Damian Peach Interview: How to Photograph the Planets on a Budget

Damian Peach - the planet's best planetary photographer - gives expert advice on how to shoot Jupiter (and Saturn and Mars) on a budget.
I am super grateful he agreed to help me (astrobiscuit) with the next mission: JUPITER FOR £100. If you have any questions then please write them in the link below and I'll do my best to answer them.
Also you may want to check out some of his stuff here...
/ @planetimager

[@galacticus9845]

Wow you can't get a better amateur astrophotographer than this guy. He is the best. But Damian is giving me all the reasons why I need to relocate to Arizona.

[@Astrobiscuit]

True... Iets do it! 😂

[@SonoranAstro]

@@Astrobiscuitcome visit

[@mrtambourineman6107]

Peachy is king 🤴 planet in my book - my advice to newbies would be listen to him AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE. Also, Astrobiscuit is worth listening to again and again. I've picked up new layers each time I've re-watched Astrobiscuit. Probably watched some of these vids 10 times at least!

[@andrewallan349]

Amazing vid! Can’t wait to see ur results

[@fusion-music]

A good time for planets is 2022 winter. Good content - suitable for re- edit.

[@GarnettLeary]

Glad to see you back and great video. Fantastic surprise every time you post.

[@Astrobiscuit]

Thx fella... Take care!

[@slapastronomy8646]

Good video and a great interview. Nice work! Scott

[@arrantownsend7157]

Can't wait!

[@scotlandsnightsky]

love the vid bud! good tips by damian, cant wait to see ur planet pics soon

[@Astrobiscuit]

Thx mate

[@cliveroberts415]

Quite a scoop there mate he really is the best in the biz, what he didnt mention was focal length I have heard him say something like f22 (maybe with a barlow)

[@Astrobiscuit]

Yeh we did talk about barlows... But not f ratio... Im going for f24 with my set up but ive heard others talk about f30... Of course it all depends on the size of your pixels.

[@cpaulo1]

Exciting times! Great stuff.

[@Astrobiscuit]

Thx craig...

[@johngraham7045]

Great video, thanks Astobiscuit! Damien Peach is awesome. I do strictly planetary. I have a Meade 125mm Mak StarNavigator NG. The focal length is 1900mm. Most other 125mm Maks are 1200 or 1500mm. And I use a ZWO Asi 462mm for imaging. Damien mentioned turning the gain up high, Christopher Go also recommends running 100% gain. How does that work? My typical settings, would be gain below exposure and 15-20% of the histogram.

[@RaysAstrophotography]

Good Work. Thanks!

[@Astrobiscuit]

+Ray's Astrophotography thx for watching😁

[@nettyvoyager6336]

okay if you have a telescope the size of a house thats cheating :P

[@Astrobiscuit]

not as cheaty as juno ;-)

[@AstroGuy]

😂

[@TheCsel]

the trick is to turn your house into a telescope

[@Guido_XL]

The challenge with planetary imaging is that it takes lots of magnification. Deep sky objects generally can do without that. A telescope is generally a device that gathers light. Magnification is not on top of the list, unless planets are the target. Then, the telescope's job is not to gather lots of light, but to magnify. Planets in opposition emit more than enough light, so that there is no need for that. There is a need though for magnification, as planets appear rather small in the sky. Really small. To accomplish a reasonable resolution, this takes quite some aperture, unfortunately. So, imaging planets is prone to set you back financially, unless you luckily find a secondhand telescope that does the job. Deep sky can be done with smaller ones, as long as the mount is ensuring tracking during the exposures. As Damian said: for planets, you can get away with a lesser mount than what you need for deep sky objects. But, you need to invest in telescope real estate, i.e., opening. Bigger is better. Combined with large focal length, which can be accomplished with the added help of a Barlow lens, but only if the telescope allows for reasonable quality to sustain a good image in the end. I use a compromise for all of that. A jack-of-all-trades. It's a Maksutov-Newtonian. It has a 190 mm opening and 1000 mm focal length. With a 3x Barlow, I can take reasonable images from Saturn and Jupiter. Not as good as a proper Schmidt or Mak Cassegrain, but it does the job nevertheless.

[@woody5109]

What about the mount?

[@omulet29]

Man i have Orion Telescop N 150/750 StarSeeker IV AZ SynScan-GoTo used only for moon and some planet,I'll try deep sky,ty for your work,is a good tutorial has good things.

[@Astrobiscuit]

Cool thx. Andromeda is a good target to start with (if you have dark skies) keep the exposures to 30sec or less on your system. Should be good😜

[@dubstepzsi]

Your just abig kid really arnt you haha Love it :)

[@NorthernChev]

HOW did a photographer of your caliber figure you should sit in front of a bright window and point the camera into the sunlight and expect it to work out?

[@Astrobiscuit]

errr... dude I cock up all the time😂

[@sharmilachakravorty]

Aww Damian has a cat!

[@astroshlibber9654]

DP is a legend

[@TareqAstroPhoton]

Still didn't get answer about which telescope to get, he said it is the most factor or #1 factor and yet no more details about it, and just talked a lot about weather, well i don't have UK weather as i live in dry hot climate so it is always clear sky, what telescope to get then for planets?

[@Astrobiscuit]

The thing is he's answering questions to help me with my 100£ mission.Later I bought an orion 150mm f8 newtonian for £25 which he though was an absolute bargain. I know Damian rates the SCT's if your budget is a little higher.

[@TareqAstroPhoton]

I see, so the interview is about helping you, not necessarily for public or in general, well, for that scope i think you can't do much, i have 7" Mak and i still look for another scope, but can't afford largest SCT, and medium SCT isn't gonna replace or make a huge difference over my 7" Mak then.

[@polyblank73]

oh no, a child

[@ruudsjardin3626]

ż

[@cirurginn]

when Jupiter has better image quality than this interview