Is purely observing a minority pastime now ?

[Tomjo59]

Only visual for me so far, but last night, on Perseid watch, had a good, long look at Jupiter, through the 8" Newt and the detail visible was excellent - really wished I could have done some imaging then!

[GalaxyGael]

Imaging is certainly catching on and the capability of 'routine' equipment is astounding. The only impediment to enjoying viewing for me is disassembly of the lit. My 70mm flatfield quad apo would be enough, but need the focuser to disassemble a little to get into focus. I always shave some targets that need to wait for another few hours imaging and they never get taken down to observe. Wrong scope and a bit of laziness/unwillingness.

But, the freedom of visual observing with a good instrument is such a tonic compared to imaging sometimes. With a 15028 HTN incoming, my old reliable Intes MN56 is coming off imaging and full time onto visual since it is amazing for wide rich field.

Or, find a holiday spot that is dark enough to lie out on a rug in a dark field and look up with binos.!

[Merak]

This may be a personal thing but I feel looking at The Moon through a eyepiece is far more immersive than taking pics of it.

[Rob Aylen]

  I already had an interest in photography so it's natural that I've dabbled in imaging whilst I've been visually observing.  So far I've only done a bit of smartphone eyepiece projection or basic astrophotography using my DSLR. There's definitely an attraction to imaging and knowing that you captured something so beautiful.

  Working on a computer all day though, I'm not sure I fancy getting full on into imaging. Deep sky imaging seems very involved and likely expensive to me. There is a real simplicity to 'just' observing that I enjoy and I love sketching the deep sky objects that I'm looking at. I like that it gives a more accurate depiction of what my human eyes can actually see too. I can forsee that I'll probably stick to mainly visual work on my dob but I may invest in a proper camera for planetary imaging in the future to use on the side.

[cloudsweeper]

I like the work involved in tracking a target down, in battling to split tight doubles, and concentrating on the Moon to tease out detail that you miss at first sight.  That's where I put the effort, and  enjoy the immediacy of what I can actually see, and feel a sort of direct contact with.  

Reading other responses, this does not seem like a minority view, but there are of course other ways to enjoy this pastime.  And that's all that matters.  😉

Doug.

[Mr Spock]

5 hours ago, Merak said:

This may be a personal thing but I feel looking at The Moon through a eyepiece is far more immersive than taking pics of it.

That's exactly what I said earlier. What an amazing way to spend your evening. 

[RT65CB-SWL]

On 13/08/2021 at 10:08, John said:

Interesting idea but too much tech involved for me.

The way I want to do things now (as I did last night) is with simple, un-driven alt-azimuth mounts, quick setup, look at stuff that I can find myself for as long as the conditions allow, than pack away quickly when done.

Having been at this for around 40 years now I guess I have learned what makes it work for me as a hobby and I'm happy to stick with that now.

Probably I am a "dinosaur". My wife and kids certainly think so

 

Agreed... I too am lo-tech. A few manual/un-driven alt-az mounts, a few 'scopes and e/p's and I enjoy doing it. It gives you the freedom from the IT highway. 

At the present time, I cannot bother about the hassle of polar-alignment and getting pin sharp images, etc. If I see something interesting I may attach a camera,
(2x DSLR's, 2x digital compact, 1x smartphone), and press the shutter release. Then I sort the 'wheat from the chaff'... If I get a nice image, it's a bonus and a keeper.
If not it ends up within the computer recycle bin/trash until I click/press the delete button/key. 

[Gfamily]

I've just posted on our Club FB page about my theory of the next phase of Remote Telescopes; where basically, you're standing next to someone doing imaging? 

 So, this is the Whirlpool Galaxy (M51), an image taken at Astrofarm France (by an astro buddy).

An education; seeing someone using an ASIAir to do polar alignment, target location and guiding. I can see the attraction.

Mind you, I can also see that telling 'a device' to take two dozen images, each of which is 3 minutes long is not the most 'engaged' in the night sky I can imagine.

