Apparatus and methods for time-lapse photography are known. In general, time-lapse photography comprises capturing a sequence of photographs or images at temporally spaced apart times (the time between the capture of subsequent images defining a frame capture rate), so that the captured images can be displayed at a playback rate that is faster than the frame capture rate. For example, a sequence of time-lapse images can be captured at a frame capture rate of 1 frame/second and played back at a playback rate of 30 frames/second. Using time-lapse photography, changes in a subject that take place over relatively long periods of time can be captured and played back in much shorter time periods, thereby animating the changes in the subject over time.
Celestial objects (e.g. stars) can be difficult to photograph, because many celestial objects are relatively dim. To obtain satisfactory exposure for a photograph of a celestial object, a relatively long exposure time may be used. However, celestial objects move relative to the earth and, consequently, photographing celestial objects with a relatively long exposure time results in blurring.
There is a general desire to provide techniques for capturing time-lapse images sequences of celestial objects.