http://www.startrails.de/html/software.html With modern digital cameras is it relatively easy to get decent startrail-images.
Instead of taking one long exposure one can take many shorter exposures and combine
them in Photoshop using layers in “lighten”-modus.
The big advantage is that the background heaven will stay as dark as on the single exposures.
My procedure: When visual observing with my 12” dobsonion style Newton telescope I usually
can’t resist taking some startrails. I put my Canon 10D on a tripod with a wide angle lens at
maximum aperture. Camera is set to ISO 400 at an exposure time of 30s.
To start the exposures I put the camera in “continous drive”-mode and lock the cable release.
Usually the camera is capable to take 3 frames a second, now however it takes one frame every 30 seconds ;-)
So as you can see taking the images is easy, stacking them (usually about 200 to 300 images) in Photoshop is not too much fun.....
This is why I decided to develop the “Startrails.exe”
