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Old 03-09-2018, 04:25 PM
miskairal (Robyn)
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First Telescope - Information Overload

Hello all,
About to buy my first telescope and have spent many hours researching but seem to now be lost in too much information and would love some advice/reassurance (there are a lot of "first scope" type posts here). I just want to get lost in the sky at this stage, stare at the moon and whatever else I can see and feel like an ant must on earth. I installed Stellarium on my pc some time ago and although hopeless at remembering the names of things, it still fascinates me.

In amongst all the reading I have read over and over to get a Dobsonian to start with so have kind of settled on a 6” Skywatcher (I think an 8" would be too big for me but am open to suggestions) for the amount of money I want to spend at this early stage of a potential hobby. I live on a farm several km from very small towns. I don’t know of any clubs in the area, or even anyone else with a telescope.

I love my amateur photography which was taken up a notch a month ago when a friend who is a professional photographer invited me to join him in on an astrophotography session.

First and foremost I’d like a Telescope I can see stuff with. If it came to the choice of 2 similar telescopes but only one had the potential to be used with a camera further down the track then I’d probably pick that one. However my brain is all done in now and I cannot start researching that as well. I can spend more money at a later date if I become addicted but I think now I need to just get in and get something and learn more about what is ideal for me (plus it might bring rain ).

My questions are in order of importance:
1) Is a 6” Dobsonian a good choice for a beginner?
2) Can a Dobsonian be attached to a tripod further down the track?
3) Do these have the potential to attach a DSLR camera further down the track?
Many thanks for any help for this overloaded brain.
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Old 03-09-2018, 04:49 PM
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gaseous (Patrick)
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Hi Robyn, and welcome.


A 6" (or preferably 8") dob (reflector on a dobsonian mount) is a good starting point for a visual beginner. I'm not into the photography side of things, but with the correct connections, I believe you should be able to attach a DSLR camera and take some short exposure shots of the moon and brighter planets - the mechanics of a dobsonian mount means it doesn't lend itself to long exposures due to field rotation. I believe the connections for a camera are pretty cheap.


A reflector, again with the correct accessories, can be mounted on an eq mount, which will suit longer exposure photography, and there are astrophotography reflectors made for this purpose. Bear in mind that to support a decent sized reflector will require a sturdy mount, and I've heard it said that the mount can be one of, if not the, most important part of an astrophotography setup. A decent 8" dob, without GOTO functionality, can be had new for $500-$550. A similar sized tube with a mount suitable for photography can run into a sizable chunk of money though - it can be an expensive rabbit hole into which to fall.



The benefits of a reflector vs refractor for photography is something I'm extremely unqualified to comment on, so I should probably let the camera jockeys take over from here .... good luck!
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Old 03-09-2018, 05:06 PM
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multiweb (Marc)
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Sounds like you need the following:

A reclining chair.
A good pair of binoculars.
A small tripod for your DSLR.

Layback, learn the sky with a widish fov and take unguided widefield short exposures, timelapses, star trails etc...
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Old 03-09-2018, 05:12 PM
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RB (Andrew)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by multiweb View Post
Sounds like you need the following:

A reclining chair.
A good pair of binoculars.
A small tripod for your DSLR.

Layback, learn the sky with a widish fov and take unguided widefield short exposures, timelapses, star trails etc...
You forgot to mention the Port Marc!

RB
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Old 03-09-2018, 05:21 PM
Malcolm
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Some dobsonians cannot reach prime focus with a dslr attached. You would likely have to use a barlow, which increases magnification. An alternative is to move the primary mirror forwards 25mm so the focal point can reach the focal plane of the camera. Ideally a dob is not suited for astrophotography. However, a SkyWatcher can reach focus with a dslr, and I know this as I've done it. Without tracking you'll be limited to lunar and planetary, and you'll need an eq mount, add extras for tube rings and dovetail, capable of carrying the weight of the OTA, the camera and possibly a guide-scope to do DSO's. Unless you can get a good score second-hand, you'll probably want to spend around 3k to get into astro-photography. Or, you could get a 10" SkyWatcher GOTO for under 2k, and either use a DSLR or a usb camera to do multiple 25sec exposures (before field rotation sets in) and software stack the images. Or, spend close to 2k on a mount, and another 1k on a refractor, which is what you need for taking pics ideally. So, you have to make a choice, visual or astro-photography, or buy both setups.
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Old 03-09-2018, 08:39 PM
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multiweb (Marc)
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You forgot to mention the Port Marc!

