Astro-photographers

OldGoat

Just wondering if ye will be able to get any good shots of Mars or will it still way too distant for any reasonable shots.

Mars is set to be at it's closest to us in over 100 years and the astrononers are all getting kitted out to watch and spot the shadows that were once mistaken for canals.
http://www.science.ie/science-news/mars-astronomy-ireland.html

Gregor Samsa

What equipment are you planning on using?

You'll need your camera hooked up to a telescope to get anything remotely impressive. And as you'll be taking long exposure, you'll need a tracking mount, to compensate for the rotation of the earth. With even a 400mm lens, Mars will just look like a bright star. And without the tracking mount, you'll get a streak instead of a dot with any exposure over 20 or 30 seconds.

By the way, "close" in this context means 112 million km away. In that article, Astronomy Ireland are talking about using powerful telescopes to see any features at all.

Take a look at this thread on dpreview from 2009, where a similar question was asked - I haven't looked through all the replies, but there might be some info in it for you.

http://forums.dpreview.com/forums/read.asp?forum=1039&message=32547702

OldGoat

Clear images of Mars are well byond my ability. I'm still trying to get a decent shot of the moon using a borrowed 300mm. Without tracking I'm kinda stuck with short exposure shots. It's all a learning curve.
I'll read the linked site and follow where it leads me.

Gregor Samsa

Actually, the linked thread isn't all that good, sorry. But there is this post with a pic of Mars taken with an 8" Schmidt-Cassegrain telescope - with a focal length of 2000mm. That kind of scope would set you back about 2 grand. That will kind of give you an idea of what you're up against in terms of equipment and image quality.

I'm currently trying to get my 5.91" telescope set up, after it being boxed up for a year. I discover last night that one of the tracking motors is broken, so I'm currently figuring out how to fix that. But that aside, astrophotography is quite a bloody pain! You're up all hours in the cold and dark, you've got the photography settings to think about, and all the astronomy skills and settings to think about (polar alignment, collimation, tracking, etc). That's on top of the expense. I haven't managed to take a decent picture with the setup at all yet (although, I've taken pictures of the moon with a 400mm lens on a regular tripod that I'm very happy with). But still, the prospect of getting it right some day keeps me going!