Chapter 4
Long-Exposure Prime Focus Astrophotography
This is considered by many to represent the highest level one can achieve in
astrophotography. The allure is that almost any deep sky object can be
photographed, and when done well, yields astonishing results. If you pause for a
moment and think about the most amazing astrophotos you have ever seen, you will
almost certainly be envisioning long-exposure prime focus images. Perhaps the
most famous of all is the Hubble Deep Field image, a photograph taken at the
prime focus position of the Hubble Space Telescope that had a total exposure of
over 100 hours!
Rosette Nebula photo by Dr. Brady Johnson and Jay Ouellet, Canada. Taken with EQ6 Pro mount.
Sky-Watcher Telescopes is very pleased to offer a variety of premium mounts and
telescopes that have enabled many people to enjoy great success in photographing
nebulae, star clusters and galaxies using prime focus techniques. We offer the
hugely popular EQ6
and HEQ5
SynScan mounts in both Standard and
Pro Series. These high precision computerized mounts can automatically point
your telescope to over 14,000 objects in the standard data base, and when
connected to a computer with suitable planetarium software they can point at
virtually any known object.
M8 M20 photo by Dr. Brady Johnson and Jay Ouellet, Canada. Taken with EQ6 Pro mount.
For astrophotography the SynScan mounts can’t be beaten. They are capable of
tracking the sky with errors limited to a few millionths of a circle. Moreover,
they are equipped with built-in autoguider ports and have user programmable
backlash compensation that adds even more precision to the tracking process.
In fact, the EQ6 has been described as “The best value in all of astronomy -
bar none”. It has earned this reputation due to it’s enormous payload
capacity, it’s high precision performance, and it’s amazingly affordable
price. Its nearest competition costs more than double the price, yet has no
better tracking performance and a lighter payload capacity.
Gamma Cygni photo by Dr. Brady Johnson and Jay Ouellet, Canada. Taken with EQ6 Pro mount.
If you need further convincing as to the capability of these mounts then just
enjoy the accompanying astrophotos, all taken with the EQ6 or HEQ5 SynScan
mounts. Using these mounts and readily available software, multiple images are
done in seconds each with state-of-the-art CCD cameras. And then the images are
processed allowing incredible photos which were unheard of just a few years ago,
even with large observatory telescopes.