Customer Reviews

Astrophotography: Featuring the Fx System of Exposure Determination

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This book is really a gem. While it covers all aspects of astrophotography, including equipment, film, etc..., its real strength and main focus is determining exposure. Most other books I've examined are weak on this point. They give fairly vague rules of thumb and tell you to bracket exposures to make sure you get a good result. This book doesn't do that.

Gordon has developed an extremely precise system for determining what exposure time is required for a given lens, a given aperture (f-stop), and a given astronomical object. I've used the system several times and it has always produced a perfect exposure the FIRST time, with no bracketing required (at first, I did bracket -- being a suspicious type, but the suggested exposure was always the best of the bracketed group, so I stopped).

The easiest and best way to use the book's system is to check with your lens manufacturer to see at what aperture it gives the best optical performance (i.e. least chromatic aberration, least distortion, and best resolution), then use the fx system to determine, for the magnitude of the object you want to photograph, what the proper exposure time is for that aperture.

If you're serious about astrophotography, and especially if you're just starting out and don't want to learn "rules of thumb" the hard way (by trial and lots of error), buy this book! It'll save you lots of wasted film and missed shots.