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Old 05-04-2007, 06:20 AM
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iceman (Mike)
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Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Gosford, NSW, Australia
Posts: 36,799
Hi there Sekans1 (what's your real name?)

The scope/camera required to take photos of planets is completely different than the telescope and camera that's required to take pictures of deep-sky objects.

For planets/lunar, you need:
1) Large aperture telescope (anything over 8" is best, largest practical aperture is probably around 12" before you need to start looking into active cooling).
2) Fast framerate webcam - a firewire/USB2 webcam is best, but the ToUcam (still USB1.1) is the best of the budget webcams.
3) A tracking mount, however it doesn't need to be the biggest and best. The exposures are short and so a bit of drifting is ok as long as you can use the hand controller to keep the planet in the FOV. Too much movement and it will affect the quality.

For deep-space imaging, you'll need:
1) A shorter focal length telescope, like an ED80. You can use 10" telescopes for deep-space stuff, but most will also use focal reducers to reduce the focal length. The higher the focal length, the more demand you put on the accuracy of your tracking.
2) A digital SLR or similar. The DSI/Pro work well for a starter. Others even use a modified ToUcam (webcam) with some great results (see BallaratDragons posts).
3) The mount is everything. It has to be solid, it has to track well and accurately. Bigger is better. You're doing long exposures so it needs to be aligned accurately.
4) (optional) as you get experience, you'll want more accurate tracking so you'll need a guidescope, guidecamera etc.

Hope that helps!
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