Best products from r/askastronomy

Hello :-)

What is your budget?

Most cheap and small telescopes are utter garbage, sorry. "Small" and "Pocket" suggest a small aperture and flimsy mount. For astronomy, that's a deadly combo :-)

• Binoculars. As /u/sflamel wrote :-) Even cheaper $30 binoculars such as the Cometron 7x50 are OK, but you get what you pay for. Still, a better choice than anything in the sub-$100 range.
  
  
• Verdict: Yes!
  
  
• $20: Astromedia Cardboard newtonian, plumber's telescope kit or Galilean kit (US). These work, are educational and fun to build. Overall they make more sense than a small telescope. IF the person likes to build stuff.
  
  
• Verdict: Yes?
  
  
  
• 50mm refractor. These cost under $50, but mount and accessories simply suck. Sorry. They might look like your normal telescope, and beginners will think: "This is great!" but they are not. Some start at 27 dollars. Even the ones from Brands like Celestron or Meade (e.g. 50az, 60az, 60eq) share some of the issues (stability, accessories).
  
  
• Verdict: Please No.
  
  
• $40-$60: Firstscope 76/300, Meade Lightbridge Mini 82 and similar.
  
  
• Travelscope.
  
  
• Those are cute small telescopes, but they do not show a lot. I used mine a couple of nights, but moved on. They have flawed optics making them less ideal for planets, and for wide-field, binoculars are much easier to use.
  
  
  
• Verdict: Firstscope/Mini: Maybe yes. Travelscope: Maybe No.
  
  
• 70eq, 70az and similar telescopes: Mount often not ideal. They work, but 70mm aperture is pretty limited by today's "standard".
  
  
• Verdict: Inspire or LT 70az maybe, but you can usually get a better telescope for a similar price-tag.
  
  
• $70-$100: Orion Skyscanner 100; Often $75 as "2nd" (used/refurbished) via Telescope.com. For that, it's a nice table-top telescope that already is more useful than the 3" table-tops. Still, it's not ideal.
  
  
• Verdict: Maybe. Beats most, far from perfect.
  
  
• $130 Dazzle 4.5. This is where it starts to get a bit better. 4.5" aperture already shows quite a bit compared to the other entry-level telescopes. It's not ideal for planets, but still outperforms all the cheap 3" telescopes.
  
  
• Verdict: Yes. Better choice in this price-range!
  
  
• Ignore all the 127eq and 114eq in this price-range. They either have flawed optics (bird-jones 114/1000, 127/1000; Spherical mirror: Astromaster 130) or a weak mount (All of them).
  
  
• Verdict: Burn. ... Especially these and the smaller refractors can often be found for $10-$20 on the classifieds, because no one wants them anymore.
  
  
• $180-200: Lightbridge Mini 130, Zhumell z130, AWB Oneksy (Europe: Heritage 130p). These are among the best entry-level telescopes despite some quirks. Other telescopes in a similar price-range are the Meade Inifnity 102mm (short, not ideal for planets, but decent otherwise), 90eq (decent but small aperture shows less), Orion xt4.5 (a bit more expensive, focal-ratio has some benefits compared to the 130mm table-tops, but it's price is close to a great 6" dobsonian). These might look like toys to some, but they are much less than an overpriced, bad, weak little refractor with 5 star rating on Amazon.
  
  
• Verdict: Wow!
  
  
• $300, $400: Skywatcher 6" or 8" dobsonian, Zhumell z8. Big. More expensive. Show so much more. z8 has so many accessories it's one of the best deals out there.
  
  
• Celestron Nexstar 130 or 127 SLT: Computerized, but GoTo will NOT make everything easier for beginners. Relatively compact. 8" will show a lot more though.
  
  
• Verdict: DO NOT get these. You will have tired employees all the time. They will stay up all night looking through their great telescope and come to work sleepy every other day!
  
  Difference a large aperture makes
  
  Size, Portability
  
   
  
  If you where thinking of something like a small $10-$20 handheld monocular or a $20-$50 spotting-scope: These work well for day-time and the moon. They are pretty bad for astronomy though. Anything with zoom in this price-range is. And over 10x magnification is difficult to hold free-handed, during the night, when you try to focus on a small detail. It's tolerable during the day, but not for nebulae and such.
  
  &nbp;
  
  TL;DR: "Turn left at Orion" or "Nightwatch" plus binoculars -> Best entry level set for beginners. Or at least the telescope in the $120-$200 range.
  
