As a recent subscriber and an avid amateur astronomer myself. Hats off to you Tsula- what a terrific video! I was enjoying watching the video and saying to myself, holy smokes so much effort put forth to set up all the telescopes and gear! Not to mention like you stated transferring the field flatteners, diagonals, necessary adapters, camera each time you were capturing images. Bless your heart for the determination, patience, and commitment to putting forth these great videos! Thank you again! As always, look forward to new content. Sidebar... great arsenal of telescopes you own! 🔭I have a similar array myself, several refractors and two big SCT.
Hi Nate: Thank you. Yes, it takes a lot of work to get out all those telescopes and get them all going and getting the cameras off and on, not to mention while filming myself. Sometimes after a night like that I feel very creaky the next morning and kind of hunched over but I will keep going as long as I am physically able! Thanks again.
I'm so excited about your videos, dear Tsula. The first time I've seen a video about visual observation through astro-telescopes by a woman! You demonstrate here in a very realistic way what to expect and I have a few aha moments. The fact that you are so brave out there observing amongst wild animals deserves the greatest respect. If just one hedgehog shows up in my garden, I'm close to having a heart attack. I need an astro friend like you! Love your videos and greetings from Austria.
Geez, I thought the noises in my backyard on a moonless night were scary. You're very brave, Tsula! Thank you for braving the wildlife to bring us these videos. Maybe it's time to get night vision goggles to see what's out there... 😵💫 This is a great video to help new folks manage their expectations. Terrific stuff! Thanks again.
Thank you, Greg. I'm keeping bear spray out there from now on, although it seems running into the house and returning with my 400mm lens always manages to drive away any interesting animals instantly!
I'm new to your channel. What impressed me is your celestrial drawings and I really love it. That's probably the best way improving observation skill for amateurs to capture fine details visually. Lately I often do digital imaging and found myself losing some visual observing skills. Many thanks for your nice videos.
Just came across your channel and It's wonderful! The time and effort that is put into quality RUclips videos like this is often underestimated or not understood at all. Keep up the great work!
Thank you! You are exactly right. I think people don't realize how long it takes to make a video like this. So, I really appreciate the acknowledgement. Thank you!
Another home run video. I always enjoy scope comparisons. The differences between apertures and the differences between scope designs is fascinating. I remember at a very young age how disappointed I was with my first views of planets and deep sky objects…. They just don’t look like the photos on the box!. Not to mention the frustration of a cheap wobbly mount. Fast forward quite a few years when I bought my first “real” telescope. No promises of Voyager quality views., no outlandish magnification claim. Of course I had to learn for myself that the Messier objects still looked like dim grey tone patches. I didnt have you tube or even mentors to learn from so I just had to do a lot of reading and self discovery. Great videos like this would have been a huge help and definitely shortened the learning curve. Your enthusiasm is contagious. You definitely prove that this is a hobby that you need to keep moving forward as there are many obstacles that crop up but shouldnt discourage someone to just give up. Now regarding your moose issue…. Did you happen to see a flying squirrel buzzing around too? Do you carry protection with you? Probably not a bad idea to have something at hand. I never observe alone. At the very least I have my two friends Smith and Wesson with me. Too many coyotes and bears in my area to risk the danger. Thanks again for another great video. Hope you get your flip mirror setup working soon.. Clear skies! Chris
Thank you, Chris. I know exactly what you mean. I had no one to help me understand what to expect to see in my telescope. Like you I had to just read endlessly and try to figure everything out. My first telescope was so terrible that I could never see anything. When my brother told me about Dobsonians I immediately went out and bought a 6" Dob and even then I had no idea what to expect or what a galaxy was supposed to look like through the telescope. I was probably looking right at it and had no idea that the misty gray patch was the galaxy. Nevertheless, I never tired of dragging that big telescope out to the national parks and scanning the sky looking at all those marvelous stars. That moose was right behind my house. I couldn't believe it came so close. Normally they are so shy. Actually there were two of them but it didn't show well in the video and of course they left as soon as I came outside with my 400mm lens. I definitely carry bear spray when I am out walking but I didn't really think it would be necessary so close to the house. The bigger concern is that darn skunk that keeps coming around. Fortunately it does scamper away when I scream at it. I guess the bear spray will be one more item that has to go onto the table from now on. I'm waiting on that adapter for the flip mirror to come. Talk to you soon. Thanks for watching.
Wow, you seem to have some pretty cool instruments around! As a only-one-telescope owner, it is really interesting to have a view and see what one can expect from other telescopes. Well made video, thank you so much. Greetings from Spain.
Such a great range of scopes you have. But that big Meade SCT is my favourite. Although I love to do astrophotography, seeing with my own eyes is often more amazing.
Good on you having a go at doing this for all those scopes Tsula I can imagine switching between the eyepiece and camera with the refocus would have been painful. If you ever feel like a great little Astro planetary camera the ASI 224mc is great, just slots straight into your 1.25 eyepiece and is very capable. Clear skies !!
Love and watch all of your videos… really good stuff… very real and sometimes kinda funny … you show what it’s really like…learning a lot from ya and as most of us… I’am slowly growing in knowledge, while attaining the love and a smile when under a good sky!😊😊 Thank You for what you do! It is really really appreciated! 👍😃
@Tsula'sBigAdventures I sure enjoy these type videos. What one can see with different scopes. Can you list in the description sometime the model numbers of the scopes? I am glad I have not bought a telescope yet. I cannot believe how many times I go back and forth between Dobsonian, Schmidt or Mak Cassegrain or Refractor. I like the idea of not worrying about collimation with Refractors but they are also the most expensive too. The way you yelled at the moose made me think you would do that to me if I was your pesky neighbor wanting to see through your scopes. Get out of here.....you were just over last night!!! Lol
Yes, absolutely. I can edit the description to add the models. I know what you mean about vacillating between the different types of telescopes; it's so hard to decide. As you can see in the video, I just never decided! That's funny what you said about yelling at the moose and at a recurring neighbor. Actually, I think my neighbors really are afraid of me.
