide scope with a starlight express lodestar 2X CCD connected to the freeware program PHD for guiding. The 500mm lens is too heavy for the Sky-Watcher or iOptron. I recently purchased a Sky-Watcher Star Adventurer Pro Pack and intend to use it for travel. With the counter weight included with the Sky Watcher Star Adventurer Pro Pack it can easily handle the canon 70-200mm F2.8 lens and camera. One nice advantage with 70-200mm lens is that it comes with a shoe mount that allows you to rotate the camera on the mount and not need to use a ball mount with the tracker to get the image oriented the way you want. With good polar alignment you should be able to get 3+ minute exposures at 200mm without any issue using either of those trackers. You will also want a good tripod when using a tracker. (I'll be using a ManFrotto MT055XPRO3 tripod with mine (Not super high end (Aluminum not Carbon Fiber) but it handles the 500mm lens without any issue).

Earnest Botello Loc: Hockley, Texas

Great capture, Ballard.

manofhg Loc: Knoxville, TN

Thanks for the details.

bnsf

On of the Lords' may wonderful creations he has made for us to wonder at.