Astrophotography - with a camera phone

[Caz]

My last couple of phones have been Google phones: originally I had the LG Nexus 5, but upgraded earlier this year to the Pixel 3a almost as soon as it was announced. I was lucky and picked up a secondhand one not more than 2 weeks after the launch (I think it was an unwanted upgrade).

So I was used to the Google camera app, but the pixel had new features to me: the "night sight" is excellent. I noticed that the new Pixel 4 had an astrophotography feature, and had heard that a lot of the new features were available on the older versions.

I had my first attempt on the 22nd - although the astro feature is not listed, if you select night sight and point at the sky, a notification comes up that it's switching to astrophotography mode.

I took a couple from my son's balcony but there were a lot of buildings about, so had a second attempt from mine. I was initially drawn to trying because Sirius is so bright at this time of year, but what you mostly see is Orion.

Ian has already seen this from a share on Facebook, and has already spotted from the palm fronds that I was away when I took it!

[Garry]

Crikey that is clear, Caz.
I know darn well my old mobile wouldn't be capable of that. Must try it though.

[Ian]

The exif data on the shot also has the location it was taken at thanks to it being a smartphone shot - so Caz was just south west of Malaga

Isn't one of the Orion stars Betelgeuse? There is some speculation it may be about to go nova...

Ian

[Caz]

"Just south west of Malaga" is pretty much spot on: I was in Torrequebrada, a suburb of Benalmadena. The only time we went to Malaga was arrival/departure and we also had a morning at the Jardin Botanico - it was incredible what was still in flower.

I really decided to travel light: I used the Pixel phone a lot (as did my son in law); the rest of the family had various Samsung Galaxy Phones (s8 and s10) which also took excellent images. My main camera was my old Canon EOS-M (I still have the mark 1) with the 22mm f2 pancake and (slightly larger) a 50mm f1.4.

I'm really pleased with the performance of the Pixel in low light. However, if there are bright street lights you can get a lot of flare.

I've attached a panorama I took on Boxing Day as we walked along the beach to see the sunset

https://photos.app.goo.gl/iVnDbJB1qv6phj3N7

The exif data on the shot also has the location it was taken at thanks to it being a smartphone shot - so Caz was just south west of Malaga

Isn't one of the Orion stars Betelgeuse? There is some speculation it may be about to go nova...

Ian

[Ian]

Hope you don't mind me displaying your pano in fullsize?

There is a bit of a slope there How many margaritas had you consumed beforehand ?

Ian

[Caz]

I didn't mind at all Ian, thank you - I couldn't put it in the post so it was much appreciated.
Margaritas? I'll have you know that during my week in Spain, I consumed 3 glasses of wine and probably about 4 beers - and no meat. We were visiting the vegetarian wing of the family.

[Ian]

Both my daughters have given up meat and we've cut down. Sign of the times!

[Garry]

Fabulous ! My sort of image, Caz. Ok. Slight slope as Ian mentioned. But I like evening and natural light scenic shots.

Looks even better after logging in and seeing it on the black background of the dark theme.