Here we are, with expensive cameras, expensive adapters, dongles and allsorts of fancy stuff that's supposed to make this easier - Along comes a 13 year old and goes "why don't you just take a photo with your phone and upload the screenshot...?" So simple, yet so effective. Genius. I love it!

@antdx316

2 жыл бұрын

and in the future people are going to be like, "how come people don't rest in peace more often?"

@PafMedic

Жыл бұрын

@@antdx316 😂😂😂😂Omg

That "taking a picture of the camera screen" trick for plate solving is equal parts horrifying and fascinating.

Thank you, sir. I asked about this during your video where you built your own $30 tracker and you said you will revisit this. I appreciate a man of his word. Cheers!

My last time out I got a great image of not the Heart Nebula.

@deltahat880

3 жыл бұрын

good job not getting it!

@enidrajm

2 жыл бұрын

😂 You too?

@Matt_10203

Жыл бұрын

I always use the little triangle/arrow of stats at its centre to position it.

@wonderkris

Жыл бұрын

I got half rosette :) … then I recognized the star pattern the next time but the moon was stronger. Now I know the reason why everyone doesn’t get into astrophotography … takes equipment, effort and wait for at least some reasonable seeing condition … fun and keeps you coming back to improve though

@PafMedic

Жыл бұрын

@@wonderkris ,Amen To That,But Thank God For People Like Nico,And A Number Of Others For Having The Ability To Break This Down Into A Much More Simple Process

This channel is pure quality - sincere thanks Nico!

i always remember how long it took to find m33 the triangulum galaxy the surface brightness was so low, but the galaxy is massive. washed out by lights in my neighborhood and having small scope did not help anyway i like your videos nebula,photos ... keep up the good work

I just spent two hours trying to find m81 lost so much time...this was much needed thanks!

That last tip is insane… can’t believe it actually works 😳

Love the tip about taking a photo of your screen. I’m going to start doing that. Much quicker than my current workflow

I was searching for this exact video, thank you. And clear skies.😊🔭

Brilliant idea - cell phone connected to the camera and then an astro programm on the cell phone. I ordered a small ball head mount with a camera shoe (20€), connected my cell phone holder to it and used my SkySafari Pro. It,s nearly like a goto to. I made a picture of the Markajans chain with my Canon and my 200 mm objectiv, without any problem. Thank you, GREAT!

Nico, I've got to say that is such a useful vlog for me! Thank you so much. I have been dabbling in Astrophotography for several years, having used large telescopes in the past, and now messing around with DSLR/tracker and small scopes/lenses, even so I still have great difficulty finding targets. Recently I failed to locate Markarians chain, I was off by one frame width - I'm in a heavily light polluted area so the visible stars are few and far between - its quite frustrating as you know. Thank you again for such a useful video!

That's great info Nico. Just when I'm feeling like it's only me that misses targets you get me right back out there. Thanks

Amazing video Nico! To complement the star hopping process, especially when it's light polluted and hard to see stars - I mounted a phone to the hotshoe of the DSLR. Using Stellarium or similar, then polar align not only the tracker but the DSLR and phone. So all three! This is obviously a rough alignment for the phone and camera. Once ready, pop M81 or object into the search of Stellarium, and turn the camera to where the phone is directing. I'm only one or two frames out when plate solving in astrometry. It's a system that seems to work when it's difficult to see....anything.

This is so awesome! Planning to dive into astrofotography as a beginner, the need to find anything in the sky by just oldstyle starhopping - without any automated help - was just about to keep me completely off. So thanks a lot. This video is just fantastic!

Thank you! Thank you so much for sharing this video. The Plate Solving page is just great. Works like a charm... Need clear skies! Keep up the amazing work! All the best from Norway

Hi Nico from West London (Bortle 7-8). I was imaging last night for only the fourth serious attempt and thought I would catch up on your videos while my camera did its thing only to find you were talking about M81 which is what I was imaging!!!! I have to say your videos are very helpful and I'm pleased to say I caught over 100 lights at 90 secs last night all in focus having finally started using a bhatinov mask. Now I just need to get to grips with processing which I am slowly especially since watching your 4 hour critique video with lots of helpful hints in. Right, four hours sleep and have to work now!!!! Keep up the good work and clear skies. Jeff.

Great timing! I had just tried to find the Pinwheel Galaxy, which was invisible due to light pollution in a 30 second exposure. I've been using a combination of star hopping and using the difference in coordinates (RA and DEC) between the known star and my target. However, at high magnification I still sometimes end up too far from my target to know where I am. The plate solver is just what I need! Thanks!

Thank you so much Sir .. I would never forget your tutorial in my life

Nice video Nico. Using plate solving can help with orientation on the night sky and know better where to image!

