Astrophotography

[Philphil44]

Hi guys I'm new to astrophotography, I'll try keep this simple.

I have a skywatcher Skyhawk telescope and when I attach a Nikon camera equipped with a t adapter to the part on scope where lenses go all I see is the attached image, do I need a lens attached to camera too.

 

The second image is what I see if I look in telescope with out lenses

[adoldesa]

Hi there,

1) No need to attach lenses to the camera.

2) What is the telescope pointing at? It looks like it is simply out of focus. Being a Newton you may have troubles getting in focus using a DSLR camera since the focal point my fall inside the focuser tube, but if is hard to say without knowing the specs of the scope/focuser. Is the focuser 2" or 1.25"? From your first picture it looks like you are using a 1.25" adaptor at the end of a larger tube, that is likely to extend the camera too far back from where it can get in focus.

[MimasDeathStar]

I don't think you can reach prime focus with that telescope - but I may be wrong!

Your issue is that even with the focusser wound all the way in, the chip of the camera is still too far away to reach focus. It looks like your T-adapter is attached to some sort of long nosepiece is that right? If possible try and remove that. Most skywatcher telescopes have a screw thread at the top of the focusser that attaches to the T-thread on your adaptor. If possible connect directly to that. 

Also there are two types of Skyhawk I think one of them has a small lens built into the focusser (bird jones) to double the focal length. Do you know the focal length of your scope? If its really long chances are you've got the spherical bird jones type rather than the parabolic; this would rule out focusser modifications to achieve prime focus if the other methods didn't work.

Edited December 3, 2019 by MimasDeathStar

[Anthony1979]

Take the extention off.. I use skywatcher 150p and have no problem focusing with my nikon... It will bringing your camera closer

[joe aguiar]

that's the full adptor do you see the front part where it gets bigger? that front part also unscrew off.

screw that to your t-ring then camera that may or may not still reach focuse but should be much closer then using the full adptor. If it still doesn't you may need a low profile focuser BUT before doing that there are 2 more things to try

maybe put a 2x barlow into focuser and then then your camarea with the small nose piece

also di you see that thumb screw on that full adptor you can put an eyepiece there and that thumb screw locks it there so it doesn't slip and see if it reaches focus that way. I used to do it that way I think its called ep projection, anyway I did it that way before buit with a slr camera not a dlsr camera but it may also work.

joejaguar

 

Edited December 4, 2019 by joe aguiar