Bill: I edited the description to add the name of each telescope I used and a link (not necessarily where I bought each) to where you can find each telescope. Wow, the price of that Skywatcher Evostar 150mm has gone way up since I bought it!
Very informative, I was able to get a sense through your comments. I wonder though what the results would be between your 6 inch Mak vs your 6 inch refractor. I laughed during the moose part.
Hi: Thank you! I love moose but why can't they come during the day? Well, I made another video where I compared the Mak to my 6" refractor. I think it's titled Maksutov-Cassegrain Telescopes: Are They Any Good? And since I already made that one that's why I didn't compare them again. But you can watch that one and see the mighty little Mak go toe to toe with an expensive refractor.
So much work involved on this video bringing all the equipment, great content!!! Subscribed for braveness vs wildlife :) U fill somewhat of a niche for visual astronomy on RUclips! Thank you!
It is a lot of work lifting those mounts and telescopes but I'm so grateful I have the means and ability to do so from my Bortle 3 site. Thank you for watching and supporting my little channel.
Thank you. The other day I was hiking near my house in Montana and I suddenly came up on a moose right in the trail. You really shouldn't get that close to a moose but it was so sudden and she would not move and even snorted at me as if to say "back off!" So, I had no choice but to terminate my hike and return to the trailhead.
You need to go much lower than a 24mm on a 6" mak to see m31. Upgrading to a 2" diagonal and using a 40mm even 50-56mm eyepiece is the way to go. And yes it works, the smaller baffle is not an issue, there won't be vignetting. On your 12", if you dont have a 2" visual back that threads onto the big 3.25" rear cell of the scope, you need one, since the 2" sct thread step down plate does obstruct the rear baffle, and faint stars are choked off in the outer field of big 2" eyepieces. If you arent yet using 2" eyepieces for low powers and widest fields on that 12", you are only half using that scope. And unobstructed view through a 31mm nagler, 30mm widescan II, 40mm meade SWA, 40mm pentax XW, and 50mm axiom or 55mm plossl/56mm super plossl in my C11 was awesome. The veil with OIII especially in the 50mm axiom (i didn't have a 56mm SP back then before I was robbed, but I do have one now, and an old 10" meade lx premiere, and old powerstar C8 to use it in. M31 in the 31mm nagler was also pretty awesome. If you are limiting yourself to a 24mm panoptic, there is so much more sky you could be seeing. A 31mm nagler, or much lower priced but near equally performing 28mm 82deg uwan/pwa type eyepiece is absolutely amazing in a dob, as well as every other telescope you own. But way too heavy for that little goto mount your mak is on. In its case a much lighter 55 plossl or 30-42mm budget superwide is just fine at that focal ratio. Actually the 30mm UW80 chinese widescan II clones are quite nice in that scope, but to get good brightness on m31 a 40mm superwide or 55 plossl is needed. I always liked to have all 3. Surprisingly the 40mm wide field 3 element eyepieces from those 2" kits are quite good in slow scopes, but I dont recommend the whole kit, as the filters are useless except the moon filter, the 26mm might as well be 1.25", and the diagonal isnt dielectric. When I was selling scopes I always steered people away from that kkt and towards a store brand GSO dielectric diagonal and a 40mm william optics swan 72deg eyepiece for their SCT.
Critters out west are no joke! I would have some sort of firearm with me if out there alone. I'm by no means an astrophotographer, but I do know that plate scale is everything for planets - so you need either a very long f/l telescope (a Maksutov say) or a high-quality barlow like the Televue 2.5x Powermate (not a simple barlow). Thanks for the video! You have a really fine set of scopes! :)
Thanks. That moose scared the hell out of me because it was dark and I wasn't exactly sure what it was at first. But as soon as I went in the house and came back with a big zoom lens, it moved away across the meadow. They never stand there like that in broad daylight. Oh well. Yes, the best looks at planets are with big aperture like my big 12" SCT and if the seeing is good I will put on a 3X Televue Barlow I have. I got some great looks at opposition. Thank you.
i was out tonight with my old 4.5 inch tasco reflector....old enough to be made in japan, i have some decent eye pieces as far as .956 go and the views of jupiter and saturn are comparable to my 8 inch cassagrain only much smaller. orion nebula looks really good and cause the magnification is half, i can see the whole thing, on a good night i can just make out the trapezoid.....just. i think there are benefits to the smaller scopes. like you said its all about the eye training
Great video series! Have you tried filming through the eyepiece with a smartphone? Works great on the planets and would show the different views very clearly… Love watching your show!
Thanks, Frank. I tried the smartphone method and never got very good shots with it. Another viewer told me about a flip mirror I can attach instead of my current diagonal, that will allow me to attach my camera and an eyepiece at the same time. And as soon as I get the adapter for it, I'm going to be using that next. It will make things so much easier. Thanks for watching!
Great job with a challenging task! Did not realize the complexity but very insightful. Does aperture always win for the size planets appear? Based on your research, the take away is that the refractor will provide smaller but sharper views. Would you go with a 4/5“ APO refractor or a 10/12“ SCT?
Hi Elray: Thank you. For planets you always want the biggest aperture you can afford. No other telescope I have owned comes close to the resolution and apparent size of the planets in my 12” Meade Schmidt-Cassegrain. However, it is a very expensive and very heavy telescope. The resolution and quality of what you can see of planets in that little 6” Maksutov-Cassegrain was quite impressive for its size but it won’t perform as well on deep sky objects because of the smaller aperture and focal ratio of f/12. So yes you always want a bigger aperture when it comes to planets and good optics and high quality eyepieces. But you also have to consider how you would move the telescope around, where you intend to use it, can you handle the weight, and of course, does it fit your in your budget. Hope that helps.
