To Goto or not to Goto

[Metalhead]

Hi I am sure that this has been asked hundreds of times, so here goes again I am seriously looking at getting a Skymax 127 Mak goto, I have read up loads of stuff about this scope Lots of good stuff but also some bad news ? I have seen the videos on You-Tube from Astronomy and Nature and he has a good selling manor, but I have heard that this scope can be a bit of a Nightmare if running ob batteries? also does the sys-scan goto system track as well as find objects?...I will be mainly using this for Planets and lunar Visual work ,but would like to attach my Canon 650D to this and start taking shots of these too,,,any advice her would be taken seriously,,,The main reason I am looking at this is due to its physical size and weight , I dont have much room at home and a dodgy back means that my Big - Boss 130 Newt will sadly probably be sold even before I have had a chance to use it ,,( its a bit too heavy for my poor old back to carry around) Pity cos it is only 3 weeks old !!!

[Pig]

Metalhead,

I have not used this particular scope. However, I do own a GoTo mount. The mounts will not only need to track but it will need to track accurately on the EQ plane if you want to perform any exposures over approx. 30 seconds.

[rowan46]

for planetary and lunar imaging the mak on this mount is a decent scope but if you want to go deep  for imaging its not great. it can be done but not easily. It does benefit from using a power pack maplins often have them relatively cheap. It used to be that  a webcam was the way to go for imaging but there seem to be some decent images coming out with dslr on movie mode. hth

[nmoushon]

If all you are interested in is doing lunar and planetary viewing with the occasional picture of both you will be fine. You don't need a EQ style mount to take pictures of either. You will only want tracking which will help keep the object in your field of view. If you are going to try to venture to take long exposure images of DSOs then you will need an EQ style mount and a scope that is much faster than the Mak but it doesnt sound like you're interested in that...unless I miss read. You will be taking very short exposures on both the planets and moon. Like 1/200th of a second short for the moon (or faster). The same for planets too. But the best way to capture both is by using video instead of still pictures. You take a minute or so of video and then use a program to stack the individual frames to make a single pictures. Some DSLRs have a video mode and work pretty decently. You will also want to invest in a barlow as well. This will give your images a much bigger scale to allow for more detail to show. 

[RichieP]

Just a thought, but if planetary and lunar is your goal, why bother with goto at all? Save the money and spend it on a better, non goto, mount.

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[Langy]

Just a thought, but if planetary and lunar is your goal, why bother with goto at all? Save the money and spend it on a better, non goto, mount.

That's a good point and I know nothing about most scopes. If I can find the planets being new then I wouldn't bother with the goto, some form of tracking yes so you can keep them in the EP, which could then be used for a webcam or DSLR to take lunar and planetary images.

[Sandancer10]

Hi

As Nmoushon said, you don't need a goto mount for Planetary or Moon images. This is because the shutter speed is quite fast for taking these type of objects - you could just as easily use a normal tripod with a good size lens, say 70-300. You would also need a 2 x adapter which would effectively make your lens 600 plus factor of x 1.5 for the sensor size of the 650D. I'm not sure what the Mak is, but it's probably a smaller focal length than this setup.

If you want to try DSO later on, then you will need a goto mount for tracking as you are then looking at shutter speeds of 60 seconds+

[ronin]

Astrophotography: For the moon stand outside with whatever camera, fairly long lens and set it to centre spot metering and take a shot. Will likely be overexposed but take care of that by making it under or overexpose by the camera settings. Or just start with full manual and try a few combinations. Basically for the moon you can use a camera.

For planets many use a Mak/SCT, usually an alt/az mounted one with motors. You don't take "a picture" you take a video, so you need a web cam, you process the multiple frames of the video into one picture, Registax. One aspect is count the number of planets that can be "photographed".I can think of 3. More realistically 2.5 - don't expect Mars to be easy. Planets are also not there all the time. I guess that in August, for example, there will be no planet worth bothering wih.

