Product Review .... iOptron Skytracker

[JTPhotography]

I love toys. I was completely skeptical of this so I ordered from Amazon Prime fully expecting to take advantage of the free return. If you've never heard of it, it is a small portable tracking device that allows you to take a long exposure photo of the night sky without having star trails. I am blown away by this thing. It was a snap to set up. It mounts between the tripod and ball head. You simply level it, point it north towards Polaris, then dial in your latitude. Then you turn it on, and shoot. You can't even tell it is on and rotating. Now you see why I am skeptical. Well it works. Here is proof, two photos, 100% crops, both taken at 85mm, ISO 3200, f4.5, 30 seconds.

Tracker turned off.

Tracker turned on. This is the same star.

I am really shocked at these results. The thing is, by the time I mounted my camera on the ball head I banged the whole thing around enough that I was sure I had knocked it out of whack. But it still worked.

Here is a full image, same settings as above. Just a random shot of the night sky. I over processed just to see how it would look. This is going to be fun. Can't wait to see how it does with a 200mm 2.8. I have read that it will be fairly accurate up to that point.

 

[jsecordphoto]

My buddy has one and loves it, enjoy!