Telescope uses?

John_B wrote in post #2321471
JaGWiRE,
If you are talking about the ETX-90AT that has a maximum aperture of f/13.8 and will be like a 1250mm lens when hooked up to your camera.
I suggest you look around and pick up a book or two before spending any $$$$ to make sure you get what you need. Figure out what you want to photograph like planets, galaxies or stars. Then when it gets warmer out (although it is pretty warm here ), you can go out and get what equipment you need and take the photos you want.
Good Luck

Hard12find, I'm interested, please send me some photos too, I'm curious what this is capable of (chemicalbro I'm sure will send me some more photos later too.)

Yeah, the ETX-90AT looks like the one. The 80 looks like it's 400mm or something, and doesn't include the tripod.

I am thinking of picking one up in a few months. I believe the winter is not ideal for doing anything astronomy, it can still be done though I guess, right?

I got some books recommendations. Left of Orion, The Backyard Astronomer's Guide NightWatch : A Practical Guide to Viewing the Universe (Spiral-bound).

If I get the ETX-90 for example, would my cameras crop sensor come into play with focal length when using regular lenses, would I be able to view the stuff through the viewfinder (taking advantage of a greater focal length, or well, more narrow field of view I guess.)
Also, hopefully this isn't a stupid question, but can you zoom with these scopes, or is it a fixed focal length? It'd suck to have your crop body and 1200mm, and not be able to frame the moon properly or something cause your focal length is too large.

JaGWiRE,
Yes, just like a EF lens your senor size comes into play.
No, the telescope is like a prime, no zooming. You can however magnify more with the use of eyepieces. To figure out how much you will see, imagine using 2 2xTC's hooked up to your 70-300 at 300 (would be like 1200mm).

John_B wrote in post #2323286
JaGWiRE,
Yes, just like a EF lens your senor size comes into play.
No, the telescope is like a prime, no zooming. You can however magnify more with the use of eyepieces. To figure out how much you will see, imagine using 2 2xTC's hooked up to your 70-300 at 300 (would be like 1200mm).

I'm lost on the eyepiece thing. Is this something that adds a magnification to the overall focal length like when you use a microscope the eyepiece is 10x or something (trying to remember what we used in school had for it's eyepiece.) Can somebody please explain this to me?

When you connect the camera, what do you connect it to? The eyepiece? When you are shooting, you are looking through the cameras viewfinder, or the eyepiece or something on the scope?

JaGWiRE
Yes the eyepiece adds magnification to the focal length like a microscope.
When you connect the camera (at least on my telescope) you can use it as a 1200mm lens or you can put the eyepiece in between the camera and telescope and take a photo through the eyepiece. However the results aren't good enough for day photos to my eyes

John_B wrote in post #2323496
JaGWiRE
Yes the eyepiece adds magnification to the focal length like a microscope.
When you connect the camera (at least on my telescope) you can use it as a 1200mm lens or you can put the eyepiece in between the camera and telescope and take a photo through the eyepiece. However the results aren't good enough for day photos to my eyes

Right, I see. So I guess after crop, a good eyepiece, etc, I'd be looking at 2000mm focal length or so w/ camera or maybe w/o camera depending on the eyepiece. I don't think it'd be a good idea to shoot through the eyepieces, but I don't know. Sounds like shooting through a piece of glass (i.e. car window).

How much do decent eyepieces cost? Should I expect to spend around half the $ the scope costs?

I see your using your scope sort of for birding. Kind of neat, what other daytime stuff do you do? I realize if I get one of these madea ones I couldn't do that because they are like f1/3, but yeah.

BTW, am I confusing tele extenders and eyepieces? The eyepieces on the meade site have focal lengths (ultra wide, wide, etc), and not zoom ratings.

JaGWiRE,
Ahh No....
The 1250mm telescope with your 30D connected via a T adapter will be like a 2000mm (1250mm x 1.6 = 2000mm) lens without an eyepiece!
The eye piece will magnify the light even more depending on its size, I believe its divide focal length by focal length to get magnifying power ex. a 30mm eyepiece on the 1250mm telescope will give you 41x magnification. The few shots I have taken through an eyepiece (daytime shots only) were not keepers to my eyes.
Now you can put a teleconverter on a telescope to make it a like a 4000mm lens on a 1.6 DSLR (1250mm x 2 [2xTC] = 2500mm x 1.6 = 4000mm on your 30D).