RB
Next level. Auto guiding required.
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Old 03-09-2018, 11:22 PM
RyanJones
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Hi Robyn,

I'm certainly not the person to comment on different scopes as my experience is only with the 2 small SCTs I own. Only thing I will say is you said " potential hobby "..... Trust me, once you start you can't stop ! That increases exponentially the moment you bolt a camera to it ! Welcome to the hotel California..... You can check out any time you like but you can never leave
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Old 04-09-2018, 09:45 AM
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sil (Steve)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by miskairal View Post
Hello all,
About to buy my first telescope and have spent many hours researching but seem to now be lost in too much information and would love some advice/reassurance (there are a lot of "first scope" type posts here). I just want to get lost in the sky at this stage, stare at the moon and whatever else I can see and feel like an ant must on earth. I installed Stellarium on my pc some time ago and although hopeless at remembering the names of things, it still fascinates me.

In amongst all the reading I have read over and over to get a Dobsonian to start with so have kind of settled on a 6” Skywatcher (I think an 8" would be too big for me but am open to suggestions) for the amount of money I want to spend at this early stage of a potential hobby. I live on a farm several km from very small towns. I don’t know of any clubs in the area, or even anyone else with a telescope.

I love my amateur photography which was taken up a notch a month ago when a friend who is a professional photographer invited me to join him in on an astrophotography session.

First and foremost I’d like a Telescope I can see stuff with. If it came to the choice of 2 similar telescopes but only one had the potential to be used with a camera further down the track then I’d probably pick that one. However my brain is all done in now and I cannot start researching that as well. I can spend more money at a later date if I become addicted but I think now I need to just get in and get something and learn more about what is ideal for me (plus it might bring rain ).

My questions are in order of importance:
1) Is a 6” Dobsonian a good choice for a beginner?
2) Can a Dobsonian be attached to a tripod further down the track?
3) Do these have the potential to attach a DSLR camera further down the track?
Many thanks for any help for this overloaded brain.

1 - hell yes!
2- technically yes but realistically no
3 - why a dslr? whats that got to do with astrophotography. It can be done but not really the right tool.you'll learn in time the right choice for you is a dobsonian, 8" if you can afford (dont buy cheap, buy quality).

cheaping out or buying the wrong thing is a common beginner mistake, it'll kill your enjoyment and you may never touch the gear ever again. Dont be fooled by big magnification numbers either, the higher the mag the more the defects of it are magnified too and the worse the view becomes. diameter is more important and it seems you are in a good location for low light pollution skies so I highly recommend an 8" dob, you may want more later and would go for 12 or 14" at that time. If you want to get serious about astrophotography (when you understand the huge effort needed processing on the computer, the photos you see are almost never ever ever "out of a camera". so if you do go the AP route it won't be with the dob, it'll be another rig completely. And while you're waiting for hours for that rig to collect data you still have your initial dob to explore the sky since you cant touch the AP rig. Plus you can use it much much quicker to show others the sky and make your sessions more social. If there was One telescope that did everything the best then there wouldnt be any choices. You need to learn and comprehend what the choices mean. Plus until you start viewing you yourself wont know what types of objects appeal to you, forget photos completely, first understand what you see in a photo is typically a combination of dozens or hundreds of single photos and its also never ever the view you see in the eyepiece. planets are small, galaxies and nebula faint and in black and white. check around videos on youtube if you cant get with an astr club or local observatory evening and look at how people use a 6" dob and an 8". they are dead easy to setup and get going, ap rigs take time to set up and packaway, not very practical for a quick session (sessions are never quick except maybe shooting the moon)
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Old 04-09-2018, 04:43 PM
miskairal (Robyn)
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Thank you ALL so much for your knowledge sharing and thoughts.
So I will drop the photography side of things totally for now and just concentrate on looking and learning more. I'm not really into post processing as I don't think that's a true image although I have worked on a couple of drone photos I took because the sky appeared blue to my eyes but in the photos it was flared out to white. The drone can take bracketed shots.

