I have a Celestron 130EQ Astromaster Reflector telescope, and would like to know what i could use to take some video and photos with this scope. Ive recently just been using a Mobile phone camera by putting the the phone camera up against the telescope lense its works quite well for taking shots of the moon but i want to be able to get some shots of planets like jupiter, saturn, venus mars as well as star clusters,nebula. Any recommendations and advice to products which i could use to achieve this with this scope would be much appreciated.
Here are my scopes specs if required:
Aperture: 130mm
FOCAL length: 650mm
equatorial mount on tripod
Eyepieces: 10mm, 20mm
Here are my scopes specs if required:
Aperture: 130mm
FOCAL length: 650mm
equatorial mount on tripod
Eyepieces: 10mm, 20mm
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I started off doing Afocal imaging too (sticking camera lens up to telescope) with crappy digi cam. I got decent shots of the moon but planets were hard to capture.
I read an article that suggested using a cheap webcam. This way you can take a video or a lot of good pictures and then stack them on top one another to get a really good clean image.
Heres the link, they do a really good tutorial: http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?ite…
I read an article that suggested using a cheap webcam. This way you can take a video or a lot of good pictures and then stack them on top one another to get a really good clean image.
Heres the link, they do a really good tutorial: http://www.cloudynights.com/item.php?ite…
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You need an adapter to hold the camera up to the eyepiece. Or better you need a camera with a removable lens and you buy an adapter that fits the telescope's eyepiece holder on one side and the camera's lens mount on the other. Then the camera replaces the eyepiece and the telescope becomes a telephoto lens for the camera. You use the telescope focuser to focus the image. Then you need to use the camera's manual control of the sensitivity and shutter speed to get the right exposure. Do a lot of trial and error. Professional photographers call this bracketing the exposure. You need a cable release to take the picture because any touching of the camera will shake the telescope too much. Or you might use the camera timer to make the camera to take a picture a few seconds after you press the button, which allows the telescope time to stop vibrating before it takes the picture. You need a motor drive on your equatorial mount and the mount must be aligned precisely to the pole so the image doesn't move in the field of view while you take the picture. It is not easy. Not easy at all.