Newcomer to Astrophotography Equipment

Hi Wolfgang,

Yes, with the ESPRIT 100ED, I would need a field flattener, but I believe that is included in the telescope accessories: 8x50 RACI.  Unsure if I will need anything else, but I would purchase any necessary accessory to get the telescope to be compatible with the R6.  Thanks for that suggestion!!!

Clear skies,
Andrewrckt

Björn Arnold:
Let me chime in with a broader reply here as recently people have more frequently asked „which equipment?“ questions.

There’s a variety of things to consider and especially to learn when one starts with astrophotography.

Sometimes it’s easier to say don’t use this because of X or Y… 

The RedCat71 is a fully corrected system while for the Esprit, you need to buy an additional corrector. The RC71 will certainly give you a lot of fun for wide field.  
For galaxies, a light bucket might be better, i.e. a reflector of 8“ or more aperture. At least many people take this approach.

From a technical point of view, the Esprit is a classical refractor design (w.r.t. focusing etc.) and so there’s a larger variety of auto focusers for example.
In addition, I am not sure if the RC71 can be used for solar imaging since I don’t know if the corrector is removable. The Esprit would be the better choice for solar imaging. (Assuming that you wouldn’t use an objective filter. For that topic, I should emphasize that one should know what one‘s doing - for your and your equipments safety)

As you can see: the choice depends on your needs. 

Both systems are of very good quality and many great images were taken with either. 

CS,
Björn

Thank you for that response.  I have thought about expanding to solar imaging in the future.  Part of the push for buying this rig now will be for the upcoming solar eclipse in 2024 as I am in New England and planning to travel to VT or NH for the event!  Didnt realize the Redcat many not be appropriate for this application.  

I am most definitely leaning toward the Esprit 100 over the Redcat due to the capabilities of the scope.  I know both are capable though, but also curious, would you rather spend all your budget up front this year on the scope alone or the scope and some practical accessories.  I am thinking placing all the budget on the scope and slowly buying accessories for the imaging train would be better rather than buying a "cheaper" scope (in the sense of budget, not quality) and accessories to start.

Hi Wolfgang,

Yes, with the ESPRIT 100ED, I would need a field flattener, but I believe that is included in the telescope accessories: 8x50 RACI.  Unsure if I will need anything else, but I would purchase any necessary accessory to get the telescope to be compatible with the R6.  Thanks for that suggestion!!!

Clear skies,
Andrewrckt

The 8x50 is the finder scope. You‘ll have to put the corrector on top.

Personally, I have this scope:

Teleskop-Express: TS-Optics 70 mm f/5 Quadruplet Flatfield Apo with 3-Element FPL53 Objective

I am very happy with it, it has the same specs like the redcat, you can put a autofocuser on it and it is half of the price of the redcat. I'm not 100% shure about it but I think it has the exact same objective like the redcat and meade. You can save up the 1000 Dollars from the redcat for your dedicated Astro camera, if you don't decide to go for the Esprit.

Clear skies

I will take a look at it!  Thanks for the suggestion.  One issue I have with the hobby getting started is the shear number of options out there.  It is a pro and a con at the same time!

Björn Arnold:

Thank you for that response.  I have thought about expanding to solar imaging in the future.  Part of the push for buying this rig now will be for the upcoming solar eclipse in 2024 as I am in New England and planning to travel to VT or NH for the event!  Didnt realize the Redcat many not be appropriate for this application.

If you have solar imaging in mind, I strongly recommend to read more about it in the beginning. There are different goals which require different hardware and you may even end up at the point to purchase a dedicated solar scope. 

My solar imaging isn’t focusing on the helioshpere and hence I can live with a „cheap“ Herschel wedge and a few filters. Haven’t thought about solar eclipses but the heliosphere is likely the major part of it and you‘ll need an Etalon to capture this signal. (@experts: please chime in if I start talking nonsense but I just want to emphasize that you might invest 1000$+ to make your scope solar eclipse fit or purchase a dedicated solar scope).

CS, Björn

Thanks!  I think that is part of the reason why I want to start this process of purchasing equipment now.  I know my main focus will be on DSO rather than solar, but the solar eclipse definitely peaks my interest as an event I would like to capture.  I am okay with $1000 investment over the next 2 years to get that image in the future.  I think for now, I am looking for a versitile scope that I can utilize in this hobby and continue to learn and grow.  That is the ultimate goal getting into this is the continual progression of growing and learning a new skill.

Björn Arnold:
My solar imaging isn’t focusing on the helioshpere and hence I can live with a „cheap“ Herschel wedge and a few filters. Haven’t thought about solar eclipses but the heliosphere is likely the major part of it and you‘ll need an Etalon to capture this signal. (@experts: please chime in if I start talking nonsense but I just want to emphasize that you might invest 1000$+ to make your scope solar eclipse fit or purchase a dedicated solar scope).

Heliosphere? We are in the middle of it!

If you were thinking of the chromosphere you would be in part right. However, in dealing with a full solar eclipse you'd not need any of those etalons or in fact any solar filter at all. Standard equipment would suffice.

