Simulating the view at the eyepiece

[hunterknox]

Hi all,

I'm not really an imager myself but I have seen a lot of threads on here that run along the lines of...

"what does [inert object name] look like through [insert scope name]"

or...

"I can't find [DSO], can someone tell me what I should be looking for"

No doubt that, these days, imaging technology can allow amateurs to get beautiful views that clearly exceed what they can get at the eyepiece, in terms of clarity and detail. However, for the benefit of those who ask questions like the above (including myself), or those who look at reviews with an eye to visual astronomy, is it possible to rein it back a bit and to approximate the view at the eyepiece?

[brantuk]

Hi Hunter - the reason LE cameras are used is because the human eye is incapable of seeing most dso's properly - even in a scope.

The camera can gather more light at the extreme ends of the spectrum and these shots can be layered together to produce a composite colour image.

Webcam snaps are probably the best ep approximations but they are mostly solar system only - there's penty of those on the forum.

Hope that helps

[FraserClarke]

Naively, I'd say an image with ~1/10th second exposure time and about 10% QE, probably with a V band filter in...

However they eye is quite a clever thing, so that might be a bit too pessimistic...

Do you have a camera? Maybe you could do some tests and find out what works for you??