Star Trails

[Mystical Potato Head]

Aligned the camera to the North star,turned the motorised mount of and took a single 5min exposure.The longer the exposure,the longer the star trail effect.The only down side to really long exposures is the light pollution,however Photshop does a good job of removing the dreaded orange glow.

http://img396.imageshack.us/img396/8619/img2562copy1ka9.jpg

[porshiepoo]

How Cool - I wanna try. What do I need to do?
I think it's really weird how when you are reading your thread you can see the stars turning in your peripheral vision!

[Mystical Potato Head]

You need a camera like a dslr with a bulb setting to give you minutes,even hours of exposure time,stick it on a tripod and align it as near as you can to Polaris(North Star) and
away you go,hopefully.

[astroman]

Great photo MPH.

Here's one I took a few years ago with a film SLR. The 7 bright stars of the Plough can be seen at the bottom of the image pointing the way to Polaris.

http://i271.photobucket.com/albums/jj138/astroman_caithness/PoleStarTrails35mmFilmCamera.jpg

[Deemac]

Great stuff chaps. How do you know where the north star is?

[Mystical Potato Head]

If you follow a line upwards in the direction of the two bright stars(the pointers) to the right of the image below,(Ursa Major) the first bright star you will come to will be the North Star.It isnt particularly bright but it is kinda on its own so cant really be confused with anything else.

http://img372.imageshack.us/img372/1907/ursamajorcx0.jpg

Nice trails Astroman,lot of fun this astrophotography lark,shame the weather isn't being kind to us.

Found a better image to show the north star(not one of mine)The constellation of Ursa Major(The Plough)is 30deg above the horizon to the north at around 9-10 pm and by around 4am it will be more to the east and a little higher in the sky,but no matter where it is in the sky always follow the two pointers and that will get you the North Star.

http://img372.imageshack.us/img372/5656/pointersax2.jpg