NEBULAE
This August brings you Nebulae, a photographer’s paradise unique to our Milky Way and star filled galaxies neighbouring our own. It is time to direct your camera to the sky and amp up your night life, with cloudy magnificence, and galaxy spotting.
NEBULAE
They are clouds of gas and dust in outer space that look like cloudy patches of light. The main types are planetary nebulae, emission nebulae, dark nebulae and super nova remnants. What makes nebulae a photographer’s paradise is not only their visual appeal, but also the camera’s advantage over any other equipment in capturing the details and colours of nebulae.
The human eye registers what it witnesses instantly. Therefore, even with a telescope you will only see pale greenish-yellow cloudy patches of light. On the other hand, a camera allows for longer exposures and can therefore capture a nebula’s true beauty with its varying hues and shades.
Viewing Equipment: Nebulae are usually not visible to the unaided eye, but easily visible with a good pair of binoculars and best with wide field telescopes. To capture the colours you can use DSLR cameras attached to a telescope. Film cameras with fast film (200 ISO and above) need an exposure of 10 to 20 minutes or digital Charge Coupled Device (CCD) camera sensors need an exposure of 2 to 10 minutes depending on the sky conditions and brightness of the object.
