Is There An Easy Way to Capture the ISS?

I tried getting a picture of the International Space Station tonight but failed. I used Shutter Priority (TV) with ISO at 1600 which gave me a shutter speed of 1/100 and f/stop of f/5.6

I am thinking my shutter speed was way too slow so should I have used a much higher ISO?

Getting the Space Station in focus seems to be very difficult as well.

Full size and cropped to 100%

Thank you for any help you can give me.

I believe that most people use video and grab a frame. Otherwise it has to be as high ISO and low shutter that will get you results. If you do all this I'd suggest manual mode to give you total control. I used to be wary of high ISO but modern cameras can handle high ISO much better than the older ones.

I'm curious, did you use a tripod and tracking device?
Maybe you need more than 300mm.

I would not call your photo a failure. It's still kind of interesting.

xa-coupe wrote in post #19285581
I believe that most people use video and grab a frame. Otherwise it has to be as high ISO and low shutter that will get you results. If you do all this I'd suggest manual mode to give you total control. I used to be wary of high ISO but modern cameras can handle high ISO much better than the older ones.

I do not know how to work with anything video.

Perfectly Frank wrote in post #19285614
I'm curious, did you use a tripod and tracking device?
Maybe you need more than 300mm.

I would not call your photo a failure. It's still kind of interesting.

I did this hand held. I do own the older iOptron SkyTracker that Roy A. Rust encouraged me to get, if you remember him. He died 2 years ago now. I miss him a LOT. He was a very good friend to me. I have not been able to use my Skytracker for a while now because my eye sight is not as good as it used to be. I can no longer find or see Polaris to align the tracker too. I used my 70-300mm lens instead of my 150-600mm lens because of weight of the 150-600m lens. I am not as strong as I used to be.

Even if I could see Polaris, I do not know of any tracker that would follow the space station at the speed it travels, or even get it initially lined up with the space station at all.

I thank you both for your help and suggestions.

I would think from a practical standpoint, you would want to shoot with the highest shutter speed you can get away with minimizing any camera movement. Or shoot a burst of video and look for the best frames. I don't think there is a easy way to get something decent. It has everything going against it, it's far, it's moving, it's dark and it's small.

gjl711 wrote in post #19285648
I would think from a practical standpoint, you would want to shoot with the highest shutter speed you can get away with minimizing any camera movement. Or shoot a burst of video and look for the best frames. I don't think there is a easy way to get something decent. It has everything going against it, it's far, it's moving, it's dark and it's small.

Thank you, but I do not know how to work with video. How do I look at individual frames within a video file? How do I get the highest shutter speed possible in a video?

I haven't tried this, but I would think that if you timed it right: you could got the ISS in an advantageous position shortly after your sunset or before your sunrise and have it still in full daylight before it experiences its sunset; or it has had its sunrise before you have down below. This is due to its high elevation. That way you wouldn't be relying on dim Earthbound city lights to illuminate it. A daytime exposure would work in that circumstance. Just a thought.

joedlh wrote in post #19285659
I haven't tried this, but I would think that if you timed it right: you could got the ISS in an advantageous position shortly after your sunset or before your sunrise and have it still in full daylight before it experiences its sunset; or it has had its sunrise before you have down below. This is due to its high elevation. That way you wouldn't be relying on dim Earthbound city lights to illuminate it. A daytime exposure would work in that circumstance. Just a thought.

I am sorry, but I have no idea what you are trying to suggest I do here. What does sunset or sunrise have to do with where ISS is located? It will never be the same one time to the next.

With solar panels stretched out ... it is roughly the size of a soccer field. See: https://www.nasa.gov …compared-to-soccer-field/

The ISS moves at about 17,150 mph. This is close to (but not quite) 5 miles per second. It's very close to 25,000 feet per second.

If you were to take a shot at 1/1000th sec ... it would move 25' during the exposure. This makes it extremely difficult to get a sharp exposure (that ... combined with atmospheric issues).

I captured this ISS crossing the face of the Sun (using a Hydrogen-alpha wavelength solar telescope).




While this video takes about 8 seconds for the ISS to cross... it is greatly slowed down. The actual time to cross the sun was just 1.1 seconds (the amount of time will vary based on how high the Sun (or Moon... because that's another cool shot) is in the sky. The lower to the horizon ... the longer it will take to pass.

I did not use a convention camera. I used a dedicated astrophotography camera optimized for solar image (a ZWO ASI174MM-Cool ... this is a cooled monochrome camera with a global shutter that can capture over 160 frames per second.)

