Entry-Level Astronomy?

brobak writes "I'm getting ready to move into a new home on a couple of acres of rural property a significant distance from any large source of light pollution. I've always been interested in astronomy in general, and I would like to put my dark skies to use by picking up decent telescope and learning a bit about the skies over my head. The overall budget for this project is going to be around $1,000. I am particularly interested in astrophotography, but I understand that that may carry me outside the scope of the initial budget. I've already signed up for my local astronomy club's next monthly meeting. I have been doing Web research, but I thought that the Slashdot community would be the perfect place to get opinions on entry-level equipment, websites, and books."

Comments

Astronomy software

[jchillerup]

The first thing I'd do would be to install Stellarium. That'd enable you to "tune in" on stars, even in cloudy weather.

Re:Astronomy software

[Mr2cents]

While we're listing astronomy software: Kstars is great too.

And if you want to use a (web)cam on your telescope, take a look at registax.

Re:Astronomy software

[screen404]

I have been doing backyard astronomy for a few years now.

Hear is the list of groups and websites you want to visit or sign up:
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/DeepSkyImager/?yguid=222412370
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/ETXASTRO/?yguid=222412370
http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/astroplanner/?yguid=222412370
http://www.weasner.com/etx

The software. One of the best softwares i have tried is Astroplanner http://www.ilangainc.com/astroplanner/
It allows you to plan your observations or download plans of others.
Will control your telescope and help align it correctly. runs both on Mac and PC.
They guy is very good at support, and it is not very expensive.

ps: I'm associated with Astroplanner but a very happy user.

Re:Astronomy software

[Rei]

The Weasner site would, of course, only be particularly useful if they're buying a Meade. As a Meade owner myself, however, it's wonderful ;)

Anyways, to the poster: First off, let me recite the standard advice for getting a telescope:

1) Don't buy from a "junk" brand (and there are a lot of them -- Bushnell, Tasco, Baytronix, etc). Get a name brand -- Meade, Celestron, Orion, etc.
2) Get large aperture, but keep the telescope portable, or you'll never use it.
3) Don't buy from Ebay.
4) Don't even buy from a store like Walmart. Buy from a telescope dealer.
5) Get quality optics like Televues and Naglers.
6) Subscribe to astronomy magazines, join a local astronomy club, and on and on.
7) If you can't afford everything above, just buy binocs.
8) Don't do astrophotography; you'll just be disappointed.

Let me tell you that most of that advice is bollocks.

Follow #1 and, as money allows, #2. Completely ignore the Ebay advice. Ebay is *wonderful* for telescopes and accessories (of course, verify that they're actually cheaper there than elsewhere before you buy, but they usually are). I find that things get to you faster from Ebay, too, and they're almost never "backordered" like so many stores are. I bought my scope, four eyepieces, and a barlow from Ebay, and everything was exactly as described, shipped quickly. One caveat: With the scope itself, if it has a motorized mount or an autostar, make sure you have a warranty. This is very sensitive scientific equipment, so Murphy's Law applies. Also, never trust an airline with *any* part of your scope any further than you can throw them, no matter how well you pad it. Trust me on this one. I've had an equatorial mount sheared clean in half by them -- i.e., straight through a bolt with about half an inch of steel, sheared right off. I think they were having a monster truck rally on top of my luggage. If you're taking a scope on the plane, the whole thing must be carryon. Let me also take this change to plug Meade's customer service, which I've dealt with several times, and have been *very* pleased with.

The "Televue and Nagler" advice is idiotic. People who advise that (and I've heard way too many) would have you spend your entire budget on two eyepieces. There are plenty of cheaper eyepieces that aren't too much lower quality than those top-of-the-line pieces. Antares eyepieces are good. I use Meade 4000 series, and have been very happy with them. On ebay, you'll only spend about $40 each for them.

Your budget is bigger than mine was, so I wouldn't recommend my scope (a Meade DS 2130AT -- a 5" newtonian with a motorized equatorial mount and autostar -- $170, plus some money for eyepieces to replace the junk ones that it comes with). You can do better than 5" aperture. I wouldn't go with a newt at all; they'll get too heavy and bulky as they scale up, and the short tube newts aren't that good. I think you'd want one of the Cassegrain or Maksutov varieties so that it'd be more portable. Perhaps something in the Meade LX series.

It doesn't hurt to join clubs or subscribe to magazines. On the other hand, you don't *have* to. There are plenty of astronomy forums online, and lots of articles.

As for astrophotography, it's not a case of "don't do it", just "do it right and be patient". One thing not to do, IMHO, is afocal with your current camera. On sites that list afocal as a method, caveats with it often are not stressed enough. If you have a fast lens, the vignetting will be atrocious, often to the point of the pictures hardly being usable. Also, the higher the magnification you use, the worse the vignetting. You really need a camera that you can remove the lens on (eyepiece projection and prime focus astrophotography). Ignore the people who say to get an SLR (non-digital). If you want to use a regular camera, get a DSLR; modern astrophotography benefits hugely from digital postprocessing. However, any camera that might be even a little heavy should

Web site

[tumutbound]

Have a look at http://iceinspace.com.au/ while it's run out of Australia, there are members worldwide.
'Where to start' is a common question there.

Well there's always...

[Artaxs]

... Google Sky.

Try building a telescope

[Derwood5555]

When you go to your astronomy club's meeting, see if they have a group that builds telescopes. Building your own telescope is a great way to save a lot of money, plus you'll learn a lot in the process.

