this post was submitted on 16 Jun 2026
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Astrophotography

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[–] jwiggler@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Thanks! When you say

the distorted stars on the edges

do you mean the edge of the frame or the edges of the stars? I'm assuming you mean edge of the frame due to the edge-to-edge sharpness diminishing wide open, but it seems to my eyes all my stars are a bit distorted -- even in the center. Then again, I have no idea how they ought to look! lol. I did use the 500 rule to try to avoid star trails. I think 13s exposure was acceptable but i wanted to be safe so i went with 10s.

any chance you have any reading recommendations for astrophotography, or maybe even for astronomy in general?

[–] lefty7283@lemmy.world 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Edge of the frame. Since stars are point sources of light any distortion from the optics, trailing from a long exposure, or even the atmosphere will distort them. IMO the center stars are what I’d consider acceptable for an untracked image, but then again I don’t really do much widefield astrophotography. It could also be your camera shifted slightly or from walking around near it?

There’s a number of YouTube channels of varying quality/expertise that are good for beginners, like AstroBackyard, Alaskan astro, cuiv the lazy geek to name a few. The cloudynights forum should If your a discord person, we do have one for this community (.gg/astrophotography) that’s pretty active with a lot of info that’s been gathered over the years, and it’s where I’ve learned most of what I know about the hobby.

[–] jwiggler@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 week ago

Ahh gotcha. I bet it was because I was wide open. I'll check out some of those resources, thanks for the input!