Thank you so much, the way ahead is so much clearer now! Your selfless dedication to your channel and your flock is amazing, and I really appreciate the time you take to reply in such detail to so many and am sure others do as well. I would add that the replies you get and your replies to them is also insightful. Thank you again for helping me weed through such a complex hobby.
@@elray4932 You're welcome. I have been thinking about you since I said I would go with the 10-12" SCT. I hope I emphasized enough how hard it is to move a telescope that big around. Fully asembled my 12" weighs 100 pounds and I am only able to drag it out to the driveway on that JMI Wheeley Bar. I don't know how old you are but you have to think about the future too and whether you will be able to move around such a large telescope once you get older. Traveling with a telescope that big, for me, is out of the question. So when I do go places I take a much smaller set up that fits in my car and I can move it around. The little 115mm refractor is perfect for travel as well as the 6" Mak. Hope that helps.
@@tsulasbigadventures Thanks again Tsula! I’m retired, and need a larger image to see detail better and enjoy. I can easily handle the weight now but in ten years who knows. I have a 8“ Dob now but am not happy with the size of the planets so that is why I was trying to figure out whether not to go with a refractor or sct. Lighter and portable is of course far better everything considered. Cheers Lance
Kudos on the effort to convey what you see to the audience. First rule: "Manage Expectations." What a person sees in real time is different than what photo stacking and digital editing shows us. The main thing I kept waiting to hear from you: Your 6" and 12" refractors shine exponentially when viewing planets. That is undeniably their forte because of their focal length values. The 10" Dob is not great for planetary viewing, so of course it's subpar compared to the SCT. It shines with deep space object viewing because they're light buckets. So, you're comparing oranges to apples. Maybe next time, highlight what we "should" be using each type of telescope to view. Use the Dob for nebulas, star clusters, galaxies. Use the SCT for single planetary views.
I wouldn't worry too much about the moose, although it might be uncouth and knock your equipment over if you leave it unattended. Good advice on replacing cheap eyepieces. I picked up a set of Televue Radians that were being phased out and on sale. Also, I have all of the Panoptics, except for the 41mm hand grenade. My most memorable sighting was M44 in early morning twilight. It was like I wasn't looking through the atmosphere but more as if the Beehive Cluster was being projected onto the atmosphere. Very pastel and surreal.
The moose scared me because I couldn't really see what was going on except it sounded large. Honestly I'm more worried about that skunk that has been coming around at night. I've never heard of the radian eyepiece but I really like the Panoptic. I was looking for an eyepiece with the richest field for my big telescope and recently bought a 36mm Morpheus that I really like. I looked at the 40mm Televue Plossl but the FOV was only 44 degrees or something like that. So, I decided against it. I'll have to look up that 41mm you mentioned. Your experience looking at the Beehive sounds dreamlike. I was looking at the Beehive last night with binoculars to see if I could find and split Tegmine which "Turn Right at Orion" asserts you can do. The Beehive looked great but splitting Tegmine with binoculars? No way!
@@tsulasbigadventures In several ways the Radian series is the parent to the current DeLite series. Plossl-like but with consistent 20mm eye relief across the series.
@@markihde4381 Do you like the Radian? I would like to get another intermediate range eyepiece. I saw a used Radian for sale at Woodland. It's much cheaper than the DeLite in the same size.
@@tsulasbigadventures I'm quite happy with my Radians, especially for lunar and planetary observations in a refractor. If I break out one of my big Newtonian/Dobsonian scopes, I'll most often go to my Panoptics for a wider field of view. Baader makes really nice eyepieces, so you might find adding a 41mm Panoptic to your 36mm Morpheus to be a bit redundant. That's why I've never found a good reason to add the 41mm Panoptic to my 35mm Panoptic in the set.
Awesome thank you for your video and patience in getting all that together. I have a 6" Dob and have been thinking about upgrading to an Oberwerk XL Binocular set or getting a celestron 9.25 HD. I want some big aperture and ease of use. What would you recommend?
Thanks! That Celestron 9.25 would be a very nice. upgrade from what you have now. But the optical tube alone weighs 21 pounds. So, you would need a sturdy mount to hold it. That is something to consider. I own an 8" Meade Schmidt-Cassegrain that weighs 11.5 pounds and I find that very manageable. I think the 8" range is a good one for seeing a lot more. I think if you plan on getting the 9.25" telescope you have to consider whether you plan to take it out to dark sky sites or only use it at home. When telescopes weigh a lot they tend to not be used as much. Those are things to think about. You would not be disappointed optically with the 925.
@@Walter-uy4or I see. Well, I have to remove the visual back, diagonal, and eyepiece and put on a #62 adapter, t-ring, and camera in order to show what I'm looking at and I probably was running out of steam by that time. It's a lot of work assembling all those telescopes and putting them away. But next time I make another comparison video which I hope will be soon, I plan to add more sketches or live views.
I didn't realize how bright Jupiter was until I tried to photograph it: had to use a shutter speed of 1/60 to keep detail from being blown out. This is at 80mm diameter, 2400mm effective focal length, which is a _very_ small aperture.
My first few attempts to get a good photo of Jupiter were completely blown out also. Jupiter was much closer to earth at that time. Now it's fading away and not nearly as bright or big in the field of view.
Get an ASIAIR Tsula! I'm really impressed with mine and I can keep my controller (iPhone) in my pocket. My laptop sucks power like crazy so I'm glad not to need it unless the ASIAIR fails. I power it all with a Jackery battery. I don't know what it will do on really cold nights, but it's supposed to be able to handle it.
