This Portable Astrophotography Setup Does It All!

BUILD THIS KIT:

Telescope: Radian 61
Guide Scope: Starfield
Tripod: Radian Carbon Fiber

MY PROCESSING GUIDE:

YOUTUBE VIDEO GEAR:

MUSIC:

FOLLOW ME:

AFFILIATE LINKS:

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[DylanODonnell]

I’m in an AstroBackyard video! My mum is going to be so proud.

[AstroBackyard]

I hope you enjoyed the dance party at the end

[Wolfie]

Looks great Trevor. I am looking forward to getting the Star Adventurer Gti and have one on order with Bintel in Sydney where I live. 

I have a couple of portable rigs as I am a pilot who travels frequently. The little one is an AZ-Gte in EQ mode with a 50ED refractor / ZWO 485. That works great and set up is five minutes. It is the one I use when moving frequently.

In Perth Australia I have another set up I store in our hangar as we spend a lot of time in Perth. It is the 72ED / ZWO 183 Pro on an Ioptron Smart EQ Pro Plus. I take that one if away for two weeks or more.

Sometime I set it up at the airport and the plane is my astro shack. Lots of snacks readily available.

Love all your videos.

[jrthewinger]

I used plate solving for the first time the other night using Astroberry and Ekos on my Raspberry Pi. It was a revelation in ease of getting to the objects!

[viniguez]

Dude I have this setup but with the old AZ GTi in EQ mode. I love how well it works with your lightweight Raptor scope! Welcome to the ASIAIR club!!

[lgf]

Outstanding portable rig. I am getting a GTI to use with my Mirrorless camera rig, now I know I can upgrade to a great portable deepsky rig. Thank you so much!

[mlbreel]

Thank you for sharing your set up! If I can ever afford to build out a system, your research will have me years of effort and so I really appreciate benefiting from all your work.

[samuel.e.glover]

I completely agree that the ASAIR (both the older Pro and now the Plus) were some of the most important upgrades to start taking good images and quit wasting time. The new image cross feature is awesome. I have been extremely pleased what they have been able to do with a reconfigured raspberri pi.

[A_RosnerNZ]

@Astrobackyard - couple places you didn't mask your GPS co-ords (when showing telescope control screen)
And yeah. Plate solving saves a ton of time. When doing plate solve to get scope position, you want to be doing it closer to the celestial equator than to the pole. My new rig (powered by APT) started complaining to me about that one time!

[DAstroTC]

I loved the "pop" halo of 52 Cygni with the reveal. Subtle, nice touch with that music! I'm debating this mount or save up for the ZWO AM5.

[johnposavatz]

I started my AstroPhotography journey last fall with a star tracker, digital camera, and telephoto zoom lens. Polar alignment and subsequently finding my targets have certainly proven to be challenging ... BUT ... I like that I'm learning the night sky through the process of star hopping. Even though it's been time-consuming to do it this way, it has given me FAR more satisfaction (as a beginner) than if I had used technology to do everything for me. I definitely plan to "upgrade" down the road to a setup like this one, but not until that "I actually did that!" satisfaction wears off.

[lukomatico]

Awesome setup and incredible shot man!! - It's great to see your enthusiasm for this rig shining through in the video, I'm also a massive fan of ASIAIR and it's incredible ease of use yet powerful functionality! love it!
Sorry I'm late to the party on this one dude - man I've had a busy few weeks haha!
Clear skies 🙂

[spidersj]

I can't wait for availability of the gear vs.... "pre-order" or "reserve yours now"...

[ianwatson]

Asiair just works, hands down the best part of my setup. And I only use the original version. I’m looking at a similar portable setup, and also looking forward to the portable battery video… 💰💷

[linuxastro]

Excellent! Welcome to plate-solving! I typically refer to it as, "the Black Magic of computer-driven astronomy." You may want to consider WiFi instead of the USB cable for mount control. WiFi has terrible range, but can manage the foot or two from the computer to the mount. One less cable.

[ckott]

I got the magic cable (RJ something or other) this past November. WOW! It makes life so much better in combination with my ASIair, HEQ5 Pro mount, and iPad. Plate solving for polar alignment not only makes alignment possible when an object is blocking the view of Polaris, but it also eliminates awkwardness of viewing polaris through the polar scope, making mount adjustments, all while trying not to bump the tripod. Now I can set the tripod height based upon obtaining the best stability for the telescope and camera, and not whether I can bend my neck to peep through the polar scope. As you point out, ZWO has done a great job with their software to get the telesope on target. I've gone from typically needing about 30 minutes of set up time to start photographing to 10 minutes.

[Mistr_A]

Been doing it for ages even when there was no planetarium mode on the asiair, it is a game changer and will go better when you can plan using the planetarium feature.

[jamieonfire]

Incredible! This is exactly what I want to be able to do….minimal set up and easy to move! So happy I bough this, now if we could just get them!

[mwales]

Just getting back into imaging and put a new setup together using my old SW AZ/GTi mount in EQ mode and a SW 50ED Evogiude as my main scope (w/Starizona FF). Also a guide scope, ASIAIR Pro, ZWO EAF and EFW with a ASI533MC Pro camera.. And as a norm have had clouds after getting it setup. Thanks Trevor....

[jameswhitehead]

Awesome video. Finally in a position to buy my first star tracker. Looking forward to this being in stock.