Help aiming at the ISS for imaging

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Jaymz Bondurant avatar
Ok, friends. I need some help from anyone experienced in capturing the ISS. I've only caught it once and it was a solar transit. I used the ISS Transit Finder website and it nailed the location. This time, I'm going after the ISS itself and don't have a sun or moon to aim at. So, I'm using Stellarium to pinpoint where I need to aim. Here's the problem: The website shows an altitude of 79.2°. But Stellarium shows it at 76.9°. Now I don't know where to aim. I went to Google Maps and put a pin in my backyard to get my exact coordinates and copied and pasted them into both the website and Stellarium. So, the location isn't off. Who do I trust? I can't track the ISS so I only get one shot at this. Do I aim at 76° or 79°?

Edit: Disregard. The TLEs in Stellarium updated. They're still slightly off. But I'm closer to a solution. I could only edit the post and not delete.
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Tony Gondola avatar

It’s not a matter of knowing super accurately where to aim. You just need to know what azimuth, altitude and time when a pass begins from your location. Once you sight it visually, start your camera, Find it and keep in centered in your finder scope. You’ll usually you’ll get enough frames to work with that way. At least that’s one way I know it’s done. Much easier with a Dobsonian of course.

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