The Astronomers

Which telescope to buy?

Below are some of the telescopes I've used in recent years, ranging from ~30 -3000 dollars. (shortened for YTs character limits) Price $35 76mm reflector dobsonian mounted (Celestron Firstscope) Weight ~ 1kg (a couple of pounds) Setup time ~0 East of Transport 1 Short focal length- wide angle field of view. Finder not really necessary. Ultra cheap, good views of Moon, Jupiter Venus, rings of Saturn, bright, wide separation double stars, and brighter deep sky objects such as M13. I was not particularly impressed with the optics on mine, but for 35 bucks, you cant complain too much! Price $200 90mm Maksutov-Cassegrain, dobsonian mount (Orion Apex) Weight ~ 1kg (a couple of pounds) Setup time ~0 East of Transport 1 Longer focal length means smaller field of view for comparable eye pieces. I was impressed with this scope on the planets. It vastly outperforms the Firstscope on optics. The scope comes off the dobsonian mount on a quick release and can be mounted as a spotter scope (the main reason I got it). The dobsonian mount here (one arm) is exactly the same as the mount for the Firstscope. These are sort of the poor mans refractor. Great views of Moon and all the bright planets. Picked out Titan (brightest moon of saturn) with ease. I got this telescope for two reasons, firstly for outreach, in that you can just grab it and point it in seconds, zero setup time. Secondly I can mount it piggyback on the CPC11 (see below) and use it as a spotting/ guide scope. The Maksutov has the 'nice' feature that its a closed tube(helps keep dust out). The Mak. will have the edge on planets/ guidescope etc due to its longer focal length, but the Newtonian will be more all around bang for the buck. Price $600 10in Newtonian reflector, dobsonian mount (Celestron Starhopper) Weight ~ 15kg (~30lbs) Setup time ~10 mins to carry parts outside, 10 mins + cool down. East of Transport: Telescope is about the size of a small child (although not that heavy). It is big and awkward. Difficult to handle for the small. Almost the biggest telescope you can fit in a compact car (the reason I got it). The long open optical train requires periodic alignment (columniation) if it is frequently transported. Powerful deep-sky scope. Near zero photographic potential, but fantastic views of nebula, globular clusters and galaxies. Great scope for planets too. At this size the moon is getting too bright to look at for any length of time. Like most big newtonians, short focal ratio, which pragmatically means you get quite wide angle views. Again well suited to deep sky observing. Price $1500 90mm (3.5in) Stellarvue apochromat, -no mount, tube only (Apo Triplet) Weight ~ 4kg (~8lbs) East of Transport: The telescope is small and easy to transport. Comes with a bag that will go on an airplane as hand baggage. Worth the price for the aperture? Probably not unless you are in a fairly specific niche. This makes a great wide angle lenses for guided photography. As a guidescope its focal length is kind of short. That basically means the field of view for a given eye piece is wide. You need a very short focal length eye piece to get good magnification. I found myself using a 4mm eyepiece to look at planets, and even at that the image was small. As a finder scope though, that wide field is great. The other thing that these scope gives is absolutely beautiful stellar images. The stars just fall into incredible pin pricks. Beautiful contrasty flat views. I found the use of the short focal length eyepieces annoying for planetary use. Lacks the light gathering for versatility as a deep sky instrument. I only really ever used this as a piggybacker for the CPC11 below. Price $2800 11in Schmidt Cassegrain, driven goto alt-az fork mount (CPC11) Weight ~ 30kg (~65lbs) and thats just the top section. Tripods another 15 kg I think. Setup time ~30 mins to carry parts outside and align, 20 mins + cool down. East of Transport: It will fit in a compact car. To carry the telescope any distance really isnt an option unless you are strong. The ergonomic design is very good though. I always found mounting up the scope a bit of a bitch. Aligning it is relatively easy as the scope mount has a GPS in it that means you dont have to plug in these numbers and the time. Alignment is quite easy. I found the scope slips relatively easily unless the clutches are done up very tight. The scope can carry quite a burden (although of course when the scope weights this much extra, it does need to be well balanced). At this level it is an excellent photographic platform. It yields amazing views of almost everything. It's photographic potential is probably as good as you can get from a portable platform. This is the instrument I used to do the full rotation of Jupiter, although there the primary limitation was the stability of the sky.

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Channels: Observational astronomy 

Added: 2425 days ago by Ordonomundi

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Galileo's Battle for the Heavens 1

PBS Nova Production by Green Umbrella Ltd. for WGBHBoston in association with Channel 4.

Galileos  Battle  for  the  Heavens 

Channels: The Astronomers 

Added: 2425 days ago by Ordonomundi

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Galileo Galilei

Requiem for a dream with pictures of astronomy, Galilei's home, and Galilei himself.

