Often use these acronyms and I will try to give the explanation but it is useful “chewing” in order to better understand all information resources available on the Web (forums/sites/chat)
For FOV Field Of View means, which is the field of view, and there is for instance a weblink to calculate the field of view from sensors of different DSLR cameras with the extension of the DSO (deepsky object, deep sky object) that is programmed to photograph, or to know the entire scene from the eyepieces that you own for a session of Visual observation :
https://astronomy.tools/calculators/field_of_view/
It is a useful tool when programming the Astro evening session, selecting objects based on your goals/telescopes that you want to observe or photograph. To make a direct example with Nebula M8, which is portrayed in between 800 and 1000 mm focal focal length, this is the FOV calculated with the website, and then got in our recovery last year (2015).
Following on from the article I wrote about creative interpretations of the photographs to the milky way, is certainly one of the problems of processing the astrophotographer shots, there are many software used, some free, others pay and possible errors that involve the loss of detail in the image is the correct mix the colors that give the color rendering of the image that allows you to distinguish carefully and lends a certain authenticity to the object photographed over that gamma correction that provides 3d look to the image rather than a flat image to a misuse of the luminance in the process of elaboration and use of filters/plugins to cosmetics to get a clean image the most common is the application of noise filter, which used excessively makes image art “and” lose detail, almost to “making comics” of the characteristics of the photographed object.
Surfing the internet these days I jumped in the eyes an astrophotography, with the same field shooting wide in the area of one of our recent Sagittarius.
This article was inspired by the equally important factor, that allows us to make a comparison, that is, the color rendering, and is no small feat for someone like me after a sleepless night in traffic wants to have a nice gift with the DSO object imaged as truthfully as possible.
I refer to this particular picture: http://www.robgendlerastropics.com/MWCenter.html
and I propose in comparison to my panorama shots but made with DSLR, camera lens and a beautiful sky (https://www.flickr.com/photos/xamad/27691630113)
You can see them in direct comparison here:
There’s a big difference in terms of detail, dimensions of the stars, presence or absence of aberrations, recording time and equipment used and for equipment, meaning Telescope/lens/camera shooting:
in the first case that I propose this is a renowned, is a Japanese and a capture ccd astrograph cooled with shooting system with filters LRGB, this is 10 thousand euros “at least” equipment, in our case, the second, of a common Canon DSLR camera, a 100 mm macro lens and a star-tracker, and to be honest this is amateur equipment from field whose total cost does not exceed 1000 euros.
Speaking in terms of colour rendition are quite similar, and I can assure you that I did not take the astrophotography of Gendler as “example” before performing this panorama of pictures while I admire greatly as astrophotographer, but calibrating the image correctly, already in the process of stacking, elaborating it carefully, trying not to alter the size of the stars too, but streatchandola on duty to highlight more details can I have the confirmation of the goodness of my workflow processing.
Why use different equipment? Not just a cost issue but also because there are many factors that you put the desire to achieve a nice astrophotography and the real possibility, first regardless of the weather, light pollution hopefully as much as possible, as well as physical availability of blankly move in place of recovery, if you walk 100 km, 10 meters or 400 km as I told a friend astrophotographer in Hong Hong.
My advice for those new to this practice is to start with the “little”, photographic lenses, a star tracker or a small motorized frame or goto. Using focal lengths above 200 is needed more precision and becomes an autoguider system, or a fairly precise and expensive frame to hold up the pursuit.
Acquiring processing capacity and familiar with astrofotografiche sessions, with time you can then indulge in longer focal lengths and demanding and look for the detail of celestial objects.
Because even when they have a lot of money, you have to have the skills and talent of Robert Gendler to manage it and make those beautiful pictures that we hear and even make images “comparable” albeit made with modest equipment, is a great satisfaction, and forgive me the similarity, it’s a bit like in car sitting behind a Ferrari with its compact car!
That’s all for now, as always, I refer you to our video tutorials to learn our techniques!
🙂