Wow that last trick to take a pic of the DSLR pic ! Insane 😅 gonna try that tonight. Canon 50D with a Tokina wide angle lens, or could use a fast 50 F1.4 also .

Man you are an incredible teacher. Thanks for all your videos.

Thanks for the video nico!!! Honestly you deserve way more subscribers

Oh this is perfect! Thanks for this video Nebula Photos! I always learn so much when I watch your videos.

Thanks for sharing Nico those are some super cool tips to locate subjects.

I’ve been looking at something like this for a very long time and it’s nice to have finally found it, this is gonna help so much for my next picture

Great stuff! A while back I used my mobile camera to take some night sky pictures on a trip. The place had very less light pollution so i gave it a try. The image was a bit fuzzy but it did show some starz and colors were great. I tried the website you mentioned in your video and i got to know that i had triangulum andromeda in my picture!

Thank you, Nico, I just purchased a second hand Meade LXD75 SN8 after a few months of not having anything, so this is going to really help in learning if I'm on target or not.

You can also use OTG cable that lets you control camera with your phone. There are few apps that cost around $15 but you get liveview on phone, focus control, intervalometer,... And you can transfer small jpg files to another phone where you upload them for plate solving. It also makes finding focus easier since phone screens are way better than cheap dslr cameras.

Thanks a lot! Finally someone explained this for beginners… thanks thanks thanks

I've just got a Sky Watcher Star Adventurer and this is the perfect video I needed to go out and try/learn how to use it and take images.

How could I have missed this - great video, just what I needed.

Well done, I've been a fan for a long time and i love your videos. Much love from Macedonia

great and topical, some of those galaxies are pretty tough to nail down at 1000mm equivalent or tighter. I've been using a telescope lens that zooms between 420to 800 occasionally with a 2x converter, when i use it, I find my object at 420mm, lock down all my adjusters and get it tracking, add my convertor, adjust focus, then start to zoom out, and refocus as i go. If i'm using a physically shorter lens, i'll lock the camera down on the tracker and find my object with a wider lens(usually faster too) , then swap lenses.

Oh man, this part indeed has got to be the hardest haha. I recently tried taking a photo of M51 and it took me A LOOOONG time to find it - I almost bailed on it. But I did in the end to patience is key. And pattern recognition :) Great tip with taking a photo of the LCD screen - loved it haha

Super awesome and helpful as always. Thanks!!

Thanks for this video. It's exactly what I needed! I was out last night and got frustrated bc my phones compass was way off and I couldn't get it close to normal. But the laser mixed with that software will help me out a bunch! Thanks again.

This is so much helpful! Thank you!

A beer 🍺 please to this good man !!! AMAZING!!! Just what I needed. You have gained a new subscriber. Thank you! Hi from Mexico.

Used the “take a picture of your preview window” tip after seeing it on here. Great tip

I love this channel thank you sir 🙏🏽 keep it up Nico!! I’m just a young 16 year old getting into astrophotography

Thanks for all this explanations ! very usefull !

This is such a useful video since I just got a Star Tracker. Thank you so much!

This is a whole new level. I have a hotshoe mounted reflex sight which is nice, and run APT on a laptop to platesolve. But I really like the cellphone mount and platesolving straight from the camera. I already have an L-bracket and a cell phone bracket, but never thought of putting them together for this purpose (duh). Thanks for sharing. Really like the workflow.

@adrianioanmunteanu3189

3 жыл бұрын

Does APT solve like astrometry.net? Do you have any tutorial on youtube about it? For newbies like me

Such a useful video; thank you for making it! It's a struggle to stay portable and keep budgets low but target-finding is a real video. How do you know when SkySafari 6 Pro is on sale? Do you just check periodically and how often does it happen? Thanks again.

Very useful tutorial! Thank you

Amazing. outstanding explanation. Hats off.

Awesome video. Thanks this will help a lot. I do have one request. I was wondering if you plan on doing a tutorial on blending Milky Way shot with a landscape on gimp. Thanks!

very nice tutorial, thank you! you ended a huge misery for me, also great tip at the end :)

wow i didnt know about the nova plate solver it's a great tool thanks!

The last two nights I was struggling to find some objects. Thanks for your hints, I am going to try them by the next occasion.

I happened to be trying to find Bode’s when I found this video.. what a life saver!

So very helpful! Great teacher. Am new to trying to shoot nebulae.. By accident got a shot of the LMC last January while doing a milkyway. After seeing some of your videos tried successfully to get the bug nebula, again while waiting for my milkyway lights to be done (different rig). But this week had trouble finding Andromeda galexy. Probably combo of light pollution and bad star navigation. Will definitely try the stellarium hopping tech next. Then sky safari system. Thanks so much for the tips!

