powerlord

Hopefully of interest to some people.

This allows me to easily, quickly and accurately attach my mobile phone and swap between all my EPs and Barlow without faffing about getting mobile it the right position, and secure every time.

6 hours ago, Newforestgimp said:

Hi There,

I wont offer tech advice as I'm learning myself, but what I would say is save yourself some pain and decide on visual or AP from the outset, then go from there> the guys on here have helped me enormously and I quickly gave up any ambitions of combining two aspects with one set of kit. I decided to go the AP route and have started small to learn the craft, WO Z61 with an EQ35-M pro and DSLR, all I can say is from my brief experience the Z61 is a joy to use, the EQ35-M is beefy enough for my ambitions currently, has a 10kg Payload so i have a bit of 'scope' for enlarging the OTA at some point, and has better gearing than the EQ3-PRO and Eq5-PrO i believe, its modular so can double as a camera basic star tracker too. I've also enjoyed just sticking the DSLR on a weighted tripod with ball head & an 18mm kit lens and just popping away with 20 second or so exposures.
I would only buy gear that you think will be of use long term TBH and I know that a small Refractor will always be in the quiver, its just so versatile for photography.

 

very nice, and food for thought. I'll stick with what I've got for now. As you say - learn to walk. I've got wide field options with the 50mm prime on the modified 1200d, and wide or zoomed with the RX10. Both could be on the gti mount, but probably better on the Polarie, except up towards 600mm on the RX10 in which case the GTI is worth a try.

And for all the tmount cost, its worth a try too to see what it can do on the skymax.

I might post some pics and video of what I've designed there for my mobile mount - took me a while to get right but now it's just plugin and go and works well too.

thanks for the advice chaps.

8 hours ago, vlaiv said:

It shows that with a bit of care - AzGTI can guide in 1" - 1.5" RMS range without much issues.

It is general rule of the thumb that guide RMS should be at least half of the sampling resolution - which gives us baseline for imaging resolution on this mount. I'd say that 3"/px or above is doable.

I'm still talking about using SkyMax102.

Canon 1200D has ~4.3µm pixel size. Base resolution is 0.68"/px. If using super pixel mode (and one should) that is doubled to 1.36"/px. Doubling that by binning x2 - will not be enough in my opinion as it will end up at 2.72"/px, but using x3 binning will be just right at 4.08"/px

This means that image will be only 864 x 576 in the end, but mosaics are always an option.

I won't lie and say I followed any of that 🤪

but as the saying goes - best camera is the one you've got.

Yeh I'll def keeping using the mak for now. and unsuited as it is - I'll still enjoy using it with slr and phone.

I'm definately interested to see what affect the full spectrum modifications on the SLR make too.

And keep using my Polarie with my Sony RX10mkiii which is a damn fine camera

Seems to me like any other hobby - you can game on a 500 quid laptop, you can gain better on a 2000 quid tower PC, and there's always something better for 5000 quid, etc. 🙂

stu

So chaps, if I was to 'invest' another whack of cash at this (ideally no more than 500 quid), I'm assuming a motorized EQ mount and an F5 or so newtonian would be the sort of thing to stick my 1200d on the end of ?

Would a celestron astromaster 130eq motorized work ?

Or would it be best getting more light via something like a skywatcher explorer 200p now on my az GTI , and saving for a decent EQ mount later (like an EQ3 ) ?

ok i thought i wiz doing ok but some of these are great.

beginner. telescope owner for 3 weeks.

Skymax 102, azgti. huawei p30 pro.

having never 'seen' a nebula before, or frankly expecting to be able to photograph one with this setup, i was impressed. most tricky thing i'm finding is focus at the mo.

Really enjoying this new hobby - ideal for lockdown (well.. with backgarden limitations.. im in bortle 6)

stu

thanks - I'll look up that program. I've been faffing with deepskystacker using crossover (Im on a mac), but struggling to get it to do much. Enjoying learning - but jeez it's a steep learing curve.

Thankyou for the advice - greatly received. I see the DLSR as a way of just getting used to it a bit, then maybe I get a second OTA.

I've shot with my polarie and Sony RX10iii (600mm) and got some decent (well, i'm happy..) M42 shots and will continue to do that for sure.

