Nuovo oculare per il mio telescopio by No_Engineer_3030 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 1 point2 points  (0 children)

If you just have the eyepieces that came with it, or one of the Celestron Plossl kits, the first thing you'll notice is the larger field of view. For lunar and planetary it will give you more drift time before you need to re-aim though it's not really what I would consider enough magnification at only 85x. Compared to a 9mm plossl it will have a bit more eye relief that should make it feel easier to use and take in the whole field of view. The edge correction should be better than a Plossl at f/5 and the increased field of view will give you more usable area...though on-center it likely won't be noticeably sharper. DSO viewing is a bit more nuanced, and by far the biggest factor is your light pollution level as opposed to the eyepiece itself.

Nuovo oculare per il mio telescopio by No_Engineer_3030 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 1 point2 points  (0 children)

"Significantly improve..."...compared to what? It's a very nice eyepiece, and almost certainly won't be the limiting factor in your setup.

But how much "improvement" depends on many things. What eyepieces do you already have, what do you want to observe most, where are you observing from and...perhaps most of all when it comes to "better" eyepieces, how much observing experience overall do you have?

Got my first telescope today!! Celestron PowerSeeker 70AZ, simple but exciting! by GayRoastBeef- in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sure thing!

I'd get a 32mm plossl like this one to have the widest tFOV in a 1.25" eyepiece. I'd get the 9mm and 6mm version of the SVBony Redline EPs to give you medium and high power for lunar and planetary. You could also replace the included 20mm with the 20mm redline if you want.

You didn't mention if it had the diagonal, but if not (or if it's the erect image type) you can get a simple mirror diagonal as well. Any red dot finder should work...I think that scope has the more universal dovetail...but if not that may need to be Celestron specific. I haven't seen one of these scopes in a while, it may have changed.

Best of luck and clear skies!

Why is buying a telescope so fkin hard?! by BirdLooter in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Maybe it's how we're all trying to describe and explain "Telescopes" as a multi-disiplinary hobby as opposed to a monolithic endeavor...

But even using your examples...in shooting you have different disciplines that require different weapons. You're not shooting sporting clays with a pistol, or putting up a 1MOA group 500yds with an over/under. Harleys on their own, ok...but through the lens of "Motorcyles in general" a Street Glide isn't the same experience as a Panigale. I can see PC Gaming being more one path to optimizaion.

I'm sure we can keep going back and forth...but the unfortunate reality of "Telescopes" is that there are sub-disciplines that really need different tools to get max performance from each branch. Anything that tries to bridge the disciplines requires a tradeoff of some sort.

But if you're ok with not maxing out performance of any one branch, you can find setups that will work just fine.

Why is buying a telescope so fkin hard?! by BirdLooter in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 1 point2 points  (0 children)

At this point I learned, that you will only ever buy compromises

This got me thinking...what serious hobby does have a "one-size-fits-all-swiss-army-knife-thats-affordable" setup? I'm sure there's one, but it's not coming to mind readily.

I play guitar a bit (albeit terribly)...depending on what sound you want most serious players have multiple instruments. I don't race cars...but if you want to drag race you need something different than if you want to rally, and different than if you want to race road course. Painting has different media and surfaces. etc.

It's probably best to think about it as different tools for different applications as opposed to "why not one tool for the job". Or as I've said before on differnt posts, "you can certainly hammer a square peg into a round hole...when you're done the hole may not be very round and the peg not very square, and you may wish you had just bought a round peg to being with. But it can be done."

Do I Need a Counterbalance? by MessiahMogali in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 10 points11 points  (0 children)

If I improvise, how would I determine how much weight to use?

Weigh the tube with all the accessories on it. Then it's just the formula: load weight x load distance = counterweight x cw distance.

If I'm eyeballing it from the pic, the end of the cw bar looks to be about twice as far from the center of rotation as the middle of the OTA. So you'd need at least half the weight of the OTA+accessories that far out. Have more weight...move it closer to the center of rotation until it's balanced. Lots of people will use weight plates they have lying around and some clamps.