House: I have an ASIAIR Plus. It is not compatible with Sony. I tried and tried to get it to work with a little 30mm guidescope and ASI120mini and it just would never work. Maybe that guide scope and guide camera are too small for my equipment. Last time I tried to get it to work, I had it attached to a little 80mm refractor and I think I did manage to get it to polar align and I even got the fireworks but that was as far as I got. It just wouldn't work after that. I tried everything. I even borrowed my friend's Canon 60D to set as the main camera (ugh) and I still couldn't get it to work. I have an Orion Starshoot guide camera and 50mm guidescope that work much better. However, as you said the laptop sucks energy and worse than that it just dies apparently when it gets too cold. Soon it will be very cold in Montana and no battery will work. I will have to buy a 50 foot long USB cable to run it to the garage I guess. I wish I could get that ASI AIR to work but honestly even my phone dies in extreme cold once I remove it from my pocket. But my main problem was I couldn't understand how to get it to work when the main camera is a Sony Mirrorless camera, my camera of choice. I thought that I could jus set the ASI guide camera as the main camera but for some reason that does not work. I think because that cheap 30mm guidescope cannot be lined up as it does not have rings. Maybe now that I have a better guidescope that has rings I can line it up but I left it in California when I returned to Montana. When I go back I will take the ASI AIR back and try again with the new guidescope but I believe that means I have to buy a ZWO guide camera if I recall correctly.
@@tsulasbigadventures Yeah, I heard about that Tsula. I wanted to use my Sony a6000 but Sony isn’t supported. It would have saved me some money to use that camera instead. I decided to go with ZWO because their cameras and mount work together. First I bought the ASI224MC to shoot Jupiter at opposition, but I had to wait for my equipment to come in. I was already committed to the AM5 mount so I went all in with ZWO. I got the little 30mm guidescope and it works well with the ASI224 as guide camera. I now have an ASI533MC camera that’s actually cooled, which I think is neat. I tested the cameras and mount control on my iOptron alt/as mount, and it actually worked! (I know,right?😂). Now, I’m just waiting on the equatorial mount and I’ll be in business.
dear tsula i need your wisdom I want a good size dobson in addition to my SCT of 8 I'm hesitating between a 400 for wich I need my son for carying and mounting in the backyard but my son is not always in the best mood for that and a 300 that I can carry and install by myself What do you think of that ?
A 400 sounds mighty tempting and probably eyepopping but you really have to ask yourself if your son is not in the mood for setting it up for you all the time when you want to star gaze realistically how much would you use it. I really wanted the 14" Meade SCT but I knew I couldn't lift it and that's why in the end I got the 12". I hesitate to tell you what to do but personally I think you would find yourself actually using the 300 more.
I didn't take any photos. I carefully sketched each object painstakingly at the eyepiece in order to give the viewers a good idea of what to look for when observing at the eyepiece. In that way I was hoping to help those who are new to amateur astronomy help in locating objects in the night sky.
I know what it is like to be alone and creeped out by wild animals. We don't have moose, but we have mountain lions and rattlesnakes, and I have had 2 rattlesnake enounters, one I was alone and a big diamondback took residence under my vehicle while I was observing, I went back to get something and it rattled at me, so I backed off and threw some rocks near it and it left. The 2nd time I was with a group, and I arrived late and had to set up.next to a bush, and it turns out a small sidewinder was in the bush, and that was a scare. It did leave fortunately. Had I been bitten, we were far enough away from medical help that it wouldn't really matter that I wasnt alone. Another time I kept observing after everyone left, and started to hear rustling in the nearby foliage which creeped me out so I wound up packing it in and leaving, being afraid of mountain lions. Of course mountain lions are more stealthy than whatever rodents or rabbits who were likely the culprits of the rustling. Another time in another area there was a roadkill mountain lion on the side of the road, and a cyclist was recently mauled by a mountain lion in the area
The moose was completely uninterested in me but since it was making such a racket and I couldn't see it, it scared me silly. I have had numerous encounters with rattlesnakes but always during the day while hiking. I think I would have been terrified if I had heard one at night under the car. There are mountain lions on the property also and one morning I found the bloody remains of its meal the night before -- a deer-- just behind where I was observing but curiosly I have never seen it except on the trail camera.
As a recent subscriber and an avid amateur astronomer myself. Hats off to you Tsula- what a terrific video! I was enjoying watching the video and saying to myself, holy smokes so much effort put forth to set up all the telescopes and gear! Not to mention like you stated transferring the field flatteners, diagonals, necessary adapters, camera each time you were capturing images.
Bless your heart for the determination, patience, and commitment to putting forth these great videos! Thank you again! As always, look forward to new content. Sidebar... great arsenal of telescopes you own! 🔭I have a similar array myself, several refractors and two big SCT.
Hi Nate: Thank you. Yes, it takes a lot of work to get out all those telescopes and get them all going and getting the cameras off and on, not to mention while filming myself. Sometimes after a night like that I feel very creaky the next morning and kind of hunched over but I will keep going as long as I am physically able! Thanks again.
I'm so excited about your videos, dear Tsula. The first time I've seen a video about visual observation through astro-telescopes by a woman! You demonstrate here in a very realistic way what to expect and I have a few aha moments. The fact that you are so brave out there observing amongst wild animals deserves the greatest respect. If just one hedgehog shows up in my garden, I'm close to having a heart attack. I need an astro friend like you! Love your videos and greetings from Austria.
Hello to Austria! That is so nice of you to say. Thank you so much.
Geez, I thought the noises in my backyard on a moonless night were scary. You're very brave, Tsula! Thank you for braving the wildlife to bring us these videos. Maybe it's time to get night vision goggles to see what's out there... 😵💫 This is a great video to help new folks manage their expectations. Terrific stuff! Thanks again.
Thank you, Greg. I'm keeping bear spray out there from now on, although it seems running into the house and returning with my 400mm lens always manages to drive away any interesting animals instantly!
I'm new to your channel. What impressed me is your celestrial drawings and I really love it. That's probably the best way improving observation skill for amateurs to capture fine details visually. Lately I often do digital imaging and found myself losing some visual observing skills. Many thanks for your nice videos.