Sil - I think you hit the hammer on the head when you said until I start looking I won't know what I like plus if it becomes the Hotel California (Love that analogy Ryan!) I am quite happy to buy another scope for photography.

multiweb and RB - I actually googled "Port Marc" as I didn't get it (I am always slow) and then saw RB's name is Marc! Duh. But you know what.......I love port and probably will have one while watching
As for the binoculars, I have used them before for land viewing and didn't take to them. The auto guiding - well I know it will be hard to find what I want to see but that's part of the experience, I like learning and I like learning from the ground up.

Malcolm - you are making the potential for money spending scary. Luckily I have a job and don't rely on farm income! But thanks for making it all clearer.

gaseous - thankyou for the explanations. I was thinking of going 8" but then I read a few times of people saying they are a bit hard to manage. I'm not a big person so am thinking start with the 6" and go bigger later if Hotel California takes over.

Highlight of my day was that upon returning from work this arv a tree was gone. I've been asking hubby for 2 years to cut it down as it was a crappy sheoak that totally interrupted the view off the deck and always looked dead. Spending the last couple of weeks talking about getting a telescope fixed it as he is also very interested in looking (but doesn't have my patience so can get the ports while I find something to look at).

I will just investigate the 8" a little more.
Once again, thankyou everyone.
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Old 05-09-2018, 02:55 PM
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Go for 8 inch F5.
I have one (GSO) and very very happy with it.
If you go for astro photos it will do a great job ever with a dslr.
If you look in the beginers photo section you will see what can be easily done with the eight and a dslr...its easy to set up a dob mounted scope to go on an equatorial mount.
The eight inch will go on a HEQ5 Mount which are not too expensive.
I have only recently gone to auto guiding and say you can get decent images with short exposures...the photo I suggested you look at in the beginners section was only 30 second captures which you can get without auto guiding...
The eight inch is managable for a reasonably fit person..I have leg problems and 71 years old and I manage it.
Visually the eight in a dark location will get most objects ...I have had six thru to teelve inch scopes but prefer 80mm binnos for visual...its not about the magnification but more about light gathering...searching the Milky Way with binos is the best.

Good luck.

Alex
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Old 05-09-2018, 05:04 PM
miskairal (Robyn)
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Crikey Alex, now you've given me more research
ThankYOU for your valuable input. I'm off to search the photos but just your saying you are a tad older than me has given me hope that I can manage the 8". The shipping on these things is a bit cruel though, not sure I want to spend that much yet. Will put my patience to work and research some more.

Thanks again.
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Old 05-09-2018, 09:19 PM
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Well the best advice is do it as soon as you can.

Any binos are real fun...you just cant wander out during add breaks however you need to let your eyes dark adapt 30 minutes in the dark before you really see things...as Marc suggests is the way to go first.

You can take photos on a static tripod just make short exposures and stack them in a free program called Deep Sky Stacker...it enables you to load any number of short captures and stack them to get one image equivalent in exposure to the total of the shots..ie. 10 shots at 10 seconds give you a 100 second exposure.... that program is great if you wanted to do some widefield milky way stuff which is just so much fun.