Requiem  for  dream  astronomy  galileo  galilei  telescope  earth  planets  space  outer  astronauts  music  song 

Channels: The Astronomers 

Added: 2425 days ago by Ordonomundi

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Learn the planets kids song fun space science facts and the solar system funbrain lesson

basic space science education of sun and the planets mercury venus earth jupiter mars saturn uranus neptune and the planetoid pluto. Kids learning fun planetary facts along with the planet names. brain tofu braintofu "planets songs" "elementary songs" "early learner" "early learning" "learning to read" "first words" "kids songs" "baby songs" "baby shows" "learn to read" "young reader" "nursery rhymes" "childrens songs" "learn to english" "abc song" "abc songs" "alphabet letters" "learning the abcs" "kindergarten songs" preschool songs "funbrain" "learning reading" "learning and reading" "learning to read and write" "Kids learning station" "kids learning center" "smart kid" abcs "alphabet zoo" "animal alphabet" "abc pictures" "abc 123" "abc s" "abc letters" "starfall" "baby can learn" "baby can" "baby words" "kids can learn" "baby song" "babies songs" "children songs" "the baby song" "first word" "first grade words" "my first words" "baby first words" "firstword" "first words baby" "baby first word" write books pictures teach sesame street words "how to videos for kids" "fun kids videos" "youtube for kids" "fun videos for kids" "youtube kids" popular kids websites" "videos for kids" "kids youtube videos" "kids videos"

picture  learning  baby  app  show  early  earlylearning  first  word  videos  for  babies  preschool  words  planet  songs  learner  cartoons  about  space  kid  science  kids  song  games  the  planets 

Channels: Planetary science 

Added: 2481 days ago by deek

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The Universe is a strange place

About the Lecture Perhaps the universe is not so much strange as brimming with lovely paradox. The search for such beauty seems to lie at the heart of Frank Wilczek’s work. Twentieth century physics, from Einstein through Wilczek’s own Nobel Prize-winning efforts, involves demonstrating the existence of a topsy-turvy reality: for instance, that such sub-atomic particles as quarks and gluons, which have little or no mass, “orchestrate themselves into not just protons and neutrons but you and me,” according to Wilczek. “How is it possible to construct heavy objects out of objects that weigh nothing?,” he asks. Only by “creating mass out of pure energy.” These particles are essentially “excitations in otherwise empty space.” Says Wilczek: “That suggests something …beautiful and poetic: the masses of particles are not like, or similar to or metaphorically suggested by—they are the tones or frequencies of vibration patterns in dynamical voids.” The theory of quarks and gluons and the strong interaction accounts quantitatively for “the mass of protons, neutrons and ultimately you and me and everything around us.” But physics has not yet squared away all aspects of the universe. Wilzcek says that “in cosmology, we meet our match, and don’t know what’s going on.” This is because scientists can’t account for much of the mass in the cosmos. 70% of this mass is in “dark energy,” which is pushing the universe apart. Wilczek hopes that explanations for the dark stuff will emerge through improving equations, unifying theories of different interactions and extending their symmetries. “Beautifying equations leads not to ugly consequences but beautiful surprises,” he concludes.

About  the  Lecture  Perhaps  universe  is  not  so  much  strange  as  brimming  with  lovely  paradox.  The  search  for  such  beauty  seems  to  lie  at  heart  of  Frank  Wilczek’s  work.  Twentieth  century  physics  from  Einstein  through  own  Nobel  Prize-winning  efforts  involves  demonstrating  existence  topsy-turvy  reality:  instance  that  sub-atomic  particles  quarks  and  gluons  which  have  little  or  no  mass  “orchestrate  themselves  into  just  protons  neutrons  but  you  me  according  Wilczek.  “How  it  possible  construct  heavy  objects  out  weigh  nothing  he  asks.  Only  by  “creating  pure  energy.”  These  are  essentially  “excitations  in  otherwise  empty  space.”  Says  Wilczek:  “That  suggests  something  …beautiful  poetic:  masses  like  similar  metaphorically  suggested  by—they  tones  frequencies  vibration  patterns  dynamical  voids.”  theory  strong  interaction  accounts  quantitatively  “the  ultimately  everything  around  us.”  But  has  yet  squared  away  all  aspects  universe.  Wilzcek  says  “in  cosmology  we  meet  our  match  don’t  know  what’s  going  on.”  This  because  scientists  can’t  account  cosmos.  70  this  “dark  energy  pushing  apart.  Wilczek  hopes  explanations  dark  stuff  will  emerge  improving  equations  unifying  theories  different  interactions  extending  their  symmetries.  “Beautifying  leads  ugly  consequences  beautiful  surprises  concludes. 

Channels: Lectures In Astronomy  Cosmology  Major questions in astronomy 

Added: 3254 days ago by deek

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Kepler Searching for Other Earths - NASACast Video

This webcast takes you behind the scenes to learn more about Kepler's exciting mission to discover other Earth-like planets in our galaxy.

Tech  Kepler:  Searching  for  Other  Earths  NASACast  Video 

Channels: Major questions in astronomy 

Added: 3370 days ago by adminn

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