If you're lucky enough to be in the SF bay area, the Chabot Observatory Telescope Maker's Workshop is a great place to learn about telescopes, and also how to build them. They can guide you through the process, and its really not as hard as you might think. http://chabotspace.org/vsc/observatory/telescopemakers/

If you want to hold of on astrophotograpy for a while, I recommend picking up a Dobsonian mount telescope. They're a low cost design, and you can find 10 and 12 inch reflectors for $800. Also, they're easy to build, which goes back to the building your own comment earlier.
Dobsonians are not suitable for photography though. But, they are a cheap way to break into backyard astronomy.

get an Apochromatic Refractor

[Janek Kozicki]

$1000 is not much. I've been doing research quite a long time on what should I buy, to get the best possible view both for planets and deep-sky. You know - usually for deeps skies a newton with huge mirrors is good, while they are not applicable for planets, because newtons cannot produce big magnification with enough detail. While for planet viewing the refractors are the best, because they can produce big magnifications without the distortions of newtonians. But refractors have too small aperture to collect enough light for comfortable deep-sky viewing.

The best balance in this big_mirror/refractor conflict is an apochromatic refractor. Because - apochromatic means that the lens are covered with special layers that give about 96+% of light transmission (so it's better than non-apochromatic refractor, where some light is wasted on the lens and you don't see deep-sky objects clearly), and special layer eliminates light dispersion like in an optical prism (otherwise each color would go on a different path and the resulting picture of something looked more like a rainbow instead of beight sharp). And also as a refractor it's good for planets. But... this APO refractor has to have big aperture, or it won't work for deep-sky anyway.

Refractors have some other advantages - for instance you don't have unnecessary air flow between the lens because they are inside a tube. Newtons are much brighter (good for deep-sky) but air turbulence blurries the view on planets.

Oh, and forget about cassegrains, they are compact, that's true (the only advantage). But the view is terrible.

Well if you have just $1000 you gotta decide: (1) want to see distant galaxies (newton), or (2) view to see planets (refractor). But I suggest to spend a bit more cash and get APO refractor. Should be good for both.

You can look at those reviews I had bookmarked long time ago: http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=1260 and http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?item_id=32&pr=2x6x17

You can consider Takahashi also, althought from my research it looks like TMB make better equipment, but you never know that for sure: http://www.tmboptical.com/itemsGrid.asp?cat_id=4 .

Re:get an Apochromatic Refractor

[Phroon]

$1000 is not much. I've been doing research quite a long time on what should I buy, to get the best possible view both for planets and deep-sky. You know - usually for deeps skies a newton with huge mirrors is good, while they are not applicable for planets, because newtons cannot produce big magnification with enough detail. While for planet viewing the refractors are the best, because they can produce big magnifications without the distortions of newtonians. But refractors have too small aperture to collect enough light for comfortable deep-sky viewing. The best balance in this big_mirror/refractor conflict is an apochromatic refractor.

You seem uninformed on the caveats of refractor vs. reflector designs. You have the basic ideas right, but your reasoning is a bit flawed, let me try. Refractors are a lensed design, the problem with lenses is that they do not bend all colors the same amount, that is their refractive index varies by wavelength. To correct this most telescopes use a achromatic doublet, which converges most colors except for the near purple end of the spectrum, resulting in a purple haze around the object your viewing. Recently the concept of an apochromatic has reached the consumer, in which a doublet or triplet with exotic glasses are used to focus much more of the visible spectrum than achromatic reflectors. This results in a perfect image with no obstructions in the objective (I'll get to this in a moment). However, the exotic glasses are extremely expensive, resulting in a small aperture for the money.

Reflectors, by contrast, are a mirrored design. Mirrors bend all light the same amount, so they do not have the chromatic problems. The issue with reflectors is that the secondary mirror has to be in the path of the light that hits the primary mirror, so there is a "shadow" of the secondary mirror and it's supports on the primary mirror. This does not create a hole in the image, but the secondary and it's supports do diffract light around them, resulting in stars that have a spike around them. The Hubble is a reflector design, and shares these diffraction spikes. Reflectors also suffer from coma distortion.

What it comes down to then is Aperture vs Obstructions. Aperture (the size of the primary focusing element): Reflectors have much larger apertures than similarly priced refractors. A higher aperture allows you to see darker of objects, it allows you to use a higher magnification and increases how much detail is present at higher magnifications.
Obstructions: These lower the amount of light getting to the primary mirror and cause diffraction in the image. The reduction in light is acceptable for reflectors as they have a large unobstructed aperture. The issue is diffraction with bright objects, mainly planets and stars. For stars, it simply causes a starburst pattern in the image, but for planets the diffraction of the circular secondary becomes important because planets are extended objects with details. With stars this circular diffraction simply increases the brightness of the sky surrounding the star, but for planets this slightly blurs the image of the planet which some feel is unacceptable.

The telescopes you've listed are in the $10,000 and above range, very far above the poster's $1000 budget. I couldn't even find a mounted 80mm semi-apo (the minimum aperture I'd suggest for planetary viewing, let alone deep sky) for under $1000. For sub-$1000, a reflector wins over a refractor hands down simply because there are no apos in this price range. The aperture of a reflector simply destroys the possible advantages an refractor in this range due to the chromatic aberration on planets, plus you can do deep sky observing with a sub-$1000 reflector and still be happy with the planets you can see.

Re:get an Apochromatic Refractor

[E-Lad]

This man speaks the truth.

Seriously, you want to learn the sky and the gear before you try photography. That's a whole different world.

First, like the parent of this post, I would also suggest a 10" Dobsonian telescope, specifically an Orion Inteliscope XT10. This scope will run you about $700 on average.

Second, while the XT10 or whatever scope you get will come with an eyepiece or two, you'll still want to invest in more eyepieces. Eyepieces comprise half of the telescope. Initially with your scope purchase, if it's a dobsonian, I would recommend a Televue 7mm Nagler.

Third, go to Home Depot, get a metal tool case (not a box... you want one of those briefcase things made by Husky) and start making a parts box to keep your eyepieces and other things in.

Fourth, get a red flashlight, a Planisphere, and a sky atlas. These, especially the red-light flashlight, are indispensable.