And if you want to do Moon stuff get a program called Registax...again you take a few shots and load then in the program..dead easy..and you get jaw droping clear Moon shots that you wont believe...even single shots of the Moon are neat...lots of fun.

alex
Good luck.
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Old 06-09-2018, 12:16 AM
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Rkonrad (Richard)
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!00% on a 8 inch dobs good value scope that does most things well , but not for AP a pair of binos are essential for us
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Old 06-09-2018, 07:44 AM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by miskairal View Post
As for the binoculars, I have used them before for land viewing and didn't take to them.
Sky viewing is different experience from day on same gear. you don't explain WHY you didn't like them, you just seem to now discount the option based on one experience. Binos are a great tool for all astronomers. As for post processing of astrophotos as being fakery, again you show your assumption based on ignorance. Astrophotography can not be compared to regular photography. You rarely ever take a photo with a camera in astronomy, what you call post processing is where the photo is really taken. its NOT fakery or cheating in any way. This is the reality for everyone, even NASA. While you can use regular camera gear its not the right tool, nor is the mindset or understanding of photography much use to the astrophotographer. I really think you need to give it a try with what you've got, dont say you need a telescope because you dont , what you need is experience to comprehend what astrophotography means practically and software is free. A lot of astrophotographers never go beyond the free software because it does everything the need, so right now as you read this if you have a camera and camera tripod (maybe) you can start doing astrophotography with zero costs. Everything else like tracking mounts and OTAs are there to address limitations (there are always limitations regardless what you spend) but you can start with the basics of taking subs, darks and registering frames and stacking.
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Old 06-09-2018, 12:30 PM
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ZeroID (Brent)
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Hi Robyn, and welcome to the madhouse.
Alex gives good advice. An 8" F 5 will give great visual and possibly be photo capable depending on a few factors but that can come later. Bino aversion or not a pair of 10 x 50 binos are brilliant just for scanning the sky and letting you find your way around. Stellarium is excellent with it's realistic representation of what you can see. With those three and a few decent eyepieces you can be happy and busy for about a year or so till you learn some of the terms and where the heck everything is up there.
By that stage you should know where your obsession is going and can make more decisions about what is next. I just hope your bank account is elastic for astro-imaging.
I've been on this trip for about 10 years now and am still upgrading, learning new systems and upgrading as I go. My intention is like Alex, to just keep going and I'm no spring chicken either.

Last piece of advice ...
Check the IIS For Sale section, scopes come up all the time as people upgrade and there are some excellent buys there. And whoever sells you a scope will make sure you get what you need to get started. That's what it's all about.

Enjoy ..!!
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Old 06-09-2018, 04:34 PM
miskairal (Robyn)
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You lot are terrific. Thankyou so much.

I didn't like binoculars the few times I've tried them because the image was sort of funny around the edges and I also have bung shoulders so can't hold them up long.

I do have a camera tripod and have taken some pics at night which are kind of ok but I need a lot more practice and am not a fan of winter nights. Thanks for the heads up on the freeware Alex. BTW some of your pics are really gorgeous.

Thanks for the info Sil. As I implied earlier, I have done no research on astrophotography because that is not what I was after yet however now you have me intrigued. I think just getting everyone's comments here has helped clear my brain for more research. I'm not saying it's cheating to post process pics, I'm saying that I, personally, like pics that show what I see. From what you have said, this isn't going to apply with astro.

Brent thankyou for your input. To know that I might be happy for a year before wanting to buy more is very helpful. I did take a quick look at the for sale section but might head back.

Another vote for the 8" from Richard I guess you always have to spend more than what you anticipated and I'm no longer allowed to buy pets so 8" it will probably be.

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Old 06-09-2018, 06:04 PM
RyanJones
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Hi Robyn.

I think Sil summed up the astrophotography side of things really well. I guess the best way I can describe it is that we don't take photos, we collect data. We then process the data to bring out the image of the object. If you're expecting to " see " things, you probably need a grater understanding of what you are looking at. Google the visual spectrum and see how little out eyes are physiologically able to " see " verses the wavelengths of light that travel though out our vast universe. Add to that the sheer magnitude of distance we are talking about. When we photograph space, we take long exposures and stack them because the reality is that one photon my hit our sensors and the one next to it may not arrive for minutes or hours after. Small objects in our local group can have depth meaning that the light from the back of the object and the light from the front of the object may have left their sources separated by longer time than humans have been walking this earth. Furthermore, when your eyes are light adjusted, you only use the rods in the receptors of your eyes which perceive only black or white, in this case any colour you see is actuslly " fakery " by your brain trying to construct a colour it thinks it is seeing.
This universe of ours is beyond comprehension. The best bet is to forget what you think you know now and open up to the incredible reality that we capture a very small but equally incredible amount of !