Thank you so much. That is very kind of you to say.
Just came across your channel and It's wonderful! The time and effort that is put into quality RUclips videos like this is often underestimated or not understood at all. Keep up the great work!
Thank you! You are exactly right. I think people don't realize how long it takes to make a video like this. So, I really appreciate the acknowledgement. Thank you!
Thanks for that monumental effort, I’m not sure I could have stuck it out!
Thanks. It was quite an effort to make this video.
The moose on the loose was scary. Lucky it didn't ram your telescopes. 🔭🦌 And your commentary throughout the video is so funny.
I love moose but can't they show up at a decent hour? Thank you. I'm glad you like my humor.
Another home run video. I always enjoy scope comparisons. The differences between apertures and the differences between scope designs is fascinating. I remember at a very young age how disappointed I was with my first views of planets and deep sky objects…. They just don’t look like the photos on the box!. Not to mention the frustration of a cheap wobbly mount. Fast forward quite a few years when I bought my first “real” telescope. No promises of Voyager quality views., no outlandish magnification claim. Of course I had to learn for myself that the Messier objects still looked like dim grey tone patches. I didnt have you tube or even mentors to learn from so I just had to do a lot of reading and self discovery. Great videos like this would have been a huge help and definitely shortened the learning curve.
Your enthusiasm is contagious. You definitely prove that this is a hobby that you need to keep moving forward as there are many obstacles that crop up but shouldnt discourage someone to just give up.
Now regarding your moose issue…. Did you happen to see a flying squirrel buzzing around too? Do you carry protection with you? Probably not a bad idea to have something at hand. I never observe alone. At the very least I have my two friends Smith and Wesson with me. Too many coyotes and bears in my area to risk the danger.
Thanks again for another great video. Hope you get your flip mirror setup working soon..
Clear skies!
Chris
Thank you, Chris. I know exactly what you mean. I had no one to help me understand what to expect to see in my telescope. Like you I had to just read endlessly and try to figure everything out. My first telescope was so terrible that I could never see anything. When my brother told me about Dobsonians I immediately went out and bought a 6" Dob and even then I had no idea what to expect or what a galaxy was supposed to look like through the telescope. I was probably looking right at it and had no idea that the misty gray patch was the galaxy. Nevertheless, I never tired of dragging that big telescope out to the national parks and scanning the sky looking at all those marvelous stars.
That moose was right behind my house. I couldn't believe it came so close. Normally they are so shy. Actually there were two of them but it didn't show well in the video and of course they left as soon as I came outside with my 400mm lens. I definitely carry bear spray when I am out walking but I didn't really think it would be necessary so close to the house. The bigger concern is that darn skunk that keeps coming around. Fortunately it does scamper away when I scream at it. I guess the bear spray will be one more item that has to go onto the table from now on.
I'm waiting on that adapter for the flip mirror to come. Talk to you soon. Thanks for watching.
23:40 was amazing
Thank you for your hard work and all the setup 🤗😄
Thank you! Every time I think about this video I wonder how in the world I managed to set up all that equipment by myself.
Wow, you seem to have some pretty cool instruments around! As a only-one-telescope owner, it is really interesting to have a view and see what one can expect from other telescopes. Well made video, thank you so much. Greetings from Spain.
Thank you. I'm glad you liked it and found it useful.
Such a great range of scopes you have. But that big Meade SCT is my favourite. Although I love to do astrophotography, seeing with my own eyes is often more amazing.
I agree with you. I love that telescope and I never tire of looking at things in it.
Good on you having a go at doing this for all those scopes Tsula I can imagine switching between the eyepiece and camera with the refocus would have been painful. If you ever feel like a great little Astro planetary camera the ASI 224mc is great, just slots straight into your 1.25 eyepiece and is very capable. Clear skies !!
Thank you. That sounds very appealing to just slot a camera right in the eyepiece holder. Thank you for the recommendation and thank you for watching!
Love and watch all of your videos… really good stuff… very real and sometimes kinda funny … you show what it’s really like…learning a lot from ya and as most of us… I’am slowly growing in knowledge, while attaining the love and a smile when under a good sky!😊😊 Thank You for what you do! It is really really appreciated! 👍😃
Thank you, Edward. I'm glad you liked it and got something out of it. It's good to get positive feedback.
Great video. Every beginner should watch. Thanks for uploading.
Thank you!
Just found your channel on youtube. Brilliant! Amazing lady!!
Thank you so much!
@Tsula'sBigAdventures I sure enjoy these type videos. What one can see with different scopes. Can you list in the description sometime the model numbers of the scopes? I am glad I have not bought a telescope yet. I cannot believe how many times I go back and forth between Dobsonian, Schmidt or Mak Cassegrain or Refractor. I like the idea of not worrying about collimation with Refractors but they are also the most expensive too. The way you yelled at the moose made me think you would do that to me if I was your pesky neighbor wanting to see through your scopes. Get out of here.....you were just over last night!!! Lol
Yes, absolutely. I can edit the description to add the models. I know what you mean about vacillating between the different types of telescopes; it's so hard to decide. As you can see in the video, I just never decided! That's funny what you said about yelling at the moose and at a recurring neighbor. Actually, I think my neighbors really are afraid of me.
Bill: I edited the description to add the name of each telescope I used and a link (not necessarily where I bought each) to where you can find each telescope. Wow, the price of that Skywatcher Evostar 150mm has gone way up since I bought it!
Very informative, I was able to get a sense through your comments. I wonder though what the results would be between your 6 inch Mak vs your 6 inch refractor. I laughed during the moose part.
Hi: Thank you! I love moose but why can't they come during the day? Well, I made another video where I compared the Mak to my 6" refractor. I think it's titled Maksutov-Cassegrain Telescopes: Are They Any Good? And since I already made that one that's why I didn't compare them again. But you can watch that one and see the mighty little Mak go toe to toe with an expensive refractor.