  
  Clear skies!

Stars are never more than points of light in all amateur telescopes, so even if you aimed a scope at them, they're going to look just like they do to the naked eye, just brighter. The exception from your examples being Castor, which is a nice double star that only a telescope will resolve. A number of stars are double stars, often appearing as a blue/gold pair that look very nice in telescopes. These are always interesting to see in light pollution. The challenge is finding them since you don't have many stars visible as a reference to aim the scope. A few stars are deep red carbon stars, but will require modest aperture (at least 8") to easily spot amongst light pollution.

As far as other objects are concerned, a few will be visible in a telescope.

Star clusters (open clusters and globular clusters) are good targets in light pollution since the brightness of stars increases with the square of the aperture, whereas light pollution does not (light pollution through a telescope can never look worse than it does to the naked eye). In fact, by using high magnification against many globular clusters, you can dim the light pollution without dimming the stars. This increases contrast, which makes them easier to see. By increasing magnification, you drop the exit pupil, which in turn makes all objects with a surface area dimmer (the moon, planets, galaxies, nebulae, and light pollution). But optical point sources like stars, are not affected by exit pupil, only by aperture. An 8" telescope will make stars 816 times brighter than the naked eye shows them, but light pollution will never get brighter.

A few planetary nebulae will be visible in light pollution. They are bright, but small, and require modest magnification to see easily. An O-III filter can help them stand out more since these kinds of nebulae strongly emit light in the O-III part of the spectrum. A select few are bright enough that an O-III might not be needed.

Many other nebulae will also be visible with line filters like O-III and Hydrogen Beta filters. Reflection nebulae will not, however.

Most galaxies will be invisible. They are full spectrum objects whose light cannot be isolated from light pollution with a filter. Since most galaxies have low surface brightness, they are easily lost even in modest amounts of light pollution. The Andromeda Galaxy's core will be visible as a faint smudge through a telescope.

Because galaxies and nebulae have a surface area, they get dimmer with increased magnification, the same way light pollution does. So you cannot use the same trick you use on star clusters to increase their contrast. The only way to increase contrast of emission nebulae and planetary nebulae is with a UHC/narrowband, O-III filter, or H-Beta filter. If you did get a scope, I would recommend buying a good quality UHC/narrowband, then O-III, and then an H-Beta filter (in that order, as funds allow). The key is good quality though. Cheap UHC/narrowband filters behave more like broadband filters, and do a poor job of isolating the light from emission and planetary nebulae. Expect to pay $80-100 for a quality filter.

Planets are unaffected by light pollution, and even a small aperture (3" to 6") can reveal far more than the naked eye or binoculars can. However, viewing detail on the planets requires a decent quality telescope, and favorable viewing conditions.

Telescopes I would recommend to get started

1. Explore Scientific FirstLight 114mm: https://explorescientificusa.com/collections/firstlight/products/fl-n114500eq3 ($170)
   
2. Zhumell Z-130: https://www.amazon.com/Zhumell-Portable-Altazimuth-Reflector-Telescope/dp/B07BRLSVWM ($200) (downside is it needs a sturdy table to sit on)
   
3. SkyWatcher 6" Classic: https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1141699-REG/sky_watcher_s11600_6_traditional_dobsonian.html ($285)
   
   Specifically I recommend avoiding all Celestron PowerSeekers and AstroMasters. They are very, very poor quality.
   
   I also recommend avoiding all refractors. They are extremely overpriced for how much aperture you get, often come on wobbly mounts, have poor focusers, and exhibit chromatic aberration (unless you spend a couple thousand on a nice one), which will seriously rob planetary contrast. Newtonian reflectors with parabolic mirrors on Dobsonian mounts are by far the most cost-effective way to get decent aperture, and aperture is what will best resolve double stars, make star clusters brighter, show planetary and lunar detail, and allow you to use decent magnification against small planetary nebulae.

I would say that the best thing that you can probably do is to join a local astronomy club. They're more than likely going to have "star parties" where they all bring different telescopes and look at different things in the night sky. It should give you a good taste of what you can see, the pros and cons of different telescopes, and real world experience. You're also going to have a ton of experienced observers who you can ask questions and talk with.