Fith, for extra credit, get a Telerad. You really wan to learn the sky? Try star-hopping with a Telerad. Telerads also make zeroing in on stuff easier. You use it to get your scope pointed in the correct general area, zero in on the object with the finder scope, and view through the eye piece. For me, It realy cut down the time spent getting the scope pointed in the right direction so I can see what I want throught the finder scope.

The above should start you out quite well, and be around your $1k budget.

You may come across filters. Since we're coming up on the winter sky, there's only one filter I would suggest getting and that's a triple ionized oxygen filter (O-III filter). This will make the Orion nebula just pop out of the sky at you... but filters like these are expensive. The 2" O-III filter from Baader is typically around $250.

Oh, and one thing about filters - even if all you have right now are 1.25" eyepices, buy the 2" filters. There's a 2"-1.25" focuser adapter you can get from Astro Physics that is threaded on the inside for 2" filters. What does this mean? It means that you should only have to buy 2" filtes regardless of what kind of eyepiece you're using... ergo, you don't need to waste money buying separate 1.25" and 2" sizes of the same filter.

Buy binoculars

[Uther Pendragon]

Seriously, get a good (as in buy them from a proper telescope shop) set of binoculars and a decent camera tripod.

Both are useful outside of astronomy and until you know whether you are really keen it's not worth spending lots of money. They are also great to use as spotters while you are using your real telescope as they have a fantastic field of view.

I started with a pair of Gerber 10x50s which is getting to the limit of what I would consider comfortable to hand hold without a tripod. The tripod itself is a standard camera tripod with a binocular mounting bracket.

Then start out with something simple like: http://www.skymaps.com/downloads.html to see what you should be looking at in the sky and getting familiar with the sky.

Once you are happy that astronomy is right for you just have a go at lots of different telescopes that your local astronomy club members use and see what you like. Astronomy is a very expensive hobby, one that you might not like so just be careful

If you only have $1000.....

[Anonymous Coward]

A lot of people will say 'start with a decent pair of binoculars'.

I am not so sure. That's right if you're going to get into the hobby in a big way, but your problem may be that you don't know enough about the hobby to be sure. If that's the case, you really need to try it first. No advice is as good as personal experience.

There are hundreds of advice sites on the web - many very good and put together by experts. I also got the astrophotography bug, and thought I would see what I could do for about $250. I was quite surprised to find that you could do quite a bit, and you really understand what the big boy sites mean after you work on it yourself.

I went for a small, cheap, entry-level reflector, a Meade 4 1/2 inch, which I got from CostCo for $200, and made a lot of accessories myself. It will never be as good as the big boys, but I have learned enough for me to know what to get next if I want to progress with the hobby, and the scope is light, good enough for Moon work, or can be sold if I want. And I've had lots of fun!

So I think I have done well getting a telescope which a real hobbyist would turn their nose up at. I am just putting a web site together to describe it, but if it will help I'll put the (unfinished) site up now for you. It's at http://www.telescopes.hobby-site.org/ and I can recommend the 'Remote Focusser' under 'Making Accessories'!

check out the specialist internet groups

[petes_PoV]

There are many astro (and astro-photo) yahoogroups.

They are well versed in helping beginners and will be able to give you advice and guidance on this fascinating hobby. They have their own experts who don't necessarily post here.

As a starter, get the book "Turn Left at Orion". Read it. This will set your expectations of what you can really see. If you are still enthusiastic, go ahead and take advice on what equipment to buy. Be aware though that there are as many opposing opinions as there are people willing to offer you advice (including this one). You will still have to choose which ones you want to adopt.

Good luck and clear skies

Budget too small

[Cecil]

You're not going to have enough budget to pull off any sort of astrophotography that will satisfy you, so I would recommend you start saving up.

For astrophotography you absolutely *must* have an equatorial mount, it is simply impossible to do astrophotography with a stock altitude-azimuth mount, because while it can still track the sky as it moves, the view will rotate as it does so. With an equatorial mount, the view stays properly aligned even while it tracks the sky. German equatorial mount is the preferred mount for astrophotography. Even looking at just the mount you've pretty much blown your budget right there.

Secondly, you're going to want a high quality right-ascension drive motor. It's possible to get by without one, though tedious and limiting, but don't bother with a cheap one. The gearing is insufficient for astrophotography and will cause jerking and backlash resulting in awful pictures.

You'll also need to get a heavy duty mount and tripod, because a normal tripod is only designed for the weight of a telescope, not a telescope with a camera hanging off the end. You also need to make sure you've got a very sturdy, firm mount, because any vibration at all will ruin your pictures. Remember we're talking about huge magnifications and long exposures here, it's extremely easy to blur the pictures. Astrophotography is a challenging enough hobby to begin with. Inferior equipment can make it damn near impossible.

You'll notice I haven't even talked about the actual telescope yet. That's how important the mount and tripod is to astrophotography. So now that I've completely blown your budget, I'll try and be a bit more gentle on the telescope side of things. Probably the most bang for your buck in this case will be a newtonian reflector telescope. They're by far the cheapest type of scope per inch of aperture. Sort of big and unwieldy, and they require very precise and regular maintenance (called collimation). I'd recommend a bare minimum of 5" aperture, but as high as 8" if you can manage it.

Then you have to figure out how to mount your camera to the telescope, which is a black art in and of itself. Duct tape is not recommended. For most SLRs and telescope brands you can find a suitable T-mount adaptor which will allow you to attach your camera in place of the telescope's eyepiece. For non-SLRs, I'm not sure. If you were thinking of getting an actual astronomy CCD camera (such as the popular SBIG brand) well that alone will blow your budget and then a whole lot more. Then you'll want a second one to use it as an autoguider. :)

Astronomy isn't cheap, but it is rewarding. Good luck and clear skies.

