Spent 45 minutes trying to stack a 30 second astro photo... forgot to turn off the tracking mount

Last Friday I was out in the backyard with my DSLR trying to shoot Orion, and I had this plan to stack about 20 frames to get a cleaner shot. I set everything up, did 30 second exposures at ISO 1600, thought I was golden. Got back inside, loaded them into DeepSkyStacker, and the alignment kept failing hard. I kept adjusting settings, re-downloading updates, even restarted my laptop twice. After almost an hour of frustration I realized my tracking mount was still moving between exposures so the stars shifted too much to align. Now I know to park the mount before stacking. Has anyone else burned a whole night because of something dumb like that?

2 comments

2 Comments

stone.simon25d ago

Yep, been there with a similar issue where I had the intervalometer set to the wrong delay and kept getting gaps in the star trails. Always double check your gear settings before you start shooting, it saves so much headache later. Write yourself a little checklist for the mount and camera and tape it to your tripod leg.

claire95825d ago

Oh man, I spent an hour trying to stack blurry photos before realizing my lens cap was still on.