I thought maybe with the DSLR I'd get a bit better than I'm getting currently through the OTA with my mobile ? Or will they be much the same then ?

Attached 1 shot via the sony, and one with the mobile (and x54 EP)

I realise compared to the amazing pics on here these are terrible - but I enjoy taking them 🙂

this is telescope and mobile (x54):

this is sony at 600mm on polarie

Hi chaps,

beginner here.

er I AM trying to learn all the techie stuff as quick as I can, but it is a deep learning curve.

I've been having a lot of fun with my 102 (1300mm) looking at the moon and especially M42. I designed and printed a 3d printed mount solution for EPs and my phone that let me shoot pretty good pics with my EPs and it's got me a taste of AP.

So - I know it's far from ideal OTA for DSO but.. it's what I've got for now. I've ordered a modified canon 1200D.

And I'm now a little bit confused as to what I need to mount it, and whether I need a focal reducer.

the outside thread on the OTA is a 42mm thead I think. So I need a canon t-mount I assume.

Does it need a spacer ? Are spacers all the same size ?

And, how do I calculate the fov I will get with that ?

If I need a focal reducer, I assume this screws into the interior OTA thread, and since this is quite deep, I assume it's trial and error getting this to the right point ? (55mm is mentioned some places)

And then just a matter of getting a 1.25 0.5 or 0.5 reducer and screwing it in ?

I realise I'm going to be doing 30 second odd exposures here to get anything decent, and it would be better with an EQ mount, and a different OTA, etc, etc - but that can all be added to later - just wanna expand out and enjoy for now.

all advice appreciated - I'm enjoying this new hobby far more than I thought I would to be honest - first time I captured M42 I couldn't believe what I was seeing !!!

stu

thanks - good advice. that's definately not drifting much. as you can see in my video (1300mm 102 mak with 25mm ep) mine is drifting loads.

i'm pretty sure i tightened clutches...cough. but yeh I'll need to double check next time, and I've replaced the batteries with a lipo and 12v UBEC to give me a clean portable stable dead on 12v.

I emailed FLO (the dealer) and they made some suggestions too - next clear night I'll make myself a checklist and go through it all from the ground up (sic) and see where i get to.

balance wise FLO made me realise I'd been balancing the OTA with jsut the eyepiece on - not with my phone. I mean it's not a lot of weight, and its definately not that - because i was wathcing the drifitng visually without phone mounted, but still it's another thing I'll do next time.

My old Polarie with my Sony RX10iii at 600mm was getting sharp shots with 30 second exposure, so it did kinda show the new fangled GTi up a bit.

Just need to wait for a night you can actually see a star now 🙂

Thanks. Hmm.. I'm using new alkali batteries, and ota is mounted as described. And it has my location correct. Does seem like a software rather than hw issue. Maybe I need to give FLO a call then. [removed word]. Was hoping it was something simple.

Hi chaps, I'm finding that though it seems pretty good at going to a star or planet on request, the tracking I am getting from my AZ-GTi is pretty awful.

At higher magnifications (>100x) it's pretty useless -as it loses the object in a minute or so. But even with low magnifications (56x) it drifts badly.

I've attached a small mp4 (will play quick so will need to play a few times to see - of 30 frames taken over 15 minutes of M42. You can see it drifting quite a lot.

Each time I set up I'm resetting alignment, and doing a north + 2 stars alignment. I then went to M42 (dead on), and tracking is set to sidereal, but it's just not very good.

Last night I set up my old polarie on a tripod with my DSLR and 600mm, and it kept a far better lock on M42 than the AZ-GTi.

Any ideas what I'm missing ? No one else seems to be complaining on the forums, so I'm assuming I'm doing something wrong.

stu

Here's some pics. Showing phone mounted. focused on something inside as cloudy. cable connected for snap.

bluetooth remote can still be pressed to manually take a pic so phone/mount not disturbed.

I tested using SynScan Photo - just set it to take a pic every second, then once started, start phone camera (synscan still running in background activating snap).

phone camera starts to take pics ever second. obviously up to you how camera configured, you could set it up with manual exposure (full manual is supported on p30 pro), and set an appropriate long exposure/iso, etc. then say take photos as it tracks planet, etc.

