Please help - buying first imaging rig

[Mr Green]

Good afternoon All,

I used to have a SW 200p Dob years ago and didn't even realise that I was a member of the forum since 2009 with a few dozen posts to my name.

I've not had a scope for what must be 10 years now and the itch returned about a year ago. 

My experience with the Dob always made me want to take the leap into connecting my DSLR and taking images of DSO's but this obviously wasn't possible with what I had at the time.

I'll say from the outset that I probably don't have a realistic budget and I've been speaking to Flo over email who have been incredibly helpful as always.

To spread the burden of a complete amateur with the dream of getting into astrophotography, I wanted to request advice on whether its possible to get started on a budget of anything between £600 - £1,000.

I realise the lower end of the budget is wishful thinking and I could possibly stretch to £1.2k if I could get "everything" to get started.

I appreciate that the mount is the main investment but think that I'd be forced to look at small refractors therefore a low payload for imaging.

Please treat me as a complete newbie as I have no idea what I need to connect my camera (Canon EOS 500D) to a scope as an example. It seems to depend on the scope although could be wrong.

My current shortlist is below (minus any cables/adapters etc).

SW EQM35 pro go to mount

SW 72ED or SW 130PDS 

12v Power Supply for mount

I'm hesitant with the 130PDS and collimating as every tutorial I've watched is different with multiple tools and methods being used... I just get confused the more I look into it.

Thank you in advance to anyone willing to take the time to share advice and help me out.

I'm on the verge of giving up.

Thanks,

Jon

 

[happy-kat]

There will be lots of replies to help you. There's plenty being done with EEVA and there's all in ones like the ZWO seestar s50

[M40]

Hello Mr Green and welcome back.

Ask away with any questions and you will get replies as there are lots of clever people on here.

You have answered the first question which is budget and the next is what would you like to take pictures of? Widefield dso or galaxies? Do you want to get into processing or would eeva be something to consider? 

A couple of clues I can give you are get any prospective telescope weight then add the weight of your camera plus finders etc to it for a weight limit starting point for the mount. Try and look for as much wriggle room as possible.

All the best.

[Mr Green]

Thanks for the replies so far, I've looked at the ZWO seestar and also the other similar do it all scopes and they're great. I just personally want to utilize my DSLR.

With regards to types of pictures I honestly didn't consider this when just starting out. Orion, Horsehead, pleiades & andromeda are the types of things I had in mind... guessing these all require a different setup?

[M40]

Orion, pleiades and andromeda are all nicely widefield and great targets. Can I suggest that you look in the first light optics astronomy tools, field of view calculator, (you can find it at the top of the page under resources)  stick in your camera, pick one of your targets and then have a look through a range of telescopes to see how it works. Treat it as a guide only,  but it's a pretty good guide. At least it gets you on the next step.

Something to consider though, no one telescope and camera combination will do it all as what is good for widefield will not be the best choice for planets or galaxies.

[Elp]

Tbh you've already got the camera which won't be as good as an astro camera but will do for now. So all you'd need is a mount, either a used one or get a new Skywatcher Star Adventurer GTI which will suit up to maybe an 80mm refractor for future proofing. Your lenses will make a huge difference as the majority aren't suited to imaging stars, fixed primes even vintage ones work well. One of the best optics for AP is the Samyang 135mm F2 and beats a lot of telescopes. Eventually you may want to autoguide your setup but for now, in built mount sidereal tracking and a fairly short focal length lens will go a long way for widefield imaging.

 

[Mr Green]

I definitely think widefield would be what I'd aim for as I'm assuming that tracking would be easier and more forgiving on a cheaper mount. 

With that said, any suggestions for a full kit list to get started would be much appreciated. If a budget around £1k - £1.2k is unrealistic, it'd be much appreciated to be told and put out of my misery haha.

[Cosmic Geoff]

I suggest you get a tracking mount for your camera and use it to take widefield photos.  I saw what some friends did at a dark skies site with just a camera and mount and it was quite impressive.  

Also order a Seestar S50, which does the telescope (50mm), mount, software and stacking all in one package.  What this can do is quite impressive - it actually outperformed my bigger EVA rig on imaging nebulae from my backyard. 

Once you have had a go with these two things you may be satisfied, or if not, you will have a much better idea of what to buy in order to do better. 