Re:Budget too small

[dargaud]

Secondly, you're going to want a high quality right-ascension drive motor. It's possible to get by without one, though tedious and limiting, but don't bother with a cheap one. The gearing is insufficient for astrophotography and will cause jerking and backlash resulting in awful pictures. I'm not sure if this really applies anymore. Nowadays with a digital SLR attached you can take short exposures (just a few minutes) where the defects in alignment and stability won't show, and then stack the images in software. As an introduction to astrophoto it beats blowing thousands on an arch-stable mount.

Re:Budget too small

[Lumpy]

Incorrect.

I shot many MANY photos including long exposures with a dobsonian scope and a tracking table. Less than $1000.00 spent on scope and table. It moves the whole scope as one with the sky and if you follow directions it is set up polar so it works well.

Do I shoot incredibly dim deep sky objects? nope I only have a old SLR digital and a 10" dob, not enough light collecting capability for the distant stuff. But i got photos of the horsehead and other nebulas that upset the guys at the club that have a $15,000 scope setup for photography.

Re:Why not binoculars first?

[Starwanderer]

Yes, entry level. A lot of amateur astronomers have ground their own mirror for their first telescope. It's not a difficult thing to do at all, although I'm sure it might sound as if it would be to someone who hasn't done it.

Lets see....

[Ecuador]

I was an amateur astronomer for years before I switched to being just a computer geek (no dark skies where I live now). However, even if my Messier-marathon nights are over, I think I can still give some good advice. So, let us start with equipment. Since you really don't know what you are mostly interested in viewing, I would say get a 6" - 8" Newtonian reflector with a decent equatorial mount (you can find deals for much less than $1000), or if you want to stretch your budjet you could get a more compact Schmidt Cassegrain (again 6"-8" aperture). Go for either Celestron or Meade (with the latter probably being better but more expensive). This type of telescope will provide a rich viewing experience, for both planetary and deep space targets. It is also astrophotography ready (computerized or motor equatorial drives are usually standard).
So, at first I recommend "testing the waters" for astrophotography. Find a cheap, old, mechanican Canon, Minolta etc SLR. Start with that, and if you are still interested you can invest to a CCD camera in the future.
I can't recommend books, since been such a long time, except Stars and Planets by Peterson Field Guides which was a nice reference and gets updated once in a while. I was a fan of the Astronomy magazine for years. Sky & Telescope was also decent, you should certainly pick one of those up.
I have also skipped the part about telescope accessories, but I do have to go to sleep now, so you'll have to do with the included eyepieces for now... ;)

dobson: newtonian reflector on dobsonian mount

[Janek Kozicki]

Just a clarification, so you can compare what I'm talking about in my other post. A dobson is a newtonian reflector (has a huge mirror, and good brightness) with a dobsonian mount. Dobsonian mount is the cheapest possible. You cannot adjust it to the ecliptic plane, etc. Also such dobson is quite good for deep-sky (big mirror = big brightness), and terrible for planets (blurry view on high magnifications due to airflow turbulences and cannot track planet moevement on the sky due to cheap dosbon mount). Personally I'd advice against dobson, because after the initial enthusisam wears down, you get tired by the unconfortability of working with dobson mount. It's like using debian 4 years ago (eg. woody release) compared with comfort of using kubuntu today ;) So get a better mount if you can. But that's expensive too. Oh well, if you can't spend more than that $1000 you gotta buy just binoculars.

Re:dobson: newtonian reflector on dobsonian mount

[jamie]

I agree with basically all of what you're saying except the last sentence. It sounds like the person asking the question hasn't spent a lot of time looking at the stars and doesn't really know if it's going to turn into an occasional night out having fun or a serious time investment. For such a person, spending a few nights with a decent no-frills Dobsonian reflector finding celestial objects themselves will tell them how much they love the sky. If it turns out they really love it, they can invest thousands later in something computerized and motorized that points the scope for them and tracks the Earth's rotation -- maybe camera-ready, probably a Cassegrain.

If you thought you maybe liked to draw, you probably wouldn't drop $4000 right off on a fast computer with a big screen, Photoshop, and a graphics tablet. You'd start with a good set of pencils and lots of paper, and first find out how much you really liked it.

An 8" no-frills Dobsonian runs $500 (the Orion SkyQuest XT8 is what I'm looking at) and can be found at most hobby shops. If you have less than $1000 I think that's an excellent start, certainly much better than binoculars. It's a real amateur telescope, better than what most amateurs had in the first half of the 20th century I guess -- and our sky's the same as theirs :)

The main thing I would add is to never buy a cheap refractor, they're basically binoculars on a stick... and never buy a telescope in a mall!

Celestia

[lobotomir]

I would also recommend Celestia, because in addition to simulating the night sky it lets you "travel" to points of interests -- the planets and nearby stars, so you can view them from different angles. Lively modding community around that one, too.

I went through the same thing

[Phroon]

I went through the same thing. I was fresh to amateur astronomy and didn't know what to do. My first warning: Don't spend to little on a telescope. $180 for a StarBlast is the lowest I'd pay for anything decent (and it is, I drool over it as a quick 'plop down and observe' scope from time to time). Second Warning: Astrophotography is insanely expensive. As in 10+ times your budget. Don't do it. If you really want to do astrophotography take a camera, put it on a tripod, point at the sky, set it as wide as you can and expose for 15 seconds for digital, a few hours for film. The results are quite nice.

Here's what my own experiences have taught me: Get a Dobsonian. With $1000 you can get a 10"-12" Dobsonian and still have tons of room for accessories. A dobsonian is very portable compared to a refractor and with near zero setup and takedown using it is much easier than a refractor too. 10" is a lot of aperture and you won't catch the "aperture fever" for something bigger for a while. The scope I eventually got is an Orion XT10 Intelliscope, but you may not want the computerization with your budget.