I really don't use the telescope to often because quality isn't as good as EF glass, its size and even manual focus speeds aren't close to a regular EF lens. But its great on nice summer days or Lunar rises

John_B wrote in post #2323616
JaGWiRE,
Ahh No....
The 1250mm telescope with your 30D connected via a T adapter will be like a 2000mm (1250mm x 1.6 = 2000mm) lens without an eyepiece!
The eye piece will magnify the light even more depending on its size, I believe its divide focal length by focal length to get magnifying power ex. a 30mm eyepiece on the 1250mm telescope will give you 41x magnification. The few shots I have taken through an eyepiece (daytime shots only) were not keepers to my eyes.
Now you can put a teleconverter on a telescope to make it a like a 4000mm lens on a 1.6 DSLR (1250mm x 2 [2xTC] = 2500mm x 1.6 = 4000mm on your 30D).

I really don't use the telescope to often because quality isn't as good as EF glass, its size and even manual focus speeds aren't close to a regular EF lens. But its great on nice summer days or Lunar rises

Ah, thanks for clarifying that. What would 41x magnification mean? I don't know what magnification is, only focal length, haha.

It does seem the main idea of eye pieces is to control field of view, and provide a better image for your eyes when gazing.

I've been recommended two books by several people, Night Watch and Turn Left at Orion. Does anybody know if these books cover the same stuff? I'm not sure if I should buy both or one. I will drop by the bookstore or astronomy store when I get a chance and see if they have them in stock, but I might have to order them alone without getting a chance to take a peak at them.

To get decent shots, of dim objects, you need good equipment, good optics and tracking. Bright objects like the moon and planets use relatively short exposures, (<1 sec) are much easier and webcams utilizing stacking software is a cheaper way to get into astrophotography. I have 3 telescopes, Meade 10" LX 200, Stellarvue SV105 with a GM-8 mount and a cheapy Meade 390 refractor that I drag around with me. I've probably got $10K in equipment and I have not purchased a good camera yet. There are pictures of my equipment on my website plus a few images I have taken with my Sony DSC-717 using eyepiece projection.

R1200C wrote in post #2326772
To get decent shots, of dim objects, you need good equipment, good optics and tracking. Bright objects like the moon and planets use relatively short exposures, (<1 sec) are much easier and webcams utilizing stacking software is a cheaper way to get into astrophotography. I have 3 telescopes, Meade 10" LX 200, Stellarvue SV105 with a GM-8 mount and a cheapy Meade 390 refractor that I drag around with me. I've probably got $10K in equipment and I have not purchased a good camera yet. There are pictures of my equipment on my website plus a few images I have taken with my Sony DSC-717 using eyepiece projection.

What is "good equipment?" To me, the ETX Meade telescopes are "good equipment" because from my understanding, they have great optics, where as something that is "crap equipment" is the stuff you find at walmart.

Telescopes have layered levels of quality just like cameras, just depends on what you want to spend. ETX scopes were made for tabletop viewing, they are nice little scopes. Visit "Cloudy Nights" website they have forums very specific to different scopes and scope families as well as astrophotography.

Astronomer here, with 13 scopes (some are collectible antiques, handed down to me, and given to me as gifts over the many years)... and I totally agree with R1200C... and speaking from experience: I have the largest ETX that I use for a little traveling scope. It is fine if you want to shoot the moon, or daytime terestrial stuff... but shooting the planets and other celestial objects will be difficult. It isn't designed to do true quality astrophotography... it just doesn't gather enough light.

About winter and astrophotography: it actually tends to be the best time of the year to do astrophotography... the night sky has less heat and humidity issues, there are tons of winter sky objects, and as a general rule: the colder your equipment is, the better the optic clarity is.

Astrophotography takes a lot of investing, when it comes to time and money... to this very day, I still get intimidated by it... but it can be very rewarding. Goodluck with your endeavor...

Oh, here are 2 planetary shots I did with a Meade LX200 (8 inch SCT)... both were shot in the cold of winter, at prime, with a modified web cam:

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