Besides that, I would probably pick up a book called Turn Left at Orion and a star atlas (my personal favorite is Sky and telescope Pocket Sky Atlas). Turn Left at Orion is essentially a beginners guide to amateur astronomy. It tells you what the best things to observe are during different times of the year, descriptions of them, how to find them, and other things. A star atlas is essentially a map of the night sky. I would also look into Stellarium. It's a free program that shows you what your night sky looks like based on your date, time, and where you live. It's pretty much an interactive star atlas. Also, if you have any book money left over, you might consider getting RASC's 2017 Observer's Hand. It tells you, in detail, what important things are going to be going on above our heads in 2017. It also has some nice articles for beginning astronomers, a bunch of nice maps, and a lot of helpful charts. I wouldn't call it a necessity, but it's really nice to have.

I would also recommend joining an online astronomy forum. Cloudy Nights is my favorite. The folks there are all passionate about astronomy, very nice, and very knowledgeable.

Lastly, and this is the most important piece of advice I can give, is to just get out there and start observing. You don't need a telescope or even binoculars. Go out and try to find constellations or try to find where the planets currently are or see if you can see some of the brighter Deep Sky Objects (those are essentially anything that isn't a planet or the moon). The Pleiades and the Orion Nebula are great first things to look for, for instance. Just enjoy being out there under the stars. It's a great feeling.

Clear Skies!

Nice! Well, I would definitely recommend he read some Carl Sagan (Cosmos and Pale Blue Dot) and Steven Hawking (Brief History of Time, The Grand Design, etc.). Looks like there's a really good book out since 3 days ago called, The Science of Interstellar by Kip Thorne. This would be a really good book to get him. I picked up a pretty old Astronomy textbook a while ago for a really cheap price that I'm going to look over a bit, but I don't know of any specific ones to recommend. Here's an awesome PDF I got from a redditor who was offering an eBook and PDF of his book for free to anyone who asked: http://docdroid.net/kyjz

You can't go wrong with a Dobsonian in the 6"-8"-10" range. At the lower end they'll be less expensive and more portable, but at the higher end you'll be able to see more.

http://www.telescope.com/Telescopes/Dobsonian-Telescopes/Classic-Dobsonians/pc/1/c/12/13.uts

I have an Orion 8" Dobsonian. They also sell Intelliscope models that will assist you in finding objects. I like finding things on my own, by star-hopping, but it takes a little patience and experience. These books will help:

http://www.amazon.com/Turn-Left-Orion-Hundreds-Telescope/dp/0521153972

http://www.amazon.com/NightWatch-Practical-Guide-Viewing-Universe/dp/155407147X

I recommend getting one with at least two eyepieces, or at least one eyepiece and a Barlow, so you'll have a choice of magnifications.

And whether or not you get a telescope, a pair of binoculars is a good thing to have. 7x50s are nice and easy to use without a tripod. 10x50s will show you a little more but are a little harder to hold steady. Anything larger and you'll probably want a tripod for them. I have 10x50s and am considering getting these:

http://www.amazon.com/Celestron-SkyMaster-Binoculars-Tripod-Adapter/dp/B00008Y0VN

Your teenaged relative could learn how to navigate the stars, and identify constellation locations by sight with a quality pair of binoculars and a book like Turn Left at Orion.

For an even more involved and rewarding gift, check out local telescope making workshops.
You only need a mirror blank (typically made of pyrex glass) and some grit, so he can certainly do this at home when he's not at the workshop. An 8" mirror will take about 40 hours of grinding and polishing the surface, which ends up being optically superior to machine-made mirrors.

If you feel like reading on your own, over at /r/astrophotography we have a pretty comprehensive Wiki geared toward helping you figure out which scope works for you. Keep in mind though it's with imaging in mind and not just basic observing.

Orion is a quality manufacturer, their gear is used pretty widely across the board with amateurs and enthusiasts for observation and astrophotography.

The first thing you need to do is have real expectations, all the cool space shots you see are always done with long exposures, usually stacked. This means that your camera sensor is opened up to accept a a lot of photons over a longer period of time, the resulting image ends up in way more detail and contrast than you would get with just viewing through the eyepiece. If you scroll down toward the bottom of this you'll see some comparisons of what you can expect to see.

If you don't plan on imaging, you essentially want the largest aperture scope you can afford, this will be a reflector like the one you linked. However I would look for a Dobsonian mount instead of a equatorial (tripod mount). You can get an 8" Reflector for just about $400. But this is a big footprint scope, heavier and not totally easy to tote around frequently. This is kind of a catch-22 because the way you will get the most out of this scope is to bring it to the darkest area possible, up into the mountains like you mentioned would be ideal.

A couple good examples would be either M31 (Andromeda) or M42 (Orion Nebula) both large and