I found the people at Cloudy Nights very, very helpful. They have reviews of lots of products as well as their forums and they tend to specialize in getting the most out of your money.

As far as books go, I use Nightwatch by Terence Dickinson every night I observe just for the charts. Star Watch by Philip Harrington goes well with Nightwatch as good place to find new objects for the beginner. A lot of people suggest Turn Left at Orion, but I fount it to be a bit slow and the charts lacking in lower magnitude stars for their size.

Re:I went through the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

Nonsense! The digital revolution has dropped the price considerably!

I work in GB Pounds, so I'll assume the budget is GBP500.

Simple web-cam astrophotography can be done with a cam costing about 5 GBP. It's good enough for the Moon and Jupiter/Saturn if you match it up with a cheap 114mm costing around GBP 120. You will get prety good images close to the terminator, and a lot of practice in using your hardware and stacking software.

You will need a laptop to store the images on - If you haven't got one get a cheap one off e-bay; perhaps GBP150?

The one thing this will impress on you is the importance of a good mount. If you can't point at it, you can't take a picture of it! A cheap scope won't have a good mount, but it'll be good enough. You will need remote control, mainly so that you don't have to touch the scope when taking the images.

Once you have determined that the hobby is for you, get a CCD webcam. That will be about 50GBP, and will be good enough to start to show the failings in your scope/mount.

That's cost you about GBP175 - GBP350 if you count the laptop. Well under budget, and you're taking pictures. You could have gone for twice the price on the scope, but I would recommend staying cheap until you know what you're getting.

Re:I went through the same thing

[Anonymous Coward]

I have been involved in amateur astronomy for almost 20 years, and was going to suggest this very thing. A dobsonian telescope is good for beginners for many reasons.

1) you don't get stuck with a cheap department store tripod that is shaky and hard to set up
2) you learn how to 'track' through the sky to get to specific objects
3) it is very portable - Mine fit in the back seat of the car
4) it is fast to set up - less than 1 minute
5) as small as 6 inch mirror allows for good viewing - I've watched the storm on Jupiter with a 6" dob

My advice - look for a 6-8" Dob, ask at your astronomy club - many, like RASC here in Canada, have rental for members.
Do some research into optics so you know what you are looking for when it comes to purchasing eyepieces - they can be expensive, and while a salesman may extoll the virtues of a 5 mm eyepiece, the apeture is so small it may turn you off at first.

Download a list of Messier objects and start looking. Get a star chart and learn the constellations - it may seem daunting at first, but it is actually fairly easy once you start associating things you've 'seen' first hand in them.

Purchase a red led flashlight for moving around in the dark, or making adjustments to your scope - the red light does not destroy your night vision. When pulling into an observing area, drive with headlights out and parking lights on to not interfere with others observing or destroying their night vision.

If you use a laptop in the field, set a theme using red layouts.

and have fun - you will see some amazing things - maybe not Hubble quality, but those are enhances for public consumption - and the real thing can be awesome. My first glimpse of Saturn in a scope was a disaster - I could not see it clearly because my eyes kept tearing up - it was that beautiful.

Have fun.

Re:A Great Camera?

[Registered Coward v2]

Personally, if I had the kind of space you had, with no light pollution, and if I had the budget you mentioned: I would buy a high quality digital SLR camera. Obviously, if you're looking to photograph things that you need a telescope to see, this wouldn't be a good use of money for you. But, if you're looking to take shots of constellations and the moon and such, then a high-quality digital SLR with a tripod will work beautifully.

A good dSLR can be had for under $500 (Canon 350d/d40) new or even less used (KEH.com and fredmiranda.com (Buy & Sell forum) are good sources) and quality tripods start at $100.

That leaves the choice of lens - whatever you buy if you decide to go the camera / tripod route invest in a really good lens - it's better to buy a $300 body and a $700 lens then vice versa since your glass has a greater impact on picture quality than MP's and you'll want fast glass (the ability to shot at faster shutter speeds in low light). Your investment will pay off over time since the lens will stay with you when you get a new body. Don't get all wrapped up in MP - anything 6mp or above is more than adequate for virtually any shoot. Don't worry about the endless Canon / Nikon fanboy debates - both are great systems so pick one that you like, meets your needs and fits your budget; realizing that you investment in lens will pretty much result in a lock to one manufacturer.

I'd recommend holding of on a purchase until you attend a club meeting or too - you'll get advice there as well as a chance to talk about what you want to do and learn about other's rigs before you invest.

Re:A Great Camera?

[falconwolf]

Personally, if I had the kind of space you had, with no light pollution, and if I had the budget you mentioned: I would buy a high quality digital SLR camera. Obviously, if you're looking to photograph things that you need a telescope to see, this wouldn't be a good use of money for you. But, if you're looking to take shots of constellations and the moon and such, then a high-quality digital SLR with a tripod will work beautifully.

To stay within budget and get good exposures of the night sky, stars and planets, it's better to get a 35 mm film camera. Then get a mount along with the telescope, using the mount the camera can be attached to the telescope. Someone at Astronomy.com asks for advise on getting a camera and mount for $500. Here's an adapter and mounts for different cameras for less than $100. If there is already a camera then several hundred dollars is available for the telescope. However if a camera is needed as well, one can be bought for $300 leaving $600 for the telescope. Oh, and a high quality dslr won't fit in that budget, for astrophotography and high quality a fullframe DSLR is where it's at. And the cheapest fullframe DSLR I know of is the Canon EOS 5D which retails for about $3000.

Though I haven't spent much tyme researching it, I have done some because I'm interested in astrophotography myself. I've got the 35mm and have been looking at telescopes, unfortunately I live in a brightly lit city and know of no place where I can go to shoot the stars.

Falcon

Re:Why not binoculars first?

[tom17]

I just spent the last hour or so googling and investigating this since his comment. I love making stuff so this intreagued me.

