Greg Campbell
EF5
There are a wide variety of camera adapters out there. You can hook up a small digicam or USB web cam to most decen scopes, and can use heavier film/digital SLR bodies with a more solidly mounted equipment.
IMO, you can't buy anything worth having for under ~200 bucks. Avoid at all cost the cheap Tasco class junk. If in doubt, check the mount. If it isn't solid and stable, the scope will be completely unusable, whatever optics are in it.
I'm very much Old School. Give me a dobsonian, a good sky atlas, and time to chill out and enjoy the sky. I greatly enjoy the relaxed star hopping method of observing; you'll find what you're looking for soon enough, and often encounter pleasant surprises along the way. To have the scope poop out a view on command is like fly fishing with dynamite - completely beside the point. The whirring, chirping, grinding 'goto' scopes are for lame brained Mercedes driving doctors with more $ than common sense.
GPS, Goto, Voice Command (No, I'm not kidding. "Goto M42." LAME!
) are just marketing gimmicks, IMO. Yea, I'm a grumpy old fart!
FWIW, I've got a 10" dob, and have just acquired an 18" pyrex blank for a 'big eye' project. We have a complete optics fab shop at work so I can use a powered overarm machine to hog out the glass and rough polish the figure, saving gobs of time, not to mention my back.
Be forewarned: Aperture Fever is incurable....
Opinion aside, you can spend the majority of your money on optics or on the mount, or you can try to find some middle ground. For visual observing, aperture rules - get the bigest dob you can afford. An motorized equatorial mount is obviously required if you want to do guided photography. No worries if that's your goal, but make sure you know what you really want before buyng.
The classic suggestion is to attend a star party or two. Get there early, while it's still light, and ask folks about their scopes. Most are happy to show a noob what they've got. Later, you can observe a wide variety of objects with everything from 20x70 binocs to a not uncommon 18~20" light bucket. Take notes and compare the views, the cost of the equipment, the hassle of transporting and setting up each sort of rig, etc.
Quad Cities Astronomical Society/
http://home.mchsi.com/~qcas/
Scope reviews.
http://www.cloudynights.com/
http://www.weatherman.com/
http://www.scopereviews.com/index.html
Enjoy the night sky, it's gorgeous!
-Greg
IMO, you can't buy anything worth having for under ~200 bucks. Avoid at all cost the cheap Tasco class junk. If in doubt, check the mount. If it isn't solid and stable, the scope will be completely unusable, whatever optics are in it.
I'm very much Old School. Give me a dobsonian, a good sky atlas, and time to chill out and enjoy the sky. I greatly enjoy the relaxed star hopping method of observing; you'll find what you're looking for soon enough, and often encounter pleasant surprises along the way. To have the scope poop out a view on command is like fly fishing with dynamite - completely beside the point. The whirring, chirping, grinding 'goto' scopes are for lame brained Mercedes driving doctors with more $ than common sense.
FWIW, I've got a 10" dob, and have just acquired an 18" pyrex blank for a 'big eye' project. We have a complete optics fab shop at work so I can use a powered overarm machine to hog out the glass and rough polish the figure, saving gobs of time, not to mention my back.
Be forewarned: Aperture Fever is incurable....
Opinion aside, you can spend the majority of your money on optics or on the mount, or you can try to find some middle ground. For visual observing, aperture rules - get the bigest dob you can afford. An motorized equatorial mount is obviously required if you want to do guided photography. No worries if that's your goal, but make sure you know what you really want before buyng.
The classic suggestion is to attend a star party or two. Get there early, while it's still light, and ask folks about their scopes. Most are happy to show a noob what they've got. Later, you can observe a wide variety of objects with everything from 20x70 binocs to a not uncommon 18~20" light bucket. Take notes and compare the views, the cost of the equipment, the hassle of transporting and setting up each sort of rig, etc.
Quad Cities Astronomical Society/
http://home.mchsi.com/~qcas/
Scope reviews.
http://www.cloudynights.com/
http://www.weatherman.com/
http://www.scopereviews.com/index.html
Enjoy the night sky, it's gorgeous!
-Greg
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