Ed Dixon:
To do anything at night, you will need a few things.  This includes a good mount, reasonable refractor scope, quality astro camera, finder scope, software,  and a laptop or miniPC at scope to control things.  Things tend to go further after you get these.  Reasonable mounts are 1K and up and similar for reasonable reflectors.  Guide scope and camera is maybe 200-400.   If you go the Pixinsight route, that's about 250.  Good astro cameras start at 1K (cooled) and up.  Laptop/MiniPC starts at about 300.  It adds up pretty fast. 


One option is to start smaller at first.  Get a good refractor and use it with your rotator mount.  iOptron also has a the SkyGuider Pro package for about 500.  Get a good astro camera and use that combo for 6 months.  Then branch out after you get more experience.  Slower at first for most is a good concept… crawl before you walk, walk before you run…

Thanks for those tips!  Starting I have a L series Canon Lense with a Canon R6 (mirrorless full frame) attached to it.  I have a Move Shoot Move star tracker on a sturdy mount, so been capturing wide-field astro for about 2 years now.  I have a subscription to Adobe Photoshop where I do my imagery processing along with Luminar AI and do this all on my laptop.  I have been stacking all my imagery in Deep Sky Stacker and am getting more comfortable with the imagery processing.  

The reason why I consider myself a newbie is mainly because I have been using my photography gear for astro which I collect mainly for landscape photography.  I havent dived into a dedicated telescope yet, so just want to make sure when I make this transition, the telescope is something I can grow into rather than start too slow.  I am one that loves to struggle greatly at first as that is a huge motivator for me to keep digging deeper into a topic.  

For a guide scope I am looking at the ASI120MM Mini on a WO 50mm guiding scope.  Mount I am upgrading to the EQ6-R Pro.  I am debating about either getting the ASI Air Pro Controller, but will likely start by installing Astroberry on one of my raspberry pi computing systems I have laying around the house (I have 2 - 8GB Raspi 4's laying idle right now).  

For the camera, I want to start with my Canon R6 at first but will want to upgrade to a monochrome camera, filter wheel, and filter system to record individual bands.  I am a meteorologist that does a ton of satellite meteorology, so used to wavelength filtering and banding, just in reverse (looking at earth rather than looking up).  

One other reason to get the telescope right is the wife wont likely let me buy multiple telescopes in back-to-back years, but accessories are easier to explain (haha)...just hide them in her Amazon orders. 

Thanks again and Clear Skies!

Andy Wray:
Given what you just said, I am going to suggest that you focus on field of view.  i.e. what is it that you want to capture for the next couple of years?  Galaxies,  nebula, wild field or some combination of a couple of those.  FOV is obviously a combination of the OTA, the camera sensor and any coma corrector/field reducer that you may use.  There are many tools on-line where you can enter the details and see the FOV or just use stellarium.

Ref the EQ6R Pro mount choice:  I think that's great as it will last you for years.  My wife gave me the HEQ5 Pro when she started me on this journey and it is just a tad difficult to get right with a heavy load.

On the control computer side of things:  I opted for a Windows 11 miniPC that runs APT, SharpCap and PHD2 fine and that works fine with NINA too.  The ASIAir is great, but a bit of a locked-in system.  My windows mini PC did cost me £230 which is way more than the PI, but I'm very happy with it.

Very good ideas here.  I have been using blackwater skies to try and figure out the FOV based on the different systems I am looking at.  I think with all these suggestions I am going to go with the Skywatcher 100ED as I can use a 0.7 reducer to get some wider field shots, while still having the ability to use the full reach of the 550mm focal length if needed.

The dedicated computer system sounds tempting to me as well.  I will explore both options.  I have played with APT a little bit, but excited to play with it more as I dive further into this hobby. 

CS
Andrew

EQ6-R is a solid choice, for Telescopes I think the Esprit gives you a lot of options to keep you busy overthrew next few years. Besides guiding I‘d highly recommend to already now buy an autofocusser as it will save you from a lot of nearly sharp shots and you can easily automate focusing every hour over a long winter night.


I would not go for ASI Air as you are locked in into the Zwo Ecosystem. 
You will start feeling that pain when shopping for a mono camera, you can save a lot by buying a no-name mono camera instead of the Zwo camera.

I took that route, started with a HEQ-5 and I must say it is a capable mount but also limiting because it cannot handle well longer scopes and some very interesting telescopes that are in the 8 to 12kg class.

So in the end I spent double and upgraded to the EQ6-R, I wished I would have started with an EQ6-R in the first place.

Roger Nichol:
I highly recommend the Esprit 100ED on the EQ6-R - this was my first and current scope and would be what I chose again if starting out again.

I have automated almost everything apart from camera rotation, but you can do this gradually. I paired it with an ASI2600MC, filter wheel for dual narroband and LP filters, Sesto Senso 2 autofocuser (this is a game-changer and I would highly recommend), ZWO OAG with an ASi120mm-mini (the OAG works really well and leaves space on top of the scope to mount a mini-PC with Pegasus Pocket Powerbox Adv.

Picture below might help:

This image helps out a lot.  It is very similar to how I envisioned my set up in the future.  I am going to start with the R6 to start but eventually switch over to dedicated cooler camera system.