I use the Astro type 3 a fair bit, and it is truly amazing how well it works. I use the 150-450 at max zoom and 30 second exposure works well. Any longer I tend to get a little streaking.
Great shots! Astrotracer Mode III seems to work well most of the time. But the older GPS based stuff would not have failed for the shots for which Mode III failed for you. You could always buy a newly released O-GPS2 as a back-up! A lot less expensive than most trackers and easily fits in your shirt pocket.
Great photos Kobie, have you used the K-3 III for timelapse, what are the in camera options like? The timelapse video in camera on the K-70 looks awful. Trying to consolidate my gear the last reason I'm keeping my Lumix is the timelapse. Yes I know it's better to manually compile on your PC but I'm lazy 🙂
Hey Kobe. Great short video, thanks. How do you make the stars more visible in live view? I really struggle to position the camera especially for 'deeper space' astrophotography say with a 200mm lens because I can't see the blooming stars & so am using the astrotracer 3 "in the dark" literally! I keep thinking I'm missing some magical way to up the image intensity and so focus & position ( composing my shots) are a mystery to me when shooting in astro mode.
I hear you. One thing to check is that you don't have exposure simulation on for live view, If/once it's off then make sure your focus peaking setting is set to highlight edge, then with the camera on the tripod find the brightest object in the sky and manually focus on it until it's as small as possible, press the "OK" button for Focus peaking to ensure perfect focus. Once that's done, you can move the camera where you need it as long as the focus ring hasn't been touched/moved.
That's no nebula kobie. That's the Andromeda galaxy. Easily caught when your not looking for it. The astrotracer 3 looks interesting. I wonder if they will add it to the k70. I doubt it though. I tend not to astrotrace now. I prefer to take 5 second exposure. At 3200 then 100 shots later use deep sky software to merge. It makes a far cleaner image at the end. The noise dissappear with the stacking process. I can only use astrotracer on a lens of 50mm or less. Any longer than 30 seconds on any lens and stars trail. Also you have to take dark frames. About a dozen shots with the lens cap on. These shots are subtracted from the main image and removes hot pixels. All cameras have them. Thanks for the video kobie.
Sorry to hear you can't get over 30 seconds of good tracking with Astrotracer. With my K-3II I successfully track up to 2 minutes with certain lenses. I might have even done 3 minutes occasionally. Of course, Astrotracer tracking time depends on focal length. At 300mm, I can't do usually any better than 20 seconds reliably. Stacking has many benefits but so does tracking. However it is done, tracking allows using lower ISO's, resulting in higher dynamic range and hence better colors on brighter stars that would otherwise saturate. And who says you can't track and stack? It's almost all I do. Re dark frames, I haven't found them necessary with the K-3II. But I do always dither, which allows hot pixels to be removed during stacking (as well as other benefits).
I understand the value of the built in feature, but, if you're into this type of photography I'd still consider some kind of equatorial mount, along with some light pollution filters. The electronic equatorial mounts with "go to" and "three star alignment" might mitigate the slow painful process of polar alignment. Of course, this equipment isn't going to be cheap. You took some nice shots.
A GOTO mount does not necessarily reduce the "pain" of polar alignment. However, some GOTO mounts, like mine, do include a mode that makes very accurate polar alignment much faster than, say, doing a drift alignment (which I used to do in my film days). But you know what else reduces the pain of polar alignment? Astrotracer, because you don't need to do it at all. Nor do you need to to be able to see Polaris or any particular part of the sky (three-star alignment usually requires widely separated reference stars). That has come in handy for me a number of times. EQ mounts and trackers (mini-EQ-mounts, really) are great and are camera agnostic. But I haven't bothered to use one for taking astrophotos through lenses since I got my K-3II. (I still use my EQ mount to photograph through a telescope.)
I qould like to use this but when I take it out on a clear night no matter what I do I cannot see any stars on live view in order to focus. It is as dark on the screen as if the lens cap were on. Any suggestions?
Turn off "exposure simulation" in the menu (it's either in the C menu or the wrench menu). Use focus peaking to find the brightest star and manually focus until the star is as small as possible.
Trying Astrotracer type 3 but confused on settings as whatever time I set it seems to time our after 15 secs or so in bulb mode regardless of time I enter and what is the setting in the field under the ISO window
Is that on the initial shot right after you press the shutter button, or after it's done it's preliminary assessment shot and is now taking the actual photo?
@KobieMC was using the Pentax 18-135 just outside my house probably not ideal to test no foreground was trying to get crescent moon Jupiter and Venus as aligned, Have you ever tried it with a big telephoto lens or not
I don't believe it will work with the moon. If you were looking at the screen, right when it stopped, I believe there's a failure message that briefly pops up.
I use the Astro type 3 a fair bit, and it is truly amazing how well it works. I use the 150-450 at max zoom and 30 second exposure works well. Any longer I tend to get a little streaking.
Great shots! Astrotracer Mode III seems to work well most of the time. But the older GPS based stuff would not have failed for the shots for which Mode III failed for you. You could always buy a newly released O-GPS2 as a back-up! A lot less expensive than most trackers and easily fits in your shirt pocket.
Loved those images Kobie 😍
Thanks!