Australian astrophotographer Dylan O'Donnel got an APOD for his shot of the ISS passing in front of the Moon. See: https://photographings​pace.com …t-an-apod-dylan-odonnell/

Dylan used Calsky.org to find out when a transit visible from his location would occur. When I did mine, I used Transit-finder.com. While I used my solar camera, Dylan used a Canon 70D ... so you can capture these with a DSLR ... special astrophotography cameras are not needed. BUT... Dylan did use a telescope (2350mm focal length at f/10).

Try faster shutter speed and pan with ISS. Forget what your mind thinks I suppose. Just remember it’s a big bright object in full sunlight that is moving fast. Haha. Let the sky go black and expose for the object.

Here is a couple of quick threads here. There’s lots more if you search.

https://photography-on-the.net …/showthread.php​?t=1514672

https://photography-on-the.net …/showthread.php​?t=1504417

Good luck!

Assuming your DSLR has a movie mode, you take some video, tracking or trying to track the ISS as it goes past. Take about 5 second videos (assuming the same as planetary), but take a few of these videos, in fact as many as you can as you're looking for the 'lucky' shot amongst them. Bear in mind that with a DSLR your going to get a small image at best, so don't expect some of the masterpieces you see posted which have used telescopes with massive focal length.

Download Austostakkert and import the video and process it.

I'd suggest watching a few youtube videos on Austostakkert as it isn't very intuitive until you understand it. This all sounds very confronting but if I can do it, you can do it !!

TCampbell wrote in post #19285778
With solar panels stretched out ... it is roughly the size of a soccer field. See: https://www.nasa.gov …compared-to-soccer-field/

The ISS moves at about 17,150 mph. This is close to (but not quite) 5 miles per second. It's very close to 25,000 feet per second.

If you were to take a shot at 1/1000th sec ... it would move 25' during the exposure. This makes it extremely difficult to get a sharp exposure (that ... combined with atmospheric issues).

I captured this ISS crossing the face of the Sun (using a Hydrogen-alpha wavelength solar telescope).




While this video takes about 8 seconds for the ISS to cross... it is greatly slowed down. The actual time to cross the sun was just 1.1 seconds (the amount of time will vary based on how high the Sun (or Moon... because that's another cool shot) is in the sky. The lower to the horizon ... the longer it will take to pass.

I did not use a convention camera. I used a dedicated astrophotography camera optimized for solar image (a ZWO ASI174MM-Cool ... this is a cooled monochrome camera with a global shutter that can capture over 160 frames per second.)

Australian astrophotographer Dylan O'Donnel got an APOD for his shot of the ISS passing in front of the Moon. See: https://photographings​pace.com …t-an-apod-dylan-odonnell/

Dylan used Calsky.org to find out when a transit visible from his location would occur. When I did mine, I used Transit-finder.com. While I used my solar camera, Dylan used a Canon 70D ... so you can capture these with a DSLR ... special astrophotography cameras are not needed. BUT... Dylan did use a telescope (2350mm focal length at f/10).

Thank you very much! The video was VERY interesting and fun to watch!!

Park Ranger wrote in post #19285779
Try faster shutter speed and pan with ISS. Forget what your mind thinks I suppose. Just remember it’s a big bright object in full sunlight that is moving fast. Haha. Let the sky go black and expose for the object.

Here is a couple of quick threads here. There’s lots more if you search.

https://photography-on-the.net …/showthread.php​?t=1514672

https://photography-on-the.net …/showthread.php​?t=1504417

Good luck!

I am thinking I will go Manual instead of TV with ISO at 10,000 or higher with shutter speed at 1,000 or higher.

Now how long before ISS comes back to my neighborhood with CLEAR skies????? That could be a long wait.

xa-coupe wrote in post #19285821
Assuming your DSLR has a movie mode, you take some video, tracking or trying to track the ISS as it goes past. Take about 5 second videos (assuming the same as planetary), but take a few of these videos, in fact as many as you can as you're looking for the 'lucky' shot amongst them. Bear in mind that with a DSLR your going to get a small image at best, so don't expect some of the masterpieces you see posted which have used telescopes with massive focal length.

Download Austostakkert and import the video and process it.

I'd suggest watching a few youtube videos on Austostakkert as it isn't very intuitive until you understand it. This all sounds very confronting but if I can do it, you can do it !!

My DSLR does have video (Canon 90D) but I have NEVER shot video, so when you say "assuming the same as planetary" means absolutely nothing to me. What does that mean to you?

Have YOU ever shot the ISS before in video? Any sample shots from you for reference what I can expect?