Help needed

[loordspudz]

Being new to observing the sky properly, (as opposed to staring up at it wonder), and recently purchasing 25 x 100 binoculars I have managed to locate a number of major stars along with eye viewing a few constellations, and am happy with what I've achieved on the few nights the weather has allowed me some clearish skies.  It took a lot of staring, scanning and head scratching but I managed to find Eddies coaster and NGC7000 (North American Nebula), but when it comes to the likes of M51, M81, M82 etc etc I point the bins in the general direction after consulting my star atlas but haven't the foggiest idea what I should be looking for!  Am I the only one to have fallen foul of this phenomena?  

What I'm asking is is there a source of photo's, (preferably not all taken through a telescope), in book or on-line form that will give me an idea of what to look for?

I've spent a few hours scanning the sky oohing and aahhing at the wondrous sights but would now like to put names, or numbers, to what I see.

Any help/suggestions would be gratefully received.

Thanks

[PeterW]

I use sky safari on my phone to confirm asterisms as I hop about. (You can superimpose a circle the size of the field of view, really helps judge scale). With a limited field of view you might consider some form of finder (red dot/laser to help get you near, then any star atlas can be used to zero it on your target. If your skies aren’t so good (and it doesn’t get properly dark this time of year) then galaxies will be harder to spot. I have just come in from a quick session with my 70mm bins and spotted M57 and M13 in the mid twilight. 
 

peterW

[BinocularSky]

17 hours ago, loordspudz said:

What I'm asking is is there a source of photo's, (preferably not all taken through a telescope), in book or on-line form that will give me an idea of what to look for?

 If you go to the "Observing" tab on my website, I have simulated realistic eyepiece views for most of the objects (either at 10x50, 15x70 or 37x100 -- none specifically for 25x100, but you should still be able to get an idea of what might be possible.) As an example, here's M81/82 as seen from Cranborne Chase Dark Sky Reserve.

@KevS (above) mentioned my newsletter; the objects mentioned in that also link to the object pages on the website so you can get realistic views for most of those.

 

Edited May 31, 2020 by BinocularSky

[loordspudz]

Many thanks for all the suggestions, been a great help 👍