@Andros_Gaming

Жыл бұрын

just got back from trying to shoot andromeda and failed couldn't locate it, my issue is the live view on my camera is so hard to see stars in and he said that andromeda was "easy" haha

THANK YOU, DUDE. AND THANK JESUS FOR CREATING YOU. THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT I NEEDED!!!!

Another tip from my side, because I was struggeling so much with adding an H-alpha filter and targets become even dimmer. 1. I set focus to my lens with Ha filter in the camera (750D) on a bright star. 2. I take out the Ha filter, replace it with an CLS or L2 filter and use the methods Nico mentioned above to find my target. 3. After finding and framing it, I again put the Ha filter back in and start shooting. Cheers Stfan

Wow.. nice plate solve site. No calibration needed to do the plate solve.. that's too crazy!

Thanks Nico, I am using Astrometry.net for platesolving and framing my object but never used or checked that universal telescope view, how you identified the bottom of sensor, it may be top one, I usually do by comparing pattern of star in dslr and in Nova.Astrometry and then judge the orientation and later move dslr accordingly. I am using 7D mark II and use 400mm f5.6L prime to click galaxies. Excellent video and I can relate it to my style of Astrophotography

Thats amazing that you can see m81 and m82 with only a 1 second exposure at iso 10000. Ill need to try those two sometime soon.

Thanks Niko for this. You are a saviour

Good stuff on this one, especially the plate solving part. As much as I love star-hopping, there really are targets where you have to do leaps instead of hops due to light pollution; I'm looking at you Rosette Nebula from Betelguese. One thing I'd like to add for star hopping: if your camera supports focus peaking (that blinking red/yellow guide when you manually focus) turn it on in highlights mode (ie the screen will show you over-exposed spots in the frame). The sensor can detect the stars even if we can't really see them and marks them as overexposed, so in a sea of black they really stand out. An additional benefit of this is that it's a good focusing guide - just focus your lens until the highlight on the stars are at their smallest and you're done.

@NebulaPhotos

3 жыл бұрын

Great idea! Either focus peaking or 'zebras' should work for that.

Great Video!! I do Like The Method of plate solving, Especially fo Visual Observation, I use a Smartphone app SkySafari Calibrated with my Telescope (so called PushTo), as A Finder. This Helps a Lot to find DSOs, Especially for me In a Light Pollutes Backyard!!

Cool video I am so hyped for to night it's the first clear night in months and this will help loads

Very very nice video and nice links. Thank you very much. Need to find a link to the The StarFinder Mount for the green laser here in UK....

Thanks for the video, that was helpful.

Great video Nico!!

Helping with the algorithm. Thanks for the premium content

Great tips! Thanks.

I needed this video a year ago. 😂😂😂 I was trying to find the North American nebula in July last year and completely missed it. 🙈

Very nice indeed thank you for sharing

Thank you for this one..!! 😃 This happened to me when I tried finding Andromeda galaxy last time, it was not visible in heavy light pollution..so I couldn't just be sure where I am pointing at..

Hi Niko,, thanks for your excellent and soft spoken, well enunciated videos. I am a new fan. I had bought a red dot laser for a Celestron telescope and trying to adapt it to my Nikon DSLR. in the hot shoe. It doesn't come with a piece that can fit into the hot shoe . If I find a proper rail to place my RD laser on, does the laser have to be placed right in the hot shoe, or can I have it at approx 6 inches height?

I use this and it’s very helpful. Helped me find whirlpool from a bortle 9

Very useful - thank you!

Great tutorial! …as always!

I’ve been using this plate solving hack with my Star Adventurer and it’s been very helpful, can’t thank you enough, I also rigged a cellphone holder to the side of my a6400 small rig to quickly point in the right direction using some app like Stellarium mobile or Sky Guide, and let me say that if you align well the cellphone holder to be perpendicular to your camera it has been really accurate with the iPhone 11+, with a Samsung S7 it suffers and drifts, than if I think I’m on spot with bright monitor, I do the plate solving, and adjust, if I’m not sure I do some star hopping, it’s been a success so far! I taking pictures of my camera screen, works everytime

The timing of this video is just weird.... I have been following your channel for a few months now but I only just THIS week have spent hours trying to learn better ways to find targets with my star adventurer and new telescope. So this was very useful thank you!

Thank you indeed Nico for this great video that comes for me in the right time since I'm beginner in astrophotography . I bought recently a bresser full-HD DeepSky camera and took nice photos ofJupiter Saturn Mars and the moon via my telescope 200/1000. But i didn't succeed to take any nebula like M51 M8 M31... i tried also with a Nikon D5200 (with T2) but the screen was dark 🤔.. have you any suggestion to help ??

super guidance, thank you

Thanks for sharing. We hope to compare your work with Sandra's, Dave's and others to see if this represents Lat/Lon and also which luminaries cause the phenomena. Peace love and cheers!

