Objects to image in the 200mm range?

My longest lens is the Sigma 180mm f3.5 macro; I'd like to get a Sigma 70-200mm f2.8 soon. I'd also like to get an Astrotrac or make a barn door for some long exposures, but I'm unsure of what else is out there in the 200mm range to get decent images of.

I guess what I'm saying is, I'd hate to invest in a new lens and tracking mount to have only Andromeda and the moon the closest/biggest things to appreciably fill up the frame. What else is out there that I can expect to get good images of at 200mm? M42 in Orion? Anyone have any samples in the 200mm range to share?

Thanks in advance!

I've got little rectangles printed out on transparency that I can hold over my star atlas to help find targets for different focal lengths... you can also calculate the angular view of the lens (4.24 degrees high for 200mm with an APS-C sensor) and then use something like stellarium to see what there is (the angle at the bottom of the display is the angular height of the screen).

I don't mind photographing things in a bit of context... think of it as making framing easier too If you have the resolution it gives you freedom to crop too.

But since you asked, there is Andromeda... lots of nebulae like North America and pelican, both halves of the veil, the area round Sadr, Cone... many of them are quite large.

Then there are clusters of things... star clusters like the pleiades, hyades, double cluster and beehive cluster. All you can eat galaxy clusters in Virgo, Coma, Leo and (apparently) Ursa Major.

Maybe you can collect asterisms... Orion's belt and sword, the coathanger, Kemble's cascade. You'd need to be wider for small constellations.

Anyway, I think 200mm would not be very different from your 180mm that you have. I bought wider prime lenses to do constellations and I bought a small telescope for more reach... it gets me to just over 400mm. It was cheaper than the corresponding camera lens

BTW you need well over 1000mm to get the moon to fill the frame.

I did the transparency thing too. I also have a spreadsheet of camera/lens/scope options with field of view, resolution, etc. I can put those numbers in CdC (similar to Stellarium) and decide what combination to use on a given night.
For what it's worth, I just bought a 200mm lens for that very purpose as it seemed to be the best size between the 50mm and a small telescope.

Steve.

Excellent... so it sounds like there won't be any shortage of things to shoot. Obviously, the sky's a big place and there are many things to photograph, so I was curious about how much I could expect a 200mm lens to resolve. That Stellarium angular view tip is a great idea, I'll fire it up and see what I can expect when I get home later tonight!

After playing in Stellarium for a couple of minutes, I'm pretty excited at what 4.24 degrees will get me. I also checked out the gallery at the Astrotrac website which lists the camera and lens used... it seems to confirm what I see in Stellarium.

Thanks so much for help! Great ideas all around. If anyone has any pictures with the lens length used, that would also be helpful for inspiration.

I think some of the nicest astro photos I've seen have been in the 100mm to 200mm range. It's fairly "wide angle" in some respects, but when you can capture two or three deep sky objects in a single shot I think it makes for such a nice image. Good luck and look forward to seeing what you come up with.

Badger49456 wrote in post #10942220
My longest lens is the Sigma 180mm f3.5 macro; I'd like to get a Sigma 70-200mm f2.8 soon. I'd also like to get an Astrotrac or make a barn door for some long exposures, but I'm unsure of what else is out there in the 200mm range to get decent images of.

I guess what I'm saying is, I'd hate to invest in a new lens and tracking mount to have only Andromeda and the moon the closest/biggest things to appreciably fill up the frame. What else is out there that I can expect to get good images of at 200mm? M42 in Orion? Anyone have any samples in the 200mm range to share?

With a tracking mount, you will have plenty to shoot with multiple lenses. Take a look at the DSLR section of the CloudyNights.com forum to see what people are doing with lenses. The widefield stuff is incredible.

Awesome, thanks for all the help. There are a lot of great images at cloudynights (and here, obviously) giving me a better idea of what I can do with what I have.

Question: do people just forgo the use of mirror lockup when doing astroimaging? with a remote, i can use mirror lockup but i can't set it and forget it on continuous shooting; the alternative is to put it on continuous shooting but not use mirror lockup. if i were to do something like 10 five minute subs, it's not a big deal to use mirror lockup and snap the pictures, but until I get a tracking mount it is an annoyance to have to sit by the camera and trip the shutter via the remote each time (especially if doing a lot of quick subs).

I only use mirror lock up for short exposures (for the moon and planets) that I am taking interactively.

For longer exposures I don't bother because the short period of vibration at the start of the exposure is a small part of the whole duration. And it would be tricky anyway because most timer remotes don't support it.