I appreciate your interest and drive to compare these two cameras but I'm wondering what your observations are about the output the two cameras produced. To me, all I see are tiny specks of light. Both cameras seem to pickup background objects with a long enough exposure. IMO the 10D seemed to start picking up color after about 8 seconds while the Sony was still capturing (or correcting to) white for Mars. I also wonder what lens you used on the 10D (was it an "L" lens, Canon regular glass or a knock off)?
My moon shots Some of these were taken with the 10D and a Celestron 113mm (c. 3.5" aperture) Newtonian with equatorial mount; some with my Quantaray 70-300mm Tele/Macro lens on a Slik 6600 tripod. None are time lapse shots. I don't have any useful pictures of Mars via the telescope as I don't have my remote release yet (please, oh please hurry B&H).
I also wonder what lens you used on the 10D (was it an "L" lens, Canon regular glass or a knock off)?
The lens used is a EF 28-200mm f/3.5-5.6 USM.
About the color, after reviewing the pictures it seems that the Sony might be splattering the brightness of mars, thus more white. The Canon is more true to what was seen, although by just looking at mars in the viewfinder it did look white.
. . . although by just looking at mars in the viewfinder it did look white.
I never knew until we bought a scope and started using it that almost nothing in the night sky has ANY color to it when viewed with the eye through the telescope's lens (especially with approx 25 square inches of light gathering power). You have to get up to some MONDO HUGE scopes to actually see any color. The only way to get it in pictures is either do a time lapse, add a colored filter or color correct the picture in processing. Ya know, that was just a huge turnoff as soon as I realized I didn't have all the equipment I needed to see the Pleiades or anything else. Now with a 113mm Newtonian and a barlow (2x) lens I have been able to see some color on Jupiter.
I'm still interested in taking some color corrected pictures and I'm just waiting on my shutter release to head out again and start snapping up pics.
Hope you'll keep on posting comparisons and astronomy shots, too. I haven't seen too many people take astronomy shots on here.
I hope to do some more comparisons I have another one that I want to do tonight using the USA Flag. I took a picture long ago when I first got my F717 and it was flawless at night. I want to see the comparison now with the F717 and the 10D.
some of the brightest nebula (orion,rosette) show some color I have seen the green in orion through my 10" scope (though I'm in the wrong hemisphere for the rosette) I don't know if you'd call a 10" mondo huge though
the main problem for me is light pollution I can barely see any of the pelades nebulosity or any distant galaxies without taking a 2 hour drive to the country
10" Dob, Newtonian, refractor, x-cassegrain? What type of scope is it? If its a refractor then holy great, big telescopes, Batman. That is a mondo huge scope. :)
Actually 10" is about the largest consumer that you'll find in telescope catalogs from the major companies (Celestron, Meade, etc). Anything larger and you'll probably have to have it custom made by one of the major companies or a telescope gear head.
Dobs are great for people who just want to see stars as they have tremendous light capturing capabilities but because they aren't equatorial mounts they can't do dual axis tracking for long exposure shots without some major modifications. What we got was just an out-of-the-store, off-the-shelf Newtonian (reflector) that has the tracking software, motors and controls built in.
I now have a chance to take more pictures, is anyone interested in a particular test of the cameras side by side? Canon 10D with EF 28-200mm f/3.5-5.6 USM Against the Sony F717.
