Drove 3 hours to a dark sky park and realized my tripod leg was loose the whole time

I drove out to Cherry Springs State Park in Pennsylvania last weekend, supposedly one of the best spots on the east coast for astrophotography. Setup everything, took about 40 minutes of calibration frames and got my composition dialed in. Started shooting the Milky Way core around midnight and everything seemed fine in the preview. Got home the next day, loaded the files into my stacking software, and every single frame had this tiny wobble that ruined the detail. Then I remembered I bumped my tripod leg while adjusting my intervalometer early on and never checked if the lock tightened back up. All those long exposures just turned into blurry streaks. Has anyone else driven hours to a spot only to have some tiny equipment screwup mess up their whole session?

2 comments

2 Comments

cora4001mo ago

Forgot to check my camera battery once and it died ten minutes into a Perseid shower.

the_hugo1mo ago

Cherry Springs is supposed to be incredible, Ive read some articles from PA stargazers saying its one of the few spots left with Bortle 2 or 3 skies on the east coast. Man, that wobble from a loose leg would drive me crazy, especially after all that driving and setup time. I feel you though, @cora400 mentioning the dead battery thing reminds me of when I read about someone forgetting their SD card was full after a 2 hour hike. The little stuff always gets you, right? Hope you can get back out there soon and nail it.