The other reason I like it is since it's optical path to camera - you don't need to be precise with focus - camera can pull it into focus. Now, I admit with real moon/planets that might not work so well, and if that's the case, I can set focus on camera manually as appropriate.

Also provided one jpg from camera (but it does support saving in 40mp raw too)

Oh, I should also say that is with a 25mm on a 1300mm focal length skymax 102.

I also tried my 6.5mm. through the actual viewfinder this is very dim, difficult to see through and focus.

With phone connected, the phone auto exposes the live view making it nice and bright, easy to focus in on, then phone does final focus.

that gives me a clear 200x of the highland coo's nosrel. so I know I'm a beginner and no nowt, but it does seem a pretty good way of observing imho, with the added bonus of being able to take pics and videos whenever u want.

Sorry, should have been more clear. I made a bluetooth to serial interface with an HC-06.

This means I should be able to control the az-gti via the serial port as you would any other synscan mount, but via bluetooth.

So I expected sky safari or stellarium to then be able to connect to it via BT.

But something is not quite working yet. I'll try some more debugging tonight.

Saying that, since I'd always need the SyncScan app to actually align the scope up in the first place, and that only works with wifi, I'm very possibly not making anything any easier by getting this working. But.. it's cold, and cloudy so it gives me something to do 🙂

Hi chaps, bumping open this thread again.

I build an interface tonight for my az gti mount. Hc-06.sky safari 6 Pro gives error saying connected but no response. I tried serial Bluetooth terminal app and sent 'E' which according to api should give me response from synscan mount. Also nowt.

I've tried the obvious of reversing rx/tx though I'm sure they were fine.

I've also tried 2 other bt modules so I reckon that's OK too.

Kinda stuck now. I mean WiFi works fine on mount, just figured I'd give bt a go, as it means my mobile could stay connected to Internet.

The thread talks about a 'vituoso app' but I cant find any such app. And as far as I can tell the regular synscan app is WiFi only. Any ideas?

Stu

Hi chaps. Total beginner. Got scope 4 days ago.

I've managed to get great quality mounting my phone (p30 Pro) to the eyepiece and intend to mostly use that to observe as well as photos.

So I wanted to allow the little £3 Bluetooth remote I have be able to be 'pressed' by my synscan gti mount. All I did was solder two wires to the remote button, and connect those to the snap interface.

It works a treat. I'm sure this is nothing new, but just in case. Can post pics if useful. I've found connecting phone to eyepiece great. I get a big clear picture and small focus slip is taken care of by the phone auto focus. The p30 Pro has a 40mp sensor and can shoot raw.

It does also have an 8mp 5x telephoto but it needs a fair amount of light. I've not tried using that lens yet. The main lens canera though is giving me crystal clear full screen views through my 25mm, 10nmm and both through a 2x Barlow (though as my scope is a skymax 102 the Barlow with the 10mm puts me way above what the scope can resolve is is blurry from that. I've ordered a 6.5mm eyepiece which will put me right at the max theoretical more or less and expect that to work well.

48 minutes ago, vlaiv said:

In the end, I would advise you to maybe think about this setup:

https://www.firstlightoptics.com/sky-watcher-az-gti-wifi/sky-watcher-skymax-102-az-gti.html

It will work as wifi out of the box. It will offer you telescope version that is 4" so decent aperture - will show wonderful view of the moon and planets, has a lot of potential for different kind of imaging.

You can get second hand DSLR and lens and use AzGTI mount in EQ mode. I've done that - you just need a wedge (simple pan/tilt head can be used for this - I used ball head before I got regular Skywatcher wedge) and counter weight ( M12 threaded rod and simple counter weight is all you need).

You can use it in Eq mode for EEVA with DSLR as well - also called live stacking. This will work even in Az mode. You could try that with phone as well.

Think about that possibility.

Thankyou - that's good advice. That's still fairly compact. No faffing about with electronics and a better lens. I've got a sony RX10 mk3 which would work well with it. I like the idea of tilting. I have a vixen polaris I've used before - but obviously this would work much better.