[Clarkey]

I think the Samyang 135mm lens recommended by @Elp is a good shout. This will work with a standard star tracker or mount. You might want to consider modifying your DSLR so it will pick up H-alpha signal much better than unmodified. (There are filters that can be put back into the camera so it can be used for terrestrial use without messing up the white balance). The 72ED is a reasonable scope to image with but you are getting towards the need for guiding. It might be worth you looking at the AZGTi owners thread on here. There are plenty of people using this set up (modified for EQ use) and getting good results.

 

[Elp]

29 minutes ago, Mr Green said:

full kit list

All you need is:

SW Star Adventurer GTI or alternative EQ goto mount,

A vixen dovetail bar and appropriate bolt to attach the camera to,

Intervalometer if you don't have one for your Canon to take the images automatically in bulb mode.

That's it. If you want to go more advanced there's far more and deeper (more expensive) you can go.

[Mr Green]

It's a shame that the SeeStar S50 is impossible to get hold of unless going on a waiting list for an unknown length of time. I did ideally want to use my camera although must highlight that I don't have a decent lense for it, hence why I am looking at a mount and scope combo.

As an attempt to try and nail down a solution within my budget, would the below be enough to get me started or am I missing anything that will stop me from being able to start imaging?

SW EQM35 mount - £659

SW explorer 130PDS - £239

12v Power Supply - £39

Astro Essentials T Ring for DSLR - £15

Astro Essentials 2" T Mount camera nose piece adapter - £15

StellaLyrra premium Cheshire Collimating eyepiece - £37

Intervalometer- £15

This all comes in at £1k but I am not sure if I have missed anything crucial and if both adapters are correct for connecting camera or if I'd have what I need for collimation....

Hopefully me being more specific with where my head is at on kit will make it easier to offer advice.

Thanks All!

Jon

 

[Elp]

The 130pds is no where near short enough focal length to work on that mount, it might but at 650mm you definitely will need autoguiding (guidescope, guide camera and computer controller or use an existing one you may have). You'll also need a coma corrector to get a flat field unless you don't mind coma shaped stars at the edges, a cheap coma corrector (GSO) will set you around £80, better ones can cost more than the scope and the focuser may need modification in order for you to reach focus. I would not recommend a Newtonian for AP for a beginner, I had that scope and it's not perfectly ready to image out of the box, it'll work for EAA fine.

Start simple with what you mostly have at hand. If you buy lots of things at once it'll introduce all manner of issues, it's a probability factor, more stuff, more things that need trouble shooting. Start simple.

[Cosmic Geoff]

£659 is a lot of money to spend on a mount about which some people have written very negative things.

Start simple with a tracking mount designed to support a camera. If you don't have a lens for it, there are plenty of used ones on ebay.  I bought one there for my  Canon camera body.

[Elp]

The eqm35 is known to have issues, if you want more reliability and future proofing look for a HEQ5/6 or equivalent weight class ioptron. If you can afford them a harmonic drive mount is becoming more popular and convenient if you setup and break down every time (no counterweights needed).

[Elp]

Asahi Pentax Takumars are relatively cheap manual primes, work okay for AP, you don't get so much coma with them which a lot of modern lenses suffer from. Only issues is that they focus red and green at different points (and likely blue but that's imperceptible) so your stars will likely be outlined with one or the other. Target comes out fine however.

Edited October 18, 2023 by Elp

[Mr Green]

Thanks all for your thoughts and input on the spec that I provided.

I wasn't keen on Newtonians but thought that it was a cheap affordable way to get started.

It's a shame that the EQM35 isn't recommended, I can't justify the cost of a HEQ5 when just looking to get started.

I think I'll do some research on using nothing but a tripod and DSLR and see if that interests me..... I had my heart set on a scope and go to mount but seems its not meant to be.

Thanks again for the advice.

Jon

[Elp]

You should try with your camera as is (Andromeda, Orion when it comes into view again and Pleiades are good targets on a fixed tripod as you can keep exposures below 10s or so), as you image more you'll understand better what you want. I would never recommend anything above a 60-80mm apo refractor for a beginner, refractors generally work out the box and a good glass (fpl53 or decent ED glass) will take good images with minimal issue. The recommendation for this sized scope also allows for budget or small class mounts, I use my Z61 on an AZGTI in EQ fully autoguided mode, though I have larger mounts, this one is the one I usually use with this scope or dslr setup. The mount I recommended is an out of the box solution equivalent, likely better internals too.

Edited October 18, 2023 by Elp

[Mr Green]

Would the Star Adventurer GTI work with the SW evo 80ED refractor or is 4kg for the scope alone too much weight for imaging when adding the DSLR and potentially guide scope/camera in the future?