DSO's (the rest) you need a driven EQ mounted scope and DSLR. You will get 30-40 second exposures and then you stack these to build up a picture (DSS software). You could need 20-50 exposures to have enough to generate the final image.

So having got to the sort of 3 different areas, Moon, planets, DSO's, you can see there is the possibility of a different set of equipment for each.

If weight is a problem then there is the "easier" option of just nailing a DSLR to an EQ mount and taking the wide shots of things like the Milky Way, and if you have a reasonable telephoto lens then aim it at areas with nebula in. These may come out and you can get MW detail throiugh. Would as most things be a lot better with a dark sky. Would suggest you try this first, minimal cost I suppose. It also means you get familiar with the basic requirements of long exposure photography. This actually works quite good.

Would need a remote timer, £25 from Shoot on Amazon, also check camera manual for getting the camera to take it's own noise reduction dark. This effectively doubles the exposure time as it take one "normal" image, then a second, of the same length, with the shutter close.

Possibly stick up a post asking for examples of this. Have seen some on here and elsewhere.

[GuillermoBarrancos]

Just a thought, but if planetary and lunar is your goal, why bother with goto at all? Save the money and spend it on a better, non goto, mount.

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Ehh... every tried manual tracking with a 5x powermate stuck in the Scope?

[Charic]

Hi I am sure that this has been asked hundreds of times, so here goes again I am seriously looking at getting a Skymax 127 Mak goto, I have read up loads of stuff about this scope Lots of good stuff but also some bad news ? I have seen the videos on You-Tube from Astronomy and Nature and he has a good selling manor, but I have heard that this scope can be a bit of a Nightmare if running ob batteries? also does the sys-scan goto system track as well as find objects?...I will be mainly using this for Planets and lunar Visual work ,but would like to attach my Canon 650D to this and start taking shots of these too,,,any advice her would be taken seriously,,,The main reason I am looking at this is due to its physical size and weight , I dont have much room at home and a dodgy back means that my Big - Boss 130 Newt will sadly probably be sold even before I have had a chance to use it ,,( its a bit too heavy for my poor old back to carry around) Pity cos it is only 3 weeks old !!!

Thats an EQ/GEM with power? I  still have in the shed the Celestron 127EQ.   From the experience of initial set up, and fiddling with controls all through the session, save yourself a big headache, and get a Skyliner 200P for £279.99 delivered if you know where to look? I know you mention weights. the base of a Skyliner is about 12KG and the OTA is about 9KG so easy enough to man handle. Not brilliant for astrophotography, due to the Dobsonian non-tracking mount, but from what I've read and learnt, astro photography starts with choosing the correct stable mount system, then telescope, then camera. The mount is important for best results. Just about any DSLR will work and software provides the final images from stacking images?

You mentioned some negatives about the Mak. Not so many negatives for the 200P UK's best seller for the right reasons. IMHO

[RichieP]

Ehh... every tried manual tracking with a 5x powermate stuck in the Scope?

You seem to be confusing Goto with tracking.

Goto just locates the object.  Tracking then keeps the object in view. All Goto mounts track, but many non goto mounts will also track e.g. any equatorial mount with a motor on its RA axis, and certain Alt-Az mounts such as the Skywatcher SupaTrack.

[Metalhead]

You seem to be confusing Goto with tracking.

Goto just locates the object.  Tracking then keeps the object in view. All Goto mounts track, but many non goto mounts will also track e.g. any equatorial mount with a motor on its RA axis, and certain Alt-Az mounts such as the Skywatcher SupaTrack.

Hi I know that the sysnscanis a goto mount,,I just wondered if this could track an object once this had located it,,allso dose anyone know if this can be moved d by hand without any power for Terrestrial work ???? cheers Pete.......this is NOT an EQ mount by the way

[RichieP]

Yes the synscan mounts will track. All goto mounts will track. My point was that, if goto wasn't needed, then a non goto mount which could track would be sufficient, and you might save some money.

Richard

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