Advice Needed

[Arun Suraj]

Hello everyone, 

I'm based off of the south india and i bought a celestron 6 se, so far i have been only able to watch the moon, i would like to start viewing other planets, but unfortunately i was not able to do that, i use star chart on my phone to find stars, i use the normal eye piece that comes with the scope, I've seen videos on youtube about people viewing saturn, jupiter etc. I'm also interested in astrophotography, i have a nikon DSLR and I've ordered T-ring and adapter so that i can use to attach on my scope. 

i was wondering how would you navigate through the sky, this is one of the moon's picture i took using my cellphone on the eyepiece. when i started learning about astrophotography it sounded all confusing, EQ mount, wedge etc, aligning to north star. I'm sorry if i sound dumb, i think there is a lot to learn.

i was really hoping if someone could guide me step by step, i wanted to first view all the planets and DSO if possible, then slowly graduate to astrophotography. I'm using a mac and i downloaded stellarium and it seems like a useful software, but i learned that if you want to connect your scope to my Mac, you will need to install a lot of drivers. 

I was hoping someone could help me out, just try and explain everything in very simple terms. Apologies for the lengthy post.

[PeterCPC]

Surely the 6SE is a GOTO scope? So once it's aligned you can just input your target e.g. Jupiter and it will slew to it. Am I missing something here?

Peter

[brantuk]

Yes - the 6SE is a goto scope so you need to have a good read of the manual and discover how to set it up. Then you can just choose the object from the handset and it will slew automatically. Astro photography is a huge subject and can't be explained in a short series of steps.

Get the book "Making Every Photon Count" which is a great guide to imaging and written for beginner through to expert. But honestly - I wouldn't attempt AP with a single fork arm wedge based scope like yours. Better to use a refractor on eq mount - much less hastle. You can however image planets with a web cam and no wedge very easily with your scope. Hth

[mcsheffield]

I think I have seen a good video guide on Youtube on how to use this Scope, maybe be worth searching for it.

[baggywrinkle]

I had the 6SE and it is a good scope, but for any astrophotgraphy you will be limited to around a max on 20 secs exposure as it is an AZ even though goto.

That means you could use a webcam to grab images of the Moon and planets, or your Nikon for Lunar work as the exposres required are more or less daylight ones so fractions of a second.

For DSO you would need a lot of short exposures and the stack them in DSS. It is limyed but is can be done.

A case of experiment and see the results.

[Putaendo Patrick]

You should be able to see the planets without any problem - but the 25mm supplied eyepiece gives a magnification of x60, so you won't see a lot of detail. Sooner or later you might consider getting a 10mm EP which will give x150.

[Dave In Vermont]

If you were trying to take a picture of the Moon, it appears the camera wasn't properly centered over the eyepiece. And the distance was off as well. But it looks like you're on your way!

Have fun -

Dave

[geministar]

Just to get started, simply use Stellarium or a tablet app to see where Venus, Jupiter, etc. are.  You'll have no trouble spotting them with the naked eye.

Don't even bother with alignment at first.

Put in the lowest power lens (longest focal length).

Get the target in the finder (as long it's lined up properly).

Look down the eyepiece, making any necessary adjustments to position, and you're off.