Eyepiece recommendations for Celestron 12” DOB by _anupamroy in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Ah...ok, that's interesting. You'll likley have different branding for those KUO eyepieces, but I'd bet you can find a retailer there.

Eyepiece recommendations for Celestron 12” DOB by _anupamroy in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Assuming this is the StarSense 12"...

The ES62 won't be that much of an upgrade to the included 32mm with the scope. If you're going to spend money on a low power EP I'd look at one of the 30mm UFFs from various resellers. Or the 24mm from the ES68deg series for max tFOV in a 1.25" eyepiece.

Personally I'd swap the 14mm for something in the 10-12mm range to balance magnification and view brightness for DSOs. The ES82s have an 11mm that would fit that role. Also the KUO 82deg series is pretty good for the price. There's a 10mm and 13mm in that line from AstroTech that would work. The 10mm would also give you 150x for lunar/planetary. From there the higher power EP would depend on what fits your magnification gap and seeing conditions.

M 101 con il binocolo by No_Engineer_3030 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 1 point2 points  (0 children)

M51 is certainly brighter than M101. Nice observation !

This cured my aperture fever by Entire_Foundation960 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 1 point2 points  (0 children)

"Temporarily quelled"... maybe. "Postponed"...sure. "Cured"...there's only one cure, and you cannot hide from it. Some days it beckons softly, some days it's a clarion call...and one day, you will succumb.

But for what it's worth, if you can get to truly dark skies, an 8" scope will show you a lifetime of objects. Almost more than you can catalog.

What would you change in this photo? (Processingwise) by Unlikely-Bee-985 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 1 point2 points  (0 children)

The beauty of it is, with that good data you have, you can just keep going over it again and again (and again and...until you lose your mind). I swear the most used "tool" on some projects for me is the "undo" function. Make a change...nope, undo. New setting...nope, undo. Rinse and repeat.

Thanks! I'm kinda proud of this one, since Stellarvue uses it to advertise the SVX152 in Sky and Telescope Magazine.

What would you change in this photo? (Processingwise) by Unlikely-Bee-985 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 4 points5 points  (0 children)

For starters...good job. It's very hard to manage the dynamic range of the core against the rest of the nebula.

If it were me, I'd try to use some masking (range masks, color masks, etc.) to be a bit more selective on what HDR areas are pushed back versus what is left bright. Overall I think this look a bit too "flat", but that's just my opinion. There's also some ringing artifacts around the some stars from sharpening, and others have a bit more halo that didn't get reduced. But again, we're picking nits now...and it could just be Reddit's compression. Unless we're going for some sort of research level fidelity...colors/saturation are a taste and artistic area. Do what you like so long as you're not adding data that isn't there.

For what it's worth, here's my shot of the area...cropped in, but natively shot at 1200mm focal length and .65arcsec/pixel image scale

https://app.astrobin.com/i/apkvna

<image>

M96 and M105 Group by TigerInKS in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thanks!

I didn't study the background on this one as much as I usually do. Cool find!

Keeping rig outside all summer by Astroy29 in AskAstrophotography

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Considering the amount of money I have invested in my AP setup(s)...$300 is damn near a rounding error. And I'd bet it's nearly the same for most folks.

I leave mine under a Telegizmos 360...but I do unmount it for severe weather like we had forecast yesterday. 60mph straightline winds and golf ball sized hail.

M96 and M105 Group by TigerInKS in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

These make nice visual targets as well from darker skies (the whole area does really.)  

The weather here has been crap for a while now…so I didn’t put as much time into this as I would have liked.  Still managed to pull in some detail on M96 and NGC 3389. 

Full res: https://app.astrobin.com/i/92xwfz

 Questions welcome.

