Octans Constellation - Polar Alignment

The weather hasn't been friendly for astronomy over the last few weeks, either cloudy, too windy, raining or too bloody cold. I don't have much access to the sky at home (lots of trees) but luckily I have a view of the constellation of Octans in the South, the four cup shape stars are what is required to align a polar scope with the South Celestial Pole on my Sky-Watcher mount to get long camera exposures.

Very few of the stars in this 100 second exposure of Octans are visible to the naked eye where I am due to the light pollution from the City of Sydney 45km to the South (even more so with my old eyes) which makes it a bit tricky for a beginner, the mount wasn't correctly aligned in this image hence the slight star stretching (and it's slightly out of focus). I've learnt a lot over the last month and can't wait to put some of it into practise. 

I had issues finding Octans at first, I mistakenly thought it was a lot smaller in the sky than it actually is so I was looking for the constellation within THE CONSTELLATION. This is the first constellation I have photographed for the collection.

My new process when setting up at a different site for the first time is to take a long exposure using my iPad on a tripod with an app called NightCap to get star trails (see below), this gives a clear indication of where to look for the SCP. Using this technique has been really handy as I have found that there are times when the app info and compass data when set to declination vary or just don't line up. Looking at a landmark on the horizon that you know is true South of a regular location makes the setup task quick and simple.

NightCap image taken with an iPad air 2, Star Trails Mode, 7873 seconds exposure, 1/2s shutter speed 

C'mon Spring.. Pull your finger out and bring on some clear sky!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octans