I was there with my 72mm on an Az GTi mount and an eyepiece (but not for the full 24x3 minutes it has to be said), but I saw Jupiter, Saturn, a couple of Globs, and NGC457 - great at 45x magnification. Mind you, M51 was only very barely visible to me, so hmmmm. 

Edited August 15, 2021 by Gfamily

[Astro Noodles]

2 minutes ago, Gfamily said:

Mind you, I can also see that telling 'a device' to take two dozen images, each of which is 3 minutes long is not the most 'engaged' in the night sky I can imagine.

There is no reason not to have a observing rig or a pair of binos as well. I often stay outside observing whilst the camera clicks away.

[glafnazur]

10 minutes ago, Astro Noodles said:

There is no reason not to have a observing rig or a pair of binos as well. I often stay outside observing whilst the camera clicks away.

I usually take my binos out whilst the camera is busy, sometimes I just like looking up use the old eyeballs

[NGC 1502]

On 20/07/2021 at 12:38, John said:

This is not in anyway intended to be a controversial topic I hasten to add - I'm full of admiration for those who try and capture images of the heavens and often the results are really worthwhile

I've just noticed over the past, say, 18 months how many folks are seeking to acquire images now in one way or another, through dedicated astro cameras, mobile phones DSLR's etc.

The urge to capture seems to be stronger than ever.

I've dabbled when the comet was around last year and with the occasional crude "mobile to eyepiece" snapshots of the moon, sun etc but I'm not yet tempted to get any deeper into imaging despite rather a long time "at the eyepiece" as an observer

Is the trend towards imaging growing or am I imagining it ?

 

I’m very late to this thread and I’ve not read all of it…..so apologies if others have made similar comments….

I’m strictly visual because I really enjoy it.  At times I’ve felt like I’m a dinosaur with all the attention that imaging gets.  My local club in Essex has a wide spread of different ways to do astronomy.   Hard core imagers, casual imagers, hard core visual, casual visual, hard core armchair, casual armchair…….some a mixture of all that.   My impression is that it’s fairly evenly spread with the way our members do astronomy.

I think that the appearance of imaging being more predominant is because if someone has spent many hours and loads of money to get their fabulous images then they want, quite understandably, to share that image. Plus because of all the blood sweat and tears they’ve gone through especially with how it’s done they often, again understandably, share their knowledge and ask questions between us all.

But take a look at the wide range of kit that astronomy vendors, like FLO, have for sale. There’s a shed load of visual equipment for sale. Vendors can only survive if they offer stuff that sells, if they continually stock visual equipment then there’s a reason for that, and the reason very obviously is because people are buying it.

I absolutely don’t mind if astronomy attracts lots of imagers. They are very well catered for by astronomy vendors, that keeps them in business and means they can also stock visual equipment……so we’re all winners in what’s available to buy.

So let us visual only astronomers celebrate the wide range of folks that our fabulous hobby has in its ranks👍

Ed.
 

 

 

 

 

[LoveFromGallifrey]

I'm a bit late to the topic too, and I'm a pretty dang new person to all this anyways so not sure if my two cents' count much. But I started out strictly visual because, despite wanting to foray into imaging, I know ew how difficult it could be to get everything right and how time consuming editing etc would be (for someone pretty technology illiterate). Not to mention, I brought my first scope and mount (Altair 102ED-r new, and AZ4 second hand) at a time when virtually everything was sold out in general, yet alone AP wise. 

Being able to see things like Saturn's rings and Jupiter and the Galilean moons for the first time from my back garden was incredible. My eyes get sore after a while, and I'm sure its because of the single vision so a binoviewer is on my lost of planned future purchases, but that's by the by. I'll never forget the feeling there first time I clapped eyes on Albireo through my own scope, or the time I managed to find M31 for the first time by hand, or seeing things like the Pleiades, Beehive, M42 etc. Mind = blown.

Of course, for me the contentment with visual didn't last and I have now fallen down the rabbit hold and begun to dabble in AP. But I'll always continue observing, I think (I hope). There's nothing quite like admiring the night sky, whether through a telescope, binoculars or simply staring up. 

 

Edited August 17, 2021 by LoveFromGallifrey