What a great channel. And the amount of work you have put into making this is pretty impressive☺️ new subscriber from Norway
Thank you so much.
So much work involved on this video bringing all the equipment, great content!!! Subscribed for braveness vs wildlife :) U fill somewhat of a niche for visual astronomy on RUclips! Thank you!
It is a lot of work lifting those mounts and telescopes but I'm so grateful I have the means and ability to do so from my Bortle 3 site. Thank you for watching and supporting my little channel.
The moose encounter was hilarious..."scram!" Good thing they have bad eyesight. This was a great video. Thank you!
Thank you. The other day I was hiking near my house in Montana and I suddenly came up on a moose right in the trail. You really shouldn't get that close to a moose but it was so sudden and she would not move and even snorted at me as if to say "back off!" So, I had no choice but to terminate my hike and return to the trailhead.
Love your videos….my Meade 8” sct is fabulous too.
Thank you.
You need to go much lower than a 24mm on a 6" mak to see m31. Upgrading to a 2" diagonal and using a 40mm even 50-56mm eyepiece is the way to go. And yes it works, the smaller baffle is not an issue, there won't be vignetting.
On your 12", if you dont have a 2" visual back that threads onto the big 3.25" rear cell of the scope, you need one, since the 2" sct thread step down plate does obstruct the rear baffle, and faint stars are choked off in the outer field of big 2" eyepieces.
If you arent yet using 2" eyepieces for low powers and widest fields on that 12", you are only half using that scope.
And unobstructed view through a 31mm nagler, 30mm widescan II, 40mm meade SWA, 40mm pentax XW, and 50mm axiom or 55mm plossl/56mm super plossl in my C11 was awesome. The veil with OIII especially in the 50mm axiom (i didn't have a 56mm SP back then before I was robbed, but I do have one now, and an old 10" meade lx premiere, and old powerstar C8 to use it in.
M31 in the 31mm nagler was also pretty awesome.
If you are limiting yourself to a 24mm panoptic, there is so much more sky you could be seeing. A 31mm nagler, or much lower priced but near equally performing 28mm 82deg uwan/pwa type eyepiece is absolutely amazing in a dob, as well as every other telescope you own. But way too heavy for that little goto mount your mak is on. In its case a much lighter 55 plossl or 30-42mm budget superwide is just fine at that focal ratio. Actually the 30mm UW80 chinese widescan II clones are quite nice in that scope, but to get good brightness on m31 a 40mm superwide or 55 plossl is needed. I always liked to have all 3. Surprisingly the 40mm wide field 3 element eyepieces from those 2" kits are quite good in slow scopes, but I dont recommend the whole kit, as the filters are useless except the moon filter, the 26mm might as well be 1.25", and the diagonal isnt dielectric. When I was selling scopes I always steered people away from that kkt and towards a store brand GSO dielectric diagonal and a 40mm william optics swan 72deg eyepiece for their SCT.
OK. I made a lot of improvements since this video. I got a 40mm plossl and 56mm 2" and I'm very happy with those two eyepieces and can see a lot more.
Critters out west are no joke! I would have some sort of firearm with me if out there alone. I'm by no means an astrophotographer, but I do know that plate scale is everything for planets - so you need either a very long f/l telescope (a Maksutov say) or a high-quality barlow like the Televue 2.5x Powermate (not a simple barlow). Thanks for the video! You have a really fine set of scopes! :)
Thanks. That moose scared the hell out of me because it was dark and I wasn't exactly sure what it was at first. But as soon as I went in the house and came back with a big zoom lens, it moved away across the meadow. They never stand there like that in broad daylight. Oh well. Yes, the best looks at planets are with big aperture like my big 12" SCT and if the seeing is good I will put on a 3X Televue Barlow I have. I got some great looks at opposition. Thank you.
@@tsulasbigadventures I was pretty sure you could run away, but the idea of a moose destroying all those telescopes was hard to imagine :)
@@ultrametric9317 My exact thoughts as well!
@@tsulasbigadventures :) Stay safe! :)
i was out tonight with my old 4.5 inch tasco reflector....old enough to be made in japan, i have some decent eye pieces as far as .956 go and the views of jupiter and saturn are comparable to my 8 inch cassagrain only much smaller. orion nebula looks really good and cause the magnification is half, i can see the whole thing, on a good night i can just make out the trapezoid.....just. i think there are benefits to the smaller scopes. like you said its all about the eye training
Yes, I like having a small telescope for the very large objects like NGC7000 and others and other things.
Great video series! Have you tried filming through the eyepiece with a smartphone? Works great on the planets and would show the different views very clearly…
Love watching your show!
Thanks, Frank. I tried the smartphone method and never got very good shots with it. Another viewer told me about a flip mirror I can attach instead of my current diagonal, that will allow me to attach my camera and an eyepiece at the same time. And as soon as I get the adapter for it, I'm going to be using that next. It will make things so much easier. Thanks for watching!
Great job with a challenging task! Did not realize the complexity but very insightful. Does aperture always win for the size planets appear? Based on your research, the take away is that the refractor will provide smaller but sharper views. Would you go with a 4/5“ APO refractor or a 10/12“ SCT?
Hi Elray: Thank you. For planets you always want the biggest aperture you can afford. No other telescope I have owned comes close to the resolution and apparent size of the planets in my 12” Meade Schmidt-Cassegrain. However, it is a very expensive and very heavy telescope. The resolution and quality of what you can see of planets in that little 6” Maksutov-Cassegrain was quite impressive for its size but it won’t perform as well on deep sky objects because of the smaller aperture and focal ratio of f/12. So yes you always want a bigger aperture when it comes to planets and good optics and high quality eyepieces. But you also have to consider how you would move the telescope around, where you intend to use it, can you handle the weight, and of course, does it fit your in your budget. Hope that helps.
