Astro.recon

Lost in the Milky Way

Sometimes you don't need a telescope.

A wide lens, a dark sky and a camera pointed upward are enough to reveal just how crowded our part of the galaxy really is.

These are a few wide-field frames from one of my nights under the stars. Instead of concentrating on a single nebula or galaxy, this time the target was the Milky Way itself — thousands of stars, dark clouds of interstellar dust and the faint structure of our own galaxy stretching across the frame.

This is one of the things I love about astrophotography. With a telescope we can travel deep into tiny regions of the sky, but with a wide-angle lens we can step back and see the bigger picture.

And somewhere inside all of this is our little Solar System.

Equipment:
Nikon D3400
Tokina 11–16mm f/2.8

Light in the Dark
Recon85

First steps with guiding and PixInsight.

This image shows the region around the Lagoon Nebula (M8) and the Trifid Nebula (M20), captured from my balcony in Vienna.

For this session I collected 40 exposures of 180 seconds each, giving a total integration time of about 2 hours.

This project was also a double experiment.

First, it was one of my first serious tests with a new guiding setup:

- Sky-Watcher Evostar 72ED
- Explore Scientific iEXOS-100 mount
- ZWO ASI120MM Mini guide camera
- SVBONY SV165 guide scope
- Nikon D3400

Second, this was my first real image processed in PixInsight.

After years of using other software, I finally decided to give PixInsight a try. Even after just a few days of learning, I can already see why so many astrophotographers consider it the industry standard. There is still a lot to learn, but the first results are very encouraging.

Guiding allowed me to use longer exposures and collect more light, while PixInsight helped reveal details that would have taken much longer to process manually.

This is not a perfect image, and there is still plenty of room for improvement, but every new piece of equipment and every new skill opens another door to the night sky.

Step by step, night by night.

Light in the Dark
Recon85

Moon 26%

**First real result with guiding.**

Today’s post was supposed to look a little different, but astrophotography has a funny way of changing plans when something more important comes along.

I recently added a new guiding camera to my setup, so instead of strictly following the calendar, I decided to share the result of my first more serious guided session.

The target was the **M8 and M20 region** — the Lagoon Nebula and the Trifid Nebula. It is a beautiful part of the sky, full of gas, dust, and young stars.

**Data collected:**
**40 frames, 180 seconds each**
which gives a total of about **2 hours of exposure**.

For me, this is a big step forward. Guiding allows a tracking camera to monitor the movement of the mount and correct small tracking errors. In practice, this means I can take longer exposures, collect more light, and reveal more detail.

This image was captured from my balcony in Vienna, so the conditions are far from perfect. The city lights are still a big challenge, but that makes this result even more satisfying.

This is not the final stage of working with this material, and there are definitely still things to improve: setup, focus, processing, background balance, and fighting the light pollution. But this post is important to me because it shows real progress — from short test exposures to my first longer guided session.

Step by step, night by night.

**Light in the Dark**
**Recon85**

🌙 A lucky moment captured through my telescope.

While photographing the Moon, an aircraft crossed the frame at exactly the right time.

The first image shows the final result.
The second image shows the editing process behind the scene.

Astrophotography is not only about looking at the sky — it's also about patience, processing and sometimes a bit of luck.

Welcome to Astro.Recon.

My name is Daniel and I am an amateur astrophotographer from Vienna, Austria.

This page is dedicated to the beauty of the night sky — from the Milky Way visible to the naked eye to distant galaxies, nebulae and star clusters.

Every image tells a story about our place in the universe.

Thank you for joining me on this journey.