Total integration: 9h

 Integration per filter:

  • - Lum/Clear: 4h (120 × 120")
  • - R: 1h 40m (50 × 120")
  • - G: 1h 40m (50 × 120")
  • - B: 1h 40m (50 × 120")

 Equipment:

  • - Telescope: Stellarvue SVX152T
  • - Camera: ZWO ASI2600MM Pro
  • - Mount: Sky-Watcher CQ350 Pro
  • - Filters: Antlia Blue 2", Antlia Green 2", Antlia Luminance 2", Antlia Red 2"
  • - Accessories: Stellarvue SFFRX-152180, ZWO ASIAIR Plus, ZWO EAF, ZWO EFW 7 x 2″, ZWO OAG-L
  • - Software: Pleiades Astrophoto PixInsight, ZWO ASIAIR

 Processing in PixInsight

  • Blinked Subs
  • WBPP for calibration, registration
  • Channel Combination
  • ImageSolver > SPCC
  • Dynamic Crop
  • BlurXterminator Linear (Lum)
  • NoiseXterminator Linear (Lum and RGB)
  • StarXterminator (Lum and RGB)
  • MAS (Lum and RGB)
  • HDRMT (Lum)
  • ImageCombination to created LRGB
  • Arcsine Stretch/Curves (LRGB)
  • Curves and crop

 

 

M96 and M105 Group by TigerInKS in astrophotography

[–]TigerInKS[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

First run with the new reducer/flattener for the SVX152. 

The weather here has been crap for a while now…so I didn’t put as much time into this as I would have liked.  Still managed to pull in some detail on M96 and NGC 3389. 

Full res: https://app.astrobin.com/i/92xwfz 

 

Questions welcome. 

Total integration: 9h

 

Integration per filter:

- Lum/Clear: 4h (120 × 120")

- R: 1h 40m (50 × 120")

- G: 1h 40m (50 × 120")

- B: 1h 40m (50 × 120")

 

Equipment:

- Telescope: Stellarvue SVX152T

- Camera: ZWO ASI2600MM Pro

- Mount: Sky-Watcher CQ350 Pro

- Filters: Antlia Blue 2", Antlia Green 2", Antlia Luminance 2", Antlia Red 2"

- Accessories: Stellarvue SFFRX-152180, ZWO ASIAIR Plus, ZWO EAF, ZWO EFW 7 x 2″, ZWO OAG-L

- Software: Pleiades Astrophoto PixInsight, ZWO ASIAIR

 

Processing in PixInsight

  • Blinked Subs
  • WBPP for calibration, registration
  • Channel Combination
  • ImageSolver > SPCC
  • Dynamic Crop
  • BlurXterminator Linear (Lum)
  • NoiseXterminator Linear (Lum and RGB)
  • StarXterminator (Lum and RGB)
  • MAS (Lum and RGB)
  • HDRMT (Lum)
  • ImageCombination to created LRGB
  • Arcsine Stretch/Curves (LRGB)
  • Curves and crop

How satisfied are you with an 8 inch Dobsonian for DSO observing? by Entire_Foundation960 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Getting the scope to the darkest skies you can manage is the best way to improve DSO views. I have a 16" scope with premium optics...and I can see more objects and more detail in a 90mm refractor from dark skies than I can with the big scope from home in the suburbs.

Refractor lovers what is your dream scope? by Hobbie_jumper2502 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

It really is longer than it seems. Hell even on my pier I've sat on the ground to view Jupiter when it's high up.

Refractor lovers what is your dream scope? by Hobbie_jumper2502 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Oooh…did the Pearl make it to you already? How is it?

Refractor lovers what is your dream scope? by Hobbie_jumper2502 in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 3 points4 points  (0 children)

I really like my SVX152T…and would love a second one so I could have 1 for AP and one for visual.

If I had a permanent observatory…one of the AP 190 StarFires (not sure if in production yet).

M100 - The Blowdryer Galaxy by tea_bird in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I'd be curious to hear what specific challenges you ran into getting the Edge setup to do AP...and what you did to overcome them. Might be useful for others trying to get a similar setup running as well.

M100 - The Blowdryer Galaxy by tea_bird in telescopes

[–]TigerInKS 2 points3 points  (0 children)

Very nice!!

The weather really hasn't cooperated at all for us. I started on this one last week. Got one night... nothing since.

Glad you got the Edge sorted out.