The German Equatorial Mount
Static photographic tripods offer vertical movement and head rotation, but they lock into place. Telescope mounts work in a similar fashion, but can move in right ascension and declination – the coordinates of the sky.
An adaptation of this type of mount that is most suitable for astrophotography is the German Equatorial Mount (GEM). GEMs are best suited to astrophotography because they combat the earth’s rotation to keep a telescope fixed on a location in the sky. This makes GEMs capable of tracking the object through time in a simple and precise manner. An equatorial mount has one axis aligned parallel to the earth’s axis to compensate for the planet’s rotation, which allows you to accurately track the stars. This axis moves the telescope as the earth rotates (right ascension) around the “polar axis”. The second axis (declination) moves the telescope at right angles to the polar axis. Movement along both these axes (once aligned correctly) allows a telescope to locate and track any object in the sky.
If you have a Non-EQ telescope mount: Your telescope acts as a big lens, and a tracking mount may not be needed for very short exposures of the sun, moon and planets. These other telescope mounts utilise altitude azimuth movement and, while many are motorised go-to mounts, they are suitable for short duration exposures, not lengthy exposures as required in deep space imaging.
The Optical Tube Assembly (OTA). These are the criteria on which selections should be made:
Aperture. As in photography, aperture is the size of the opening of the telescope that allows it to gather light. As astrophotography is all about gathering light, this is an important factor to consider. A larger aperture allows more light to be gathered faster. But size is also relative to the optical quality of the telescope.
Focal length. The longer the focal length, the higher the magnification, which increases the size of the object on your focal plane. For planetary photography long focal lengths are better as they offer greater magnification of your subject. Deep space photography relies more on an Optical Tube Assembly (OTA) with a wider field of view and faster optics to allow you to photograph dim nebulae.
Focal ratio: This is the relationship of the aperture size and the focal length, and determines the ‘speed’ of the telescope. When you want to capture light from distant objects, faster focal ratios will gather light faster, resulting in shorter exposure times
Focal ratio = focal length divided by aperture size
A bigger aperture size isn’t always better though. You should rather consider what you’d like to photograph and plan your purchase to suit your area of interest. This means determining your field of view, which is dictated by the focal length of your telescope or lens. Suitable focal lengths for various targets include:
– Nebulas/Star clusters: 200-800mm
– Moon: 1000mm
– Planets: 2000mm and upwards
– Milky Way: Wide field camera lens, 10mm-24mm
Telephoto lenses: Many astro photos are imaged without the use of a telescope. A good quality lens can yield great results when mounted on a tracking telescope mount. The process of acquiring and processing images remains the same as if you were to use a telescope.
The Heart and Soul Nebula imaged at 200mm focal length with a DSRL and Lens, photo by Cory Schmitz
Andromeda imaged at 600mm Focal length with a Vixen ED80sf APO, photo by Cory Schmitz
Star trails at 24mm via lens, photo by Tanja
The moon imaged at 2800mm focal length, photo by Tanja