Great photos Kobie, have you used the K-3 III for timelapse, what are the in camera options like? The timelapse video in camera on the K-70 looks awful. Trying to consolidate my gear the last reason I'm keeping my Lumix is the timelapse. Yes I know it's better to manually compile on your PC but I'm lazy 🙂
Thanks! Yes I've used the timelapse feature, BUT, surprisingly, there is no time-lapse video option in the K-3 III 😯
Hey Kobe. Great short video, thanks. How do you make the stars more visible in live view? I really struggle to position the camera especially for 'deeper space' astrophotography say with a 200mm lens because I can't see the blooming stars & so am using the astrotracer 3 "in the dark" literally! I keep thinking I'm missing some magical way to up the image intensity and so focus & position ( composing my shots) are a mystery to me when shooting in astro mode.
I hear you. One thing to check is that you don't have exposure simulation on for live view, If/once it's off then make sure your focus peaking setting is set to highlight edge, then with the camera on the tripod find the brightest object in the sky and manually focus on it until it's as small as possible, press the "OK" button for Focus peaking to ensure perfect focus. Once that's done, you can move the camera where you need it as long as the focus ring hasn't been touched/moved.
That's no nebula kobie. That's the Andromeda galaxy. Easily caught when your not looking for it. The astrotracer 3 looks interesting. I wonder if they will add it to the k70. I doubt it though. I tend not to astrotrace now. I prefer to take 5 second exposure. At 3200 then 100 shots later use deep sky software to merge. It makes a far cleaner image at the end. The noise dissappear with the stacking process. I can only use astrotracer on a lens of 50mm or less. Any longer than 30 seconds on any lens and stars trail. Also you have to take dark frames. About a dozen shots with the lens cap on. These shots are subtracted from the main image and removes hot pixels. All cameras have them. Thanks for the video kobie.
Cool! Thanks for the correction. Makes me wish I had also taken the 150-450 or 600 F/4 lol
@@KobieMC lol yeah good luck trying to track with that lol. But if you try it I'd love to see that video.
Came here to note that's a really cool picture of the Andromeda galaxy, for the focal length.
@@jawats Thanks!
Sorry to hear you can't get over 30 seconds of good tracking with Astrotracer. With my K-3II I successfully track up to 2 minutes with certain lenses. I might have even done 3 minutes occasionally. Of course, Astrotracer tracking time depends on focal length. At 300mm, I can't do usually any better than 20 seconds reliably.
Stacking has many benefits but so does tracking. However it is done, tracking allows using lower ISO's, resulting in higher dynamic range and hence better colors on brighter stars that would otherwise saturate. And who says you can't track and stack? It's almost all I do.
Re dark frames, I haven't found them necessary with the K-3II. But I do always dither, which allows hot pixels to be removed during stacking (as well as other benefits).
I understand the value of the built in feature, but, if you're into this type of photography I'd still consider some kind of equatorial mount, along with some light pollution filters. The electronic equatorial mounts with "go to" and "three star alignment" might mitigate the slow painful process of polar alignment. Of course, this equipment isn't going to be cheap. You took some nice shots.
A GOTO mount does not necessarily reduce the "pain" of polar alignment. However, some GOTO mounts, like mine, do include a mode that makes very accurate polar alignment much faster than, say, doing a drift alignment (which I used to do in my film days). But you know what else reduces the pain of polar alignment? Astrotracer, because you don't need to do it at all. Nor do you need to to be able to see Polaris or any particular part of the sky (three-star alignment usually requires widely separated reference stars). That has come in handy for me a number of times. EQ mounts and trackers (mini-EQ-mounts, really) are great and are camera agnostic. But I haven't bothered to use one for taking astrophotos through lenses since I got my K-3II. (I still use my EQ mount to photograph through a telescope.)
Beautifull Photos! One day I'll go up north for that too!
Thanks man and it's so worth the trip!
Nice shot Kobie
Thank you.
the elongated stars in the corners is caused by the lens, nothing to do with Astrotracer..
What will be the outcome if you pair the K3-III with the O-GPS2-module?
It would be the same as any other Pentax camera using astrotracer. You'd have to run the calibration sequence for each session.
I qould like to use this but when I take it out on a clear night no matter what I do I cannot see any stars on live view in order to focus. It is as dark on the screen as if the lens cap were on. Any suggestions?
Turn off "exposure simulation" in the menu (it's either in the C menu or the wrench menu). Use focus peaking to find the brightest star and manually focus until the star is as small as possible.
Trying Astrotracer type 3 but confused on settings as whatever time I set it seems to time our after 15 secs or so in bulb mode regardless of time I enter and what is the setting in the field under the ISO window
Is that on the initial shot right after you press the shutter button, or after it's done it's preliminary assessment shot and is now taking the actual photo?
@KobieMC After its done its preliminary shot
@@2011spikel Which lens are you using and did the scene have a lot of foreground or was it all sky?
@KobieMC was using the Pentax 18-135 just outside my house probably not ideal to test no foreground was trying to get crescent moon Jupiter and Venus as aligned, Have you ever tried it with a big telephoto lens or not
I don't believe it will work with the moon. If you were looking at the screen, right when it stopped, I believe there's a failure message that briefly pops up.
Sorry Kobie. Misspelled your name!
No worries, it's all good.