Demonperformer

I think for that budget you are going to be limited. It is possible to get quite good results on DSOs with a standard (unmodified) DSLR. For planetary, I thought the neximage was a bit overpriced. There used to be a lot of modified Toucams (Phillips) around that were good for planetary. I haven't seen many advertised lately, but it might be worth keeping an eye on various sale boards. If you want to get a better camera for DSOs, I would recommend you wait until you can save up for one of the (for example) ZWOs.

I always found the important thing was to pick stars that had significantly different altitudes and azimuths, preferably on either side of my target in both directions. So, at about 50 degrees alt, Polaris was fine, if I was going for something in the northern half of the sky, but preferred something else if I was looking southwards.

Your unmodded canon is already blocking IR (and diminishing a lot of the red end of the spectrum as well!). If you have no intention of modding, then the extra IR blocking of the CCD version would just be duplicating what you already have. As such, I would make the decision based on cost ...

Excellent shot of a nice grouping.

Good for you. Obviously kicked a little bit of life back into Pan-STARRS as well.

I suspect it might be easier from Sydney, being a little bit higher ...

The UHC will probably be of more use as a "general purpose" filter, but an oIII visual filter can be very effective on certain objects. My first eyeball sighting on M57 was with with an OIII - utterly invisible with anything else, but the OIII made it just pop out. I guess what I am saying is: you will probably end up buying both!

Hi, Alistair, and welcome to SGL. Good luck with the eyepiece search. Enjoy the journey.

Some years ago, I tried to image this pair, but failed miserably. Maybe I'll give it another go.

Hi, Vince, and welcome to SGL. If AP is your passion, it is worth getting a copy of this book. The 200p will serve you well visually, but I feel is a bit "in the middle" for AP - not enough magnification for planets, but a bit unweildly for DSOs. You may find yourself buying a small refractor in the future (many of us have done it this way!) - but get the book first. [This paragraph is my opinion and others' may differ - so feel free to ignore it, I won't take offence ] Enjoy the journey.

Best of both worlds.

Fair enough. I don't have a kindle, but have a bought a lot of "1p" books off amazon (+£2.79 p/p). I first went looking for this there, but the cost of a physical copy was a bit ott for me for this sort of work. A pdf suits me though.

Even cheaper at archive.org!

Yes, it is unusual to do a close-up of this gem. I prefer the less-cropped version - the contrast with the general colour and bright red (presumably) Ha in M31 makes it for me.

It very much depends for which DSOs you are searching, but in general I would say lower magnification is better. Open star clusters tend to become less obvious as you lose surroundings (but conversely, smaller clusters do benefit from a bit more magnification). And with nebulae and galaxies, the light is spread out over a large area (low surface brightness) and a smaller magnification can help concentrate the light making it appear brighter. In addition, smaller magnification means that you can sweep more of the sky faster and is helpful for "star hopping". What are you using to guide you to your target? Turn Left at Orion is a good source for some of the brighter objects.

I don't know ... IKB191? (OK, so that's ",& blue", but you get my gist!)

Any indication of how much the "interchangeable" filters would be for the 80mm model? Thanks.

Just take a piece of paper with "please turn over" written on both sides ... this gives me hours of fun! I wonder what would happen if you actually turned up to board ...

Hi, Stefan, and welcome to SGL. Enjoy the journey.

You can either buy or make a light shield (black yoga mat wrapped round the tube?) Anything you put it on will need to be very stable, as to the height, I would wait until you get the scope and see what you will need as a decent observing height. Getting a foldup chair and observing sitting down may be a decent option, depending on your circumstances.

Hi, Andy, and welcome to SGL. I used nothing but a pair of 7x50s for decades. Still have them in my arsenal, and often get them out while the gear is imaging and just cruise the skies. Still come across new things. The 200 dob is a great starter instrument. Is there an astro society near you (surely got to be one somewhere within striking distance of Bristol)? Before purchase, how about going along and seeing them. Societies often hold open "viewing" evenings when you would have the opportunity of having a look through various scopes. It would also give you a chance to see the physical bulk of some telescopes. I wish I had done that before purchasing a 10" dob (long gone now) ... totally unsuitable for my circumstances (although others get on with them very well). Nothing beats seeing a scope "in the flesh" for working out how well you will get on with it ... Enjoy the journey.

I would hope a tracked mount is what is meant. Without any tracking, even 30s would be severely limiting in terms of focal length. But you've got me thinking about PEC: apparently there are two sorts, one is dumb and the other reacts to what is happening "live". So, if you had been running an imaging session on an object, it would be learning what is happening to the mount in that session. This means that a sub taken at the end of the session would be more accurately tracked than one at the start of the session. This is, as davew said, not as easy as it first appears ...

I am barely beginning to get to grips with CMOS ... I think I will join the "dinosaur" club and stick with what I have as well ... not that anyone will notice ...

An excellent challenge that could be a great "leveller".

A dark site is the astronomical equivalent of a unicorn.