And its got the dual encoders too rather than the GTe thing.

AND you've managed to find the one place in britain (?) that have stock!!!

I'm sold!

thanks again - I will follow up with my experiences with it.

thanks. yes, I reckon I'm limited to only 10-15 secs exposures but can do lots of them and combine. I've done stacking that way with the phone and got some decent pics of milky way, etc.

Apart from being out of my price range, EQ mount seem to be a bit bulky for portability in a motorhome.

I've tried to find some pics people have taken with the heritage to set my expectations.

I found these - same mount, different scope:

https://www.cloudynights.com/topic/615168-anybody-have-a-sky-watcher-heritage-90-virtuoso/

But nothing really for the 90. I think that's what I need to hunt about for - if I can see what's possible and what isn't then I know what I'm letting myself in for so to speak.

p.s. p30 pro (sorry said p20 by mistake) has one of best cameras on a phone (top 5 or 6). attached is pic of moon I took from back garden with it for example.. I mean, its no match sensitivity for an SLR, etc but it should be capable enough for get some nice shots I'd hope ?

thanks chaps.

afaik the heritage 90p virtuoso is a Maksutov-Cassegrain ? Reviews said it was good for planets ? At Around £185 inc the motorised 'goto' mount it seemed best value to me.

As I say, adding a home build ESP8266 to the RJ-12 and I have a full goto system. The idea of the external controller is a bit archaic - which is the kinda of thing I meant by lagging in technology.

As you point out, the Star Sense thing tries to do something useful, but it's an opportunity missed imho - it should be providing tracking feedback to the controller to keep the scope locked on the target. Instead all it's doing is telling you where to move it to.. without that control loop, they want a ton of money for what is no more than a mobile app and a mirror basically.

Anyway, that's by the by.

A modern mobile like the P20 Pro I have can do some pretty amazing long exposures. Hence I thought, start simple with that. I'm big into photography and video for my other hobbies and have a bunch of kit I could use, but wanted to keep it simple to start. It seemed to be the moble mount with intervalometer app should be some good stacked shots ?

But I did feel I must be missing the search terms or something, because here's the Sky-watcher Heritage 90 - even if I bought the £60 rip off wifi adapter - coming in at 245 quid all in. But no other manufacturer seems to offer wifi enabled scope for anything like the same price ?

With stuff like the evScope, Vespera, etc being kickstarted and costing major cash.. and yet offering really not much more (and in some ways much less) than the above setup offers it seems crazy to me that the manufacturers are not jumping to engage the 'astro-numpty' market like me.

With a smart app on the eyepiece mount for a mobile, some image recognition for precise tracking with feedback to the motors, and some decent camera features like intervalometer has, they could be completing in that £2000 'smart' telescope range with a hardware unchanged and some decent app development ?

As pointed out though, combination of covid, brexit and xmas means everything is out of stock everwhere so looks like it will be long time before I find one in stock !

stu

Hi chaps,

I'm new to astronomy, but want to get something I can use when away in the motorhome. So portable. I also want something motor driven and wifi enabled so I can use with a mobile app.

Its really for very amatuer viewing of planets, and 'big stuff' and hopefully some photography. It is the looking at cool stuff, and photographing it that interests me, rather than getting deep into astronomy. I realise this may be anathema to some, but hopefully - each to their own. Hence an ability to have the scope easily and quickly take me to 'cool stuff' while I remain an astro-numpty is key.

It does seem that telescope techology hasn't really kept apace with the rest of the world much.. but looking around, the best cheap option seems to me to be:

Sky-Watcher Heritage 90p (or maybe 114p) Virtuoso.

With that an either a £60 sky-watcher dongle, or if I get it working, just a basic 3 quid ESP8286 dongle I'll make I should be able to connect with sky-watchers app and (maybe) sky safari ?

So for about £200 quid all in, I have a basic setup. adding a mobile phone mount would get me a basic photography setup ?

I can't see anything else in the same price range or even close to it ? Have I missed anything ? The cheapest WIFI telescopes seems to be around £350 or more.

I'm open to second hand, but it doesn't seem like ebay is filled with options.

Any advice greatfully recieved.

stu