There is plenty of stuff out there about it. Basically you start from a blank piece of plate glass or Pyrex (or portals it seems) and you make yourself the 'tool'- The tool is a convex shaped lump usually with small porcelain tiles on the working surface (A glass tool was traditionally used but this means using a second blank just for that so making your porcelain tiled tool is cheaper for the DIYer). The tool is made using the glass blank as a mould to get the approximate curvature for the tool correct.

Then with the 'tool' you work through differing grades of carbide grinding pastes, then aliminium oxide paste until you get the curve close. Then for the polishing, you cover the tool in optical grade pitch (a gooey stuff from trees or something), and then use fine polishing compound that I have forgotten the name of.

Then you need to get the glass coated in a suitably reflective surface, usually aluminium it seems.

2 things that bug me about this. (Things I did not work out before getting back to work)

1. How do you make the 'tool' curved on a flat blank. I assume you need to do the rough cut first and I did not find anything about this.
2. Depositing the aluminium is apparently done by specialists with vacuum chambers, thus taking it out of the DIY realm. This bothers me. I don't mind buying premade blanks but it'd be nice if all the processes could be DIY.

I'm sure there are easy to find answers to those 2 points but I will find them if I ever try to make one myself - an intreaguing prospect when I have a house.

Re:A Great Camera?

[ookabooka]

TouCam is dirt cheap and perfect for entry level astrophotography. Just google around, there's lots of literature on modifying/using the camera. I myself have taken some nice pictures of jupiter and moon(with filter) using a Toucam and 114mm maksutov-newtonian telescope. After you capture a video w/ the camera you can boot up registax to process it and make a compilation of multiple video frames for a nice still image. If you want to go for imaging deep objects like M31 or other galaxies, you will probably need to invest in a "real" astrophotography CCD.

One of the many sites about the TouCam
Registax

Re:A Great Camera?

[De Lemming]

And if you want to go this far, here are some articles on modding your digital SLR for use in astronomy (noise reduction for longer exposure times by cooling the CMOS imaging chip, removal of the infrared filter,...). I've not done this myself, so YMMV.

300D Peltier Modification
Canon Digital Rebel 300D IR Filter Removal Modification and Peltier Cooling Plans -by Gary Honis

Re:A Great Camera?

[KarMann]

...the latest version of 'registax' - it's free (beer or speech - i can't remember)....

As in beer, FYI.

What the heck, here's the link, while I'm at it.

From the point of view of someone who did the same

[Anonymous Coward]

Hi,

I did the same thing as you basically... Looked at setting myself up for some decent observing. Many posts before me have already said this but here are the key things I would do in your position:

1.) Don't buy a telescope (yet!). Most amateurs are given this advice but ignore it and go out and get a telescope straight away. If you don't really know what you are in for then you will a.) be disappointed and b.) Not get anywhere near the best out of your scope.

2.) Join an astro club. You already have so that is cool! You will get to use telescopes there and learn how to properly operated and observe using them. They may also have an astrograph for astrophotography as well. You can use this with a simple SLR that has an open shutter or unlimited exposure time setting. You will be amazed at what sort of cool pictures you can get without needing any fancy equipment early on. The astro club guys should also be able to tell you how to get the pictures developed because that is almost as important as the taking of the picture!

3.) Buy a pair binoculars. A pair of 10x50's will do but if you want to spend a bit more there are plenty of other options. I have a pair of 9x60 Celestron bino's which are brilliant. They cost a bit more (not much) but they are excellent for observing. Don't go to crazy with size. To big and you will struggle to hold them steady. 10x50's work really well.

4.) Learn how to navigate round the sky. With Bino's and naked eyes this is MUCH easier than a telescope. Get some software to help you get bearings. I use Starry Night (http://www.starrynight.com/products.html)which I find good, although later versions were a let down. As others have stated, there are plenty of free options, but many of them are not as good as the cheap commercial products for actual observing. There are plenty of websites as well that provide up to date skymaps as well.

5.) Once you have spent time observing with the club and their scopes and your binos, look at getting a telescope. Do some research as there are tonnes of options. Basic rule I found was if you want to look at the solar system and planets get a refractor, if you want to do deep space stuff get a reflector. Remember its not the tube that does the magnifying, its the eye piece so eye piece selection as very important as well. Very very basic rule... There are tonnes of options and types of scope. But you DONT want to get a small toy one like a 90mm job. You need to spend at least $700 on your scope I'd say. Ask your club for advice on this one! If you want to do astrophotography, get a scope that you can mount a camera to and a tripod that can have a drive motor attached.

6.) Buy yourself a drive motor and camera mount for your scope and take your own photo's!

Hope this helps!

James

Non budget-breaker suggestions

[baldeagle21b]

Either a Meade ETX or a small Newtonian on a equatorial mount for the scope. Either one will give you a motor-driven imaging platform that you need for any kind of astrophotography. For a camera suggestion, if you have a notebook computer, an inexpensive webcam ($115 or so), and a free program called Registax will get you into lunar and planetary photography without breaking the bank.

Re:A Great Camera?

[Starwanderer]

unfortunately I live in a brightly lit city and know of no place where I can go to shoot the stars

Try http://www.darksky.org/darksky/. Click on Dark Sky Finder version 3 and input your coordinates. It will show you the dark sky sites closest to you.

Re:Is there an "entry-level" for radio astronomy?

[Tastecicles]

A scanner capable of picking up along the 20cm band is a good start; this is the hydrogen band (H1) most commonly used in array radio astronomy for plotting the positions of strong radio sources. With a directional antenna such as a satellite dish it is possible to pinpoint "local" sources such as the sun and nearby microwave sources (such as ovens and wifi hotspots). Radio static is an indicator of background radiation from the Big Bang; analysis of this white noise is still keeping radio astronomers busy since its discovery.

Re:Why not binoculars first?