Thanks alooot like seriously this is what i was exactly looking for

Great video...This was something i needed... Great video.. in my Nikon D7200 wifi helps mobile work as view finder so that i dnt hav to bend my neck to see the camera screen which unfortunately is non articulating

Great video, thanks! I feel like my comments on the Andromeda tutorial may have been a slight inspiration 😅

Great video. Thank you.

Well this explains why I couldn’t get the veil nebula to show up in my processing after “imaging” it the other night, tried out the astrometry site with one of my images and I was off by a camera screen 🤦🏻‍♀️. Thanks for this video now I know how to check for 💯 certainty before taking all the photos!

I used to do the same as you describe with astronomy.net, but switched to a faster routine. I do need a bit more hardware... a guide scope/camera plus an AsiAir. It is still a very lightweight setup, but much more comfortable and faster. Also, no Internet connections is needed. 1) Attach a guide camera and guide scope to an L-bracket 2) I roughly align the DSLR and the guide scope/camera to a bright star, they now see the same patch of the sky 3) Then I point the camera to where I think my target is 4) Let AsiAir (controlled by mobile phone) do the plate solving (takes only a few seconds) and repeat, until target is found

Another awesome video for all; beginners and those of us who always think more and better gear is the solution. Lol.

Wow that is just a great way to find your object. Still a bit advanced for me. I came across another method recently which ive yet to test out and was used for finding objects ina Large APM Binocular Telescope. He used Stelarium to get the AZ/ALT co ordinates and purchased an electronic Inclinator which he has attached to the Binoculars via dovetail mount. He then Moves the Binoculars to the ALT using the Inclinator to get a pretty accurate ALT position. He has his Smarthone attached to the Mount and then just moves to teh AZ position using a Free Compass App on the phone. Finally uses a Smart Phone Star App to look at what Stars are near his object and if they match what he sees in the Bino Scope then he knows hes on the correct object. Only uses this for finding Faint observing targets.

Thanks man, this is great

Excellent Tutorial Video. Lost Me. Very Complicated. I Will Watch It Several More Times To See If I Can Understand It Better. Thank You.

Nico, I do something similar. I use a small telescope Celestron travelscope (400 mm), where I replaced the viewfinder by a laser. And I find the object (o references near the object), I turn on the laser to mark it, and I move my Dlsr with SA to the green laser reference. Because I live at Southern hemisphere and I don’t have a bright Polaris for polar alignment, also I use the same method to mark sigma octantis, and find it with the SA viewfinder for adjust the polar alignment.

Hey! great video, I am so fascinated by your content. This is my week's question. Is there any option to find an object if I don't have a magnetometer on my smartphone? I am doing some stuff with Star Walk 2 but that's my limitation.

Thank you. You are the best.

Thankyou Thankyou Thankyou Thankyou Thankyou . Best ever! Mike

I stumbled upon this site sometime back and has been my mainstay since then. I still feel if there can be some kind of a live indicator attached to the shoe of the camera.

Very very helpful,,,,,,, this video is,,,, thanks for making this video,,,,,,,,,,

I understood that video by golly which is brilliant. Which means the explanation is brilliant.

I use diferent approach. I get the alt/azt at a software and use a bussula to align the tripod with north. Then using a tripod head with angle scales I set it to the values from the software. Then I use a zoom wide angle lens and high iso shot to check if what I want is in the frame. Then a fine adjust the desired object to the center of the lens. Then I change the lens to a telefoto one and take other shot. If everything is ok I reduce the iso to the target value. Through the viewfinder and the lens in the correct position I memorize the pattern of stars which tells me the right position to realign after a certain time between a sequence of shots.

Love it! And what do you do if you don’t have internet to upload?

Exactly the video I needed thank you Nico! My heq5 tracking mount tracks perfectly but I've given up using the goto function to try and find things, it just slews to a seemingly random place in the sky rather than where I tell it to. My polar aligning is fine but once I try to do star alignment it just goes wrong. Whatever I manually point the scope to though remains tracked perfectly

@xaniac2429

3 жыл бұрын

Same man! I have my EQ5 pro with the goto function but it doesn't even come anywhere close so I just do that part manually.

@Paulus449

3 жыл бұрын

@@xaniac2429 I thought it was just me being rubbish at setting up but I've just accepted it now. I'll certainly use this plate solving technique though

@xaniac2429

3 жыл бұрын

@@Paulus449 Yep, I've accepted it too. I use Stellarium and navigate with constellations, I found M81 and M82 last time with the trial and error method. Can't see it in your short sub? Relocate and try again :P.

@Nebula Photos, I wish a Celestron starsense explorer type star finder with the plate solving tech be made really soon that seems like the super easiest way to find things