This option along with a field flattener and M48 ring totals my max budget of £1.2k.

I always thought I needed the EQM35 as it can image up to 7kg which I don't think I would exceed. 

[Elp]

As a general rule you should not exceed around 1/2 to 2/3 max payload, I would have thought the SWGTI can handle an 80mm, best to ask in the owners thread. The azgti is stated as max 5kg, but I'm knowingly mounting 6.5Kg on it (note this is at my own risk and my decision) and it's been working fine, how long it'll continue to work like that I don't know but the mount is so cheap I'm willing to take the risk with it.

A harmonic drive mount I suspect due to the mechanics can handle up to their stated max weight subject to the tripod being sturdy enough to handle the east west imbalanced load.

Edited October 18, 2023 by Elp

[M40]

With your initial list of items, you had the 72ed or the 130pds listed with your camera, so thought I would do a comparison.....

The 72ed is a slightly wider fov and is a nice and easy step into astronomy with no collimation required, so I think that would be my choice. 

I use an heq5 so can't comment on other mounts but the eq5 to my knowledge is a good mount and very similar costs to the eqm35. There is plenty of capacity on the mount using the 72ed, the 80ed is still within the limits, hopefully others will have thoughts on this.

 

Edited October 18, 2023 by M40
Speling

[Mr Green]

The reason why I asked about the 80ED in my last message was due to the scope coming with a diagonal, eye piece & finder scope as part of the package. This would surely make life a little easier having a finder scope and the ability to be able to have visual capability via the eye piece is a bonus.

I think the 72ED will be more costly than the 80ED once adding a finder scope, diagonal & eyepiece.

If you guys think that the Star Adventurer GTi is a better option than the EQM35 to support an 80ED, I'll go with that as it's cheaper which is a bonus.

[Mr Green]

47 minutes ago, M40 said:

With your initial list of items, you had the 72ed or the 130pds listed with your camera, so thought I would do a comparison.....

Thanks for this, really appreciate your input and I've been starring at this tool for hours.

 

[WolfieGlos]

Just on the mount side, I used to use a star adventurer 2i. It did the job with an Evostar 72ed (only with guiding) but it was far from perfect. In fact, it was close to the weight limit (including flattener, DSLR, guide scope and camera), so I’m not sure an 80ed would work even with the GTI as the capacity is the same at 5kg? 

With guiding, I was limited generally to 4 minute subs - sometimes with a circa 50% scrap rate due to trailing. Whether that was bad PA, wind, poor tripod…I’m not sure, but I’m sure the GTI would perform better due to DEC tracking and GoTo. I cannot comment on an 80ed though. 

I saw a huge difference once I upgraded to a HEQ5. I got mine second hand, with the belt mod, for £700 from a fellow SGL member. Honestly, it’s the best investment I’ve made to date. I now use it with a 102ed refractor and it performs flawlessly, so it also gives you ability to upgrade to a larger scope down the line if you want it. If I could start again, I would have skipped the star adventurer and gone straight to the HEQ5.  I’d highly recommend this mount. 

Edited October 18, 2023 by WolfieGlos

[WolfieGlos]

Not sure if you have access to the classifieds here on SGL yet, but there is currently a HEQ5 with belt mod on sale here for £650; https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/412510-heq5-pro-rowen-belt-upgrade-kit/

 

Also a GTI with Evolux 62ed here for £850; https://stargazerslounge.com/topic/413943-star-adventurer-gti-evolux-62ed-£900-reduced-to-£850-for-quick-sale/

I’m not sure what the 62ed is like, but it’s food for thought! 

 

[Mr Green]

Funnily enough, I can access classifieds as I've been a member since 2009 and was active on the forum at the time. 

I did see the HEQ5 up for sale but it's collection only and a 600 mile round trip which is too far.

The GTi appears to be in the same area which is a shame.

I'll stick to the 72ED if anything bigger will be pushing my luck.

Below is what I've now come up with to get me started so hopefully sounds like a great option for my max budget.

SW 72ED - £329

SW Star Adventurer GTi - £559

12v Power Supply cable - £39

Stellamira 2" field flattener with M48 adapter - £79

M48 camera adapter - £18

SW 9x50 right angled erecting finder scope - £75

Astro Essentials 90 degree mirror diagonal - £19

BST 18mm ED eyepiece - £55

Intervalometer - £15

With shipping, this comes to my absolute max budget of £1.2k.

If I have missed anything or anyone disagrees with my list and thinks I should go for the EQM35 over the Star Adventurer etc.... let me know.