Last edited by RyanJones; 09-09-2018 at 10:36 AM.
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Old 08-09-2018, 07:19 AM
miskairal (Robyn)
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Great explanation Ryan.....makes a lot of things clearer and gives me some knowledge to know what to google. Thankyou.

I've visited a lot of forums over the years where some people just reply "Google it" however it's very hard to research something when you don't know the lingo or the first thing about it. My mind does not remember much unless I actually do it or use it so trying to read something full of abbreviations and terminology I'm not familiar with takes hours per page while I google all the words used. After a couple of days or weeks of that I can feel my brain just blocking off. That's when I usually need to get in and do it so it gets set in my head and then it opens up to learning more. I didn't know that everything only appears black and white and hadn't read it anywhere so I didn't know to google about colours and stuff. I didn't think about the distance and the speed of light even though I know about it, it's not what I see when I look at the night sky, I just see a blanket of stars.

I can see this is going to be a dementia preventing exercise now
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Old 01-11-2018, 07:50 PM
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You can do some "types" of astrophotography without a telescope and use just a dslr. Yes of course the lens on a camera is like a telescope it focuses light.
If you want to do widefield milky way shots you could do thaf with a dslr and a widefield lens 10mm to 24mm your max exposure time will be rulle of thumb 500/lense FL, 50sec on a 10mm and much less as yohr lens Fl increases. If you dont have dark skies then you also need to take multiple exposures and stack them. Stacking boosts signal and reduces the impact of noise.

A non goto dobsonian is not really suitable for imaging, you could do some moon or planet stuff and many years ago tried that. A goto dob with modern dslr with good video or dedkcated solar imaging camera like ZWO qhy etc you cand do solar planetary and lunar imaging. Note dobsonian is just the mount the telescope in a dob is a newtonian reflector and this can be moved to a equatorial mount...

Hmm im sure your even more confused , but the hobby of Astronomy is a long winding road. There is no one singular way to enter or exit.

My advise get a small alt az goto telescope , portbility means you will likely use it more. And secondly buy used gear from people who have been in the hobby. Id say a 6" sct on a simple goto alt az mount. This is more a observing setup but could be expanded to imaging planets and EAA deep sky. In parallel get yourseld a dslr and some widefield lens. For canon a used 5d mark ii or 6d plus samyang 14mm f2.8 lens. Nikon d700 or d600 (known oil issue but nikon will fix and provide lifetime cleqning or upgrade to d610) , same sayang lens, You could also go Fuji Xt1. A dslr will let you do yohr widefield milky way without any special tracking mount. Sounds like your friend can guide you on this.

Finally regardint procesing being fakery...

One of the greatest Photographers Ansell Adams said
"You don't take a photograph, you make it" composition planning and processing. The camera the telescope are just tools.
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Old 01-11-2018, 09:25 PM
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Outcast (Carlton)
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Robyn,

I highly recommend you read Alexander's (Mental4Astro) thread on observing Nebula as well as his separate thread on observing the moon & planets.

They are an absolute wealth of information for the beginning observer; they help you understand the 'how to see', 'the what to see' & 'the why doesn't it look like the photo's'..

Whilst the photo's are fantastic, no doubt at all, for me, seeing things in real time, with my own eyes is the most mind blowing thing I think I have ever done...

Even though I've been at this for a few years now, reading Alexanders threads has given me a much greater understanding of what I have seen & what I have failed to see & why..

He then presents some challenges.. these challenges will help improve your viewing, jmprove the way you look for & look at things.

Just scroll down a little further in the 'Beginners Talk' thread & you will see his two threads, I can't recommend them enough... I value them so much in fact, that I have copied & printed them into a document that I have in my observing & telescope guide folder, he only put them out recently but, I am finding them invaluable.

Edit: the links to the two threads are here...

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...d.php?t=170511

http://www.iceinspace.com.au/forum/s...d.php?t=169840
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