[Lumpy]

You can get a quality scope that will WOW you for far less than that. Orion Skyquest X10 classic. 10" Dobsonian that blows away everyone that looks in it for $550. Go up to 12" and kick the crud out of almost all Cassegrain scopes for $870 and get something that can blind you by looking at the moon! it has fantastic quality all over it. and YES I have taken photographs with it. no not long exposure but then that's advanced and not entry level like the question asked.

For a grand I can set someone up for basic entry level easily out of an orion catalog. That is where he needs to start. and he also needs to stay away from anything smaller than 8" primary mirror size.

Oh if it's a refractor telescope, dont touch it. Short of professional 6 figure versions I never looked through a refractor scope that was worth it's weight in scrap aluminum.

Re:A Great Camera?

[frenetic_wimp]

No point in buying a fullframe DSLR for astrophotography. Reduced frame gives you a blow-up factor, meaning you can get better shots with shorter lenses. Seriously, how often do you need ultra wide angle field of view when photographing the night sky? And how often do you wish you had a lens just _that_ bit longer? For the price of a 5D ($2,500) you can get a 40D _and_ a 400mm f/5.6 L lens. Throw in a 1.4x teleconverter and you have a ~900 mm equivalent camera system - nice for moon shots etc. For stars & such you should forget about conventional lenses and look at telescope mounting systems instead.

Good binoculars, star charts, and a red flashlight

[mikehoskins]

I read in an astronomy magazine that a budding astronomer should first buy a high powered pair of binoculars (10mm x 50mm) and star charts, plus a red LED flashlight.

That way, you get used to pointing out where things are in constellations. You also find out if you can handle the long nights, getting your eyes used to darkness and waiting, waiting, waiting.

It takes about an hour to get used to the darkness. Red LED flashlights also keep your eyes dilated, having little effect on night vision.

If you get good at doing things the "old-fashioned way", then buy from somebody on EBay, who spent the big bucks and found out they weren't as interested as they originally thought.

Worst case, you got a good pair of binoculars and saved about a grand.

Best case, you learned a lot more about astronomy and will be able to find anything by constellation.

Of course, download and use Stellarium. They have a red night vision mode you can take with you on a laptop. (I'd still recommend dimming the display as much as possible and enabling a 1 minute monitor shutdown, to keep your eyes).

Also, go to http://heavens-above.com/ for more information about tracking objects in the sky. (Be sure to synchronize your clock to the atomic clock, since satellites and other objects wait for nobody). Watching satellites pass is a good way to keep yourself interested in astronomy, while you wait, wait, wait.

Heavens-above.com and Stellarium are excellent planning tools, as are your handy star charts.

astrophotography

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd suggest you check the forums at http://www.dpreview.com/ for any questions in astrophotography, or photography in general.

First get into astronomy, then astrophotography

[jalex0]

My advice - learn the sky first. There's tons to see, and you'll need practice finding it. If you've been interested in astronomy, maybe you already have used binoculars (which is a good start) to scan the sky. If you're in a hurry and want to get your first telescope, I'll give the advice that was given to me -- get a Dobsonian reflector. Dobs are very easy to set up, don't require alignment, and are generally lighter (important if you're planning on carrying your scope). The downside is that you have to manually track what you're looking at, and simply can't do astrophotography. As many people have said, you'll have a hard time getting a good telescope with a good mount with a drive system for under $1000. What you can do is spend ~$500 on something like the Orion SkyQuest XT8 Intelliscope (that's what I have and I love it), use it for a while (maybe a couple years depending on how frequently you take it out) and get to know the night sky, then when you've saved up that $1000 again in your astronomy budget, get a nice equatorial mount for it with a drive system, put some rings on the tube and attach it to the mount instead of the Dobs base. Oh, and order a Barlow lens along with the scope. Also, I really enjoy having a solar filter - why limit your telescope to night use??

The time you spend learning the sky with your Dobs will also help you decide if you want to spend the extra money for the fancy mount, camera, etc.

One thing I'll point out that may be blindingly obvious to some, but comes as a surprise to others... for the most part, images in your telescope appear in black-and-white to the naked eye. There simply isn't enough light for your eye to detect color. Once you get a spiffy camera and that fancy mount, the longer exposure pictures will get you all the color you want.

Re:Good binoculars, star charts, and a red flashli

[dumb_jedi]

I'm an amateur astronomer myself and Mike's advice is perfect. Astrophotography is addicitive, but needs planning and patience. As I assume you don't own an telescope yet, my advice is to buy a good binocular. If you still want to buy an telescope, buy a cheap ( not cheapo ) one, around US$ 250, with EQUATORIAL mount, that's VERY important. Get used to it, learn what you like the most to observe ( deep-sky objects, planets, moon, variable stars, nebula ), learn how to align your telescope so it can track the sky movement's. Then borrow from someone an old SLR camera, with film. Yes, that's right, not a digital one. Couple in your telescope ( you'll need an adapter ) and read some FAQs, ask help from your astronomy club and play with the settings, see how they change the result. You can use a webcam for that too, and some software like Registrax to stack the pictures, the result is amazing! After you get to know the dirty details, you'll know what's the best equipment to buy, the best DSLR camera. One tip: it's not about the camera or the telescope. I've seen AMAZING pictures taken with an old SLR with a home-made refractor telescope, mounted on a US$ 500 mount. It's about the MOUNT, spare no expense here. Spend 1000 on a mount and 200 on a telescope, you'll get GREAT pictures. Dark skies for you!

Re:Good binoculars, star charts, and a red flashli

[frdmfghtr]

That's all very good advice.

I've take to using my binoculars more than my telescope. While I don't get the aperture with the binoculars, I do get the ease of instant set-up time and a wide field of view so I can see not only the various objects in the sky, but also the star field around them.

