Newbie help with star photography...please!

[choumbie]

Hey..this is my first post..not even sure if this is in the correct forum..But if not im sure someone will direct me in the right direction...

I have a Sony DSC-717 digital camera..and im attempting to take photographs of the night sky..stars moon...yadda yadda. Ive been trying to get some 30 second exposure shots of the stars..and all the pictures ive taken always end up a little grainy or instead of the background being a nice black, its slightly red and fuzzy. The moon has been pretty bright the past few nights...Does this have anything to do with the red fuzzyness? I know long exposure shots dont work very well with the moon. If anyone knows anything about the camera, or how/if I can get this to work out nicer, ide appreciate any help. Thanks a bunch.

-Alex

[drg]

I have used one of these cameras for only a few hours so I'm no expert, but the one I used was a friends and he emailed me with a couple of ideas I'll repackage for you.

Use the TIFF mode, 100 iso, and don't shoot at too wide an angle much as the lens in these cameras was known in some cases to display distortion at wide angles.

Be aware of a couple of issues with this camera, it applies some noise reduction to all images taken at less than about 1/30th of a second (from the specs in the manual) and there were cameras (early models) that exhibited red saturation in longer shots.

The night shot mode is the classic black frame subtraction and is mostly for use with the 'night light' feature. The red fuzzyness is either the red 'bloom' (saturation) or the camera stepping on the image with noise reduction/color correction. White balance except in daylight was apparently slightly questionable in these cameras under extremes.

Be aware that in a 30 second exposure, the stars are going to move.

Finally, in your editing software, is there a black point or color cast adjustment tool? The various flavors of software (Adobe Photoshop(various), Paint Shop Pro, etc.) have something that lets you select an area or point that should be black in the image. When this correction is made then you can see if the 'red' disappears.

Good luck and hope this helps a little.

Oh, when using a tripod make sure that the tripod is resting on a stable solid surface like concrete.
A deck, or balcony, or platform are not stable for long exposures, unless you don't move around much. A deck will bounce, a platform or balcony may 'sway'. You will never feel it, but the camera will see it.

[Norfindel]

The camera meter will be very confused with a scene of moon and stars, so you need to go manual mode and take several pictures until you find the correct settings. The moon is fairly bright and do not requires a long exposure.

I think you are getting too much light, and that's why you get the reddish/orange tint, even if it's too little to see it, the camera will take it on a long exposure.