Astrophotography

The York County Astronomical Society (YCAS) has an active group of members doing astrophotography where they share their experience and joy of the hobby.

The Andromeda galaxy is located near the constellation of Cassiopeia. This Photo of the Andromeda Galaxy (M31) was taken with Wiliam Optics GT71 and William Optics FTL 91 scopes and the ZWO ASI 2600MC Astrophotography Camera. This composition was taken with 30 hours of exposures. Photo credit of Don Emmel.

Astrophotography is the hobby of photographing the night sky, be it our own milky way or deep sky objects like the Andromeda Galaxy or other deep sky objects. To begin taking pictures of the night sky you can start with the camera and lens that you currently own with little to no expense to get start. The image below is an example of an image taken with a stock dslr camera and lens.

The Pleiades is located in the Taurus constellation. This Photo of the Pleiades (M45) was taken with a stock Canon Rebel T7 dslr and a 75-300mm canon telephoto lens, set at 200mm’s. An unguided star tracker was used to rotate the camera with the night sky. This composition was taken with 300-30 second exposures for a total exposure length of 2.5 hours. This captures in this image were stacked and processed in a free photo editing software. Photo credit of Adam Love.

The art of astrophotography involves capturing multiple short exposures and stacking each image together to capture one image that includes all of the data collected. Join our member Astrophotography group chat and take part in the conversation. Whether you are experienced at Astrophotography or just starting out, whether you have dedicated astrophotography equipment or using an old dslr camera you can join our group chat where members discuss troubleshooting, tips and goals related to planning, capturing and post-processing of astrophotography images.