The wide field of view helps you learn the sky too. You get the big picture when learning what is what up in the sky, which makes finding things easier down the road with a telescope.

Another little tidbit--don't be so quick to use the "Go To" function all the time. Star-hopping from point to point will help you learn the sky's landmarks, how to use and control your telescope, and you might come across something that you have never seen before (think driving across country and discovering sights that you would miss in an airplane).

Re:Good binoculars, star charts, and a red flashli

[OwnedByTwoCats]

One of my earliest astronomical memories (aside from the shows at the local planetarium) was standing on a friend's driveway just after dusk. He says to me, pointing at a bright point of light against the rapidly darkening sky, "hey, I bet that's Saturn". He ducks into the garage, and drags out a 8-ish inch reflector telescope his dad had made. He lines it up, adjusts the focus, looks, and then invites me to have a look. Boom, there it is. Just like in all the picture books, only live, in front of my eyes.

So look at the planets through your scope. It should be bright enough to resolve any of the naked-eye visible planets as discs. You should be able to see the phases of Venus.

On my desk I have a picture of Comet Hale-Bopp. I took it with a 35mm film camera, with a 100-200 mm zoom lens set all the way out. Tripod, Kodacolor Gold color film (although there isn't any color in the print.) I thought I would want to take more astro-photographs, but haven't gotten around to it yet.

Re:A Great Camera?

[emaname]

Registered Coward's advice about attending a meeting or two is spot on. Actually, you should join the club and attend on a regular basis. This will give you a chance to see what other people are using and doing. This is really important. If you have the impression that you're going to set up a camera and start capturing a bunch of beautiful, full-color images of nebulae and globular clusters and galaxies, think again.

For 30 years, I was a key-holding member of a group that has several scopes with an observatory on a parcel of land on a small hill in the country. The premier instrument is a 16-inch Cassegrain with some great optics in a really nice building with a dome. For several years, I ran the public viewing nights. The things that impressed people the most were the Moon, Jupiter, Saturn, Mars, and several open and globular clusters. Nebulae and galaxies all appear as very indistinct objects. The first time someone looks through a telescope at something like the Andromeda galaxy, they find it a bit disappointing. It's just a vague, hazy, blue blob.

Doing photography requires an enormous amount of patience and excellent equipment especially if you intend to do any deep-sky stuff. Deep sky will require long exposures and a good deal of guiding. I was successful in getting several shots of Andromeda and a few nebulae. I also have several shots of Jupiter and a bunch of the moon. Nothing that would ever get publish.

My point is again, Reg Coward's advice is on target. First look at some things in the night sky. Get a sense for what you can do and understand what the results might be. In combination with the advice you get from the club members, you'll have a good idea about what to buy.

And if you live in the northern climate, I'd spend about $1000 on ways to stay warm or keeping mosquitoes off you.

The Second Thing I'd do..then 3rd..then 4th...

[Liquidrage]

Is whatever scope you get, get a Telrad for it. A Telrad is a zero reflex finder. It lets you point the scope with your eyes open looking through a non-magnified view with a projected set of concentric circles on your target. Even with a Goto mount, the Telrad is what I would call a necessity.

My experience went from a few seasons of frustration, to actually being able to easily find deep space objects and planets in the scope, the moment I got a Telrad.

Also, concerning software, Cartes du Ciel is a freeware astronomy program that is very robust and probably the most common outside of Stary Night.

My advice for a purchase it perhaps an Orion ED 80 on a Sirus goto mount. You'll crack just over a grand, but it's a quality set up the price. It's not a Tak sitting on a Losmandy, but it'll work.
Another option, especially for the photography part, would be to try and find a Meade SN-8 OTA used. You can't get the OTA alone brand new. And still get the Sirus mount.
The Atlas EQ-G mount is perhaps the best bang for the buck in astronomy, but that's about $1,500 by itself. The Sirus is it's little brother.

For best results you're also going to need to guide your scope taking the pictures. So you'll need to mount a second guide scope, or use what they call an off-axis guider. The first option is preferred. And it gives you the option of manual guiding, or getting a second imager, and autoguding.

My last little bit of advice. Typically, dedicated CCD imagers work better then dSLRs for astrophotography. I use a a couple of different Canon dSLR's and you can get the job done with them. Though you're not going to be able to get some targets well unless you get them modified to remove the IR filters they come with. The Meade DSI Pro can be found right now for about $100. And at that price is a super bargian.

Be warned, it's an expensive hobby. As I've said before, astronomy is a hobby where free software abounds, yet a simple 2" long piece piece of 2" machined tubing will cost you $100. The tech side of it is free. Everything from planetarium software, to focusing software, to control software can be found free. But the

Re:Why not binoculars first?

[szyzyg]

Oh you are more than a littel harsh with refractors..... I use mine for imaging and the tube (sans mount) costs $200 from Orion's catalogue. Sure you get less aperture for your money, but you also have to deal with fewer alignment issues and it has a lot less coma than reflectors (unless you want to spend $$$ on a paracorr).

Re:A Great Camera?

[ceoyoyo]

Digital has a HUGE advantage over film in almost all areas of astrophotography. It's well worth getting a DSLR. You don't need full frame (for telescopic use full frame is fairly useless because the edges of the field in most telescopes are quite degraded). You can get an older model DSLR for less than what you'd spend the first year in film and processing.

The real advantage of digital is sensitivity. Digital sensors capture a LOT more of the light than film does. Much of that sensitivity is swamped by noise, but if you take multiple exposures and stack them you reduce that noise, revealing faint objects. Stacking frames with film, besides being very difficult, isn't very useful because with film's lower sensitivity what you see is more or less what you get.

You'd be far better off with a DSLR and no telescope than with a film camera and a telescope.

The one exception I've found is star trails. I've still got my film SLR and it's unbeatable for that kind of shot. Long exposures you can't stack are still much easier with film.