If money weren’t a concern I would go with 10-12” SCT!
Thank you so much, the way ahead is so much clearer now! Your selfless dedication to your channel and your flock is amazing, and I really appreciate the time you take to reply in such detail to so many and am sure others do as well. I would add that the replies you get and your replies to them is also insightful. Thank you again for helping me weed through such a complex hobby.
@@elray4932 You're welcome. I have been thinking about you since I said I would go with the 10-12" SCT. I hope I emphasized enough how hard it is to move a telescope that big around. Fully asembled my 12" weighs 100 pounds and I am only able to drag it out to the driveway on that JMI Wheeley Bar. I don't know how old you are but you have to think about the future too and whether you will be able to move around such a large telescope once you get older. Traveling with a telescope that big, for me, is out of the question. So when I do go places I take a much smaller set up that fits in my car and I can move it around. The little 115mm refractor is perfect for travel as well as the 6" Mak. Hope that helps.
@@tsulasbigadventures Thanks again Tsula! I’m retired, and need a larger image to see detail better and enjoy. I can easily handle the weight now but in ten years who knows. I have a 8“ Dob now but am not happy with the size of the planets so that is why I was trying to figure out whether not to go with a refractor or sct. Lighter and portable is of course far better everything considered. Cheers Lance
Lovelly video! Thank you very much!
Thank you! I'm glad you liked it.
Thank you ❤
Thank you!
9:13 Was that a transit shadow of one of Jupe's moons?
Yes. Good eye! That was not a very good shot of a shadow transit. I got some better ones with my 12" SCT.
Kudos on the effort to convey what you see to the audience. First rule: "Manage Expectations." What a person sees in real time is different than what photo stacking and digital editing shows us. The main thing I kept waiting to hear from you: Your 6" and 12" refractors shine exponentially when viewing planets. That is undeniably their forte because of their focal length values. The 10" Dob is not great for planetary viewing, so of course it's subpar compared to the SCT. It shines with deep space object viewing because they're light buckets. So, you're comparing oranges to apples. Maybe next time, highlight what we "should" be using each type of telescope to view. Use the Dob for nebulas, star clusters, galaxies. Use the SCT for single planetary views.
OK. Thanks for the tips. I'm working on a project right now on what you can see in your Dob. So, I will incorporate your suggestions. Thanks.
I wouldn't worry too much about the moose, although it might be uncouth and knock your equipment over if you leave it unattended. Good advice on replacing cheap eyepieces. I picked up a set of Televue Radians that were being phased out and on sale. Also, I have all of the Panoptics, except for the 41mm hand grenade. My most memorable sighting was M44 in early morning twilight. It was like I wasn't looking through the atmosphere but more as if the Beehive Cluster was being projected onto the atmosphere. Very pastel and surreal.
The moose scared me because I couldn't really see what was going on except it sounded large. Honestly I'm more worried about that skunk that has been coming around at night. I've never heard of the radian eyepiece but I really like the Panoptic. I was looking for an eyepiece with the richest field for my big telescope and recently bought a 36mm Morpheus that I really like. I looked at the 40mm Televue Plossl but the FOV was only 44 degrees or something like that. So, I decided against it. I'll have to look up that 41mm you mentioned. Your experience looking at the Beehive sounds dreamlike. I was looking at the Beehive last night with binoculars to see if I could find and split Tegmine which "Turn Right at Orion" asserts you can do. The Beehive looked great but splitting Tegmine with binoculars? No way!
@@tsulasbigadventures In several ways the Radian series is the parent to the current DeLite series. Plossl-like but with consistent 20mm eye relief across the series.
@@markihde4381 Do you like the Radian? I would like to get another intermediate range eyepiece. I saw a used Radian for sale at Woodland. It's much cheaper than the DeLite in the same size.
@@tsulasbigadventures I'm quite happy with my Radians, especially for lunar and planetary observations in a refractor. If I break out one of my big Newtonian/Dobsonian scopes, I'll most often go to my Panoptics for a wider field of view. Baader makes really nice eyepieces, so you might find adding a 41mm Panoptic to your 36mm Morpheus to be a bit redundant. That's why I've never found a good reason to add the 41mm Panoptic to my 35mm Panoptic in the set.
@@markihde4381 Thanks. That's helpful.
For the most bang for the buck the dobsonian 10 in is the way to go however it can be cumbersome and difficult the transport and no bells and whistles
Saturn queen of telescopes, absolutely
Awesome thank you for your video and patience in getting all that together. I have a 6" Dob and have been thinking about upgrading to an Oberwerk XL Binocular set or getting a celestron 9.25 HD. I want some big aperture and ease of use. What would you recommend?
Thanks! That Celestron 9.25 would be a very nice. upgrade from what you have now. But the optical tube alone weighs 21 pounds. So, you would need a sturdy mount to hold it. That is something to consider. I own an 8" Meade Schmidt-Cassegrain that weighs 11.5 pounds and I find that very manageable. I think the 8" range is a good one for seeing a lot more. I think if you plan on getting the 9.25" telescope you have to consider whether you plan to take it out to dark sky sites or only use it at home. When telescopes weigh a lot they tend to not be used as much. Those are things to think about. You would not be disappointed optically with the 925.
Nice video though I could not see a picture through the 6 in MCT (around 20 min mark).
Thanks. I'm not sure. I went to the 20 minute mark and I was talking about Saturn. Is that what you are referring to?
@@tsulasbigadventures Right, e.g. no picture of Saturn through the 6 inch MCT. Great video otherwise.
@@Walter-uy4or I see. Well, I have to remove the visual back, diagonal, and eyepiece and put on a #62 adapter, t-ring, and camera in order to show what I'm looking at and I probably was running out of steam by that time. It's a lot of work assembling all those telescopes and putting them away. But next time I make another comparison video which I hope will be soon, I plan to add more sketches or live views.
I didn't realize how bright Jupiter was until I tried to photograph it: had to use a shutter speed of 1/60 to keep detail from being blown out. This is at 80mm diameter, 2400mm effective focal length, which is a _very_ small aperture.
My first few attempts to get a good photo of Jupiter were completely blown out also. Jupiter was much closer to earth at that time. Now it's fading away and not nearly as bright or big in the field of view.
I have a 10 inch newton. Thinking on a 12 inch Meade Sct. Would it be a huge improvement in viewing?
Yes. Huge improvement.
@@tsulasbigadventures Some people say Eq6r can handle it. What do you think? 35lb
@@FJano12 I put my 30 pound telescope on it and it performed fine. I think another five pounds should be OK.
@@tsulasbigadventures Thanks
Get an ASIAIR Tsula! I'm really impressed with mine and I can keep my controller (iPhone) in my pocket. My laptop sucks power like crazy so I'm glad not to need it unless the ASIAIR fails. I power it all with a Jackery battery. I don't know what it will do on really cold nights, but it's supposed to be able to handle it.
House: I have an ASIAIR Plus. It is not compatible with Sony. I tried and tried to get it to work with a little 30mm guidescope and ASI120mini and it just would never work. Maybe that guide scope and guide camera are too small for my equipment. Last time I tried to get it to work, I had it attached to a little 80mm refractor and I think I did manage to get it to polar align and I even got the fireworks but that was as far as I got. It just wouldn't work after that. I tried everything. I even borrowed my friend's Canon 60D to set as the main camera (ugh) and I still couldn't get it to work. I have an Orion Starshoot guide camera and 50mm guidescope that work much better. However, as you said the laptop sucks energy and worse than that it just dies apparently when it gets too cold. Soon it will be very cold in Montana and no battery will work. I will have to buy a 50 foot long USB cable to run it to the garage I guess. I wish I could get that ASI AIR to work but honestly even my phone dies in extreme cold once I remove it from my pocket. But my main problem was I couldn't understand how to get it to work when the main camera is a Sony Mirrorless camera, my camera of choice. I thought that I could jus set the ASI guide camera as the main camera but for some reason that does not work. I think because that cheap 30mm guidescope cannot be lined up as it does not have rings. Maybe now that I have a better guidescope that has rings I can line it up but I left it in California when I returned to Montana. When I go back I will take the ASI AIR back and try again with the new guidescope but I believe that means I have to buy a ZWO guide camera if I recall correctly.
@@tsulasbigadventures Yeah, I heard about that Tsula. I wanted to use my Sony a6000 but Sony isn’t supported. It would have saved me some money to use that camera instead. I decided to go with ZWO because their cameras and mount work together. First I bought the ASI224MC to shoot Jupiter at opposition, but I had to wait for my equipment to come in. I was already committed to the AM5 mount so I went all in with ZWO. I got the little 30mm guidescope and it works well with the ASI224 as guide camera. I now have an ASI533MC camera that’s actually cooled, which I think is neat. I tested the cameras and mount control on my iOptron alt/as mount, and it actually worked! (I know,right?😂). Now, I’m just waiting on the equatorial mount and I’ll be in business.
dear tsula i need your wisdom
I want a good size dobson in addition to my SCT of 8
I'm hesitating between a 400 for wich I need my son for carying and mounting in the backyard
but my son is not always in the best mood for that
and a 300 that I can carry and install by myself
What do you think of that ?
A 400 sounds mighty tempting and probably eyepopping but you really have to ask yourself if your son is not in the mood for setting it up for you all the time when you want to star gaze realistically how much would you use it. I really wanted the 14" Meade SCT but I knew I couldn't lift it and that's why in the end I got the 12". I hesitate to tell you what to do but personally I think you would find yourself actually using the 300 more.
12:39 two eyeshine so two moose?
Gotta get yourself a nice cozy moose-proof observatory!
Mouse proof!? Oh my god, don't get me started on the mice out there in Dark Skies, Montana! Thank god for the Ermine.
Your a trooper, great video, it’s impossible to show people exactly what’s it actually like to visually observe objects, nice try though. Thanks
Thanks, Woody.
Why does the galaxy photos look like paper and pencil drawings
I didn't take any photos. I carefully sketched each object painstakingly at the eyepiece in order to give the viewers a good idea of what to look for when observing at the eyepiece. In that way I was hoping to help those who are new to amateur astronomy help in locating objects in the night sky.
I know what it is like to be alone and creeped out by wild animals. We don't have moose, but we have mountain lions and rattlesnakes, and I have had 2 rattlesnake enounters, one I was alone and a big diamondback took residence under my vehicle while I was observing, I went back to get something and it rattled at me, so I backed off and threw some rocks near it and it left. The 2nd time I was with a group, and I arrived late and had to set up.next to a bush, and it turns out a small sidewinder was in the bush, and that was a scare. It did leave fortunately. Had I been bitten, we were far enough away from medical help that it wouldn't really matter that I wasnt alone.
Another time I kept observing after everyone left, and started to hear rustling in the nearby foliage which creeped me out so I wound up packing it in and leaving, being afraid of mountain lions. Of course mountain lions are more stealthy than whatever rodents or rabbits who were likely the culprits of the rustling.
Another time in another area there was a roadkill mountain lion on the side of the road, and a cyclist was recently mauled by a mountain lion in the area
The moose was completely uninterested in me but since it was making such a racket and I couldn't see it, it scared me silly. I have had numerous encounters with rattlesnakes but always during the day while hiking. I think I would have been terrified if I had heard one at night under the car. There are mountain lions on the property also and one morning I found the bloody remains of its meal the night before -- a deer-- just behind where I was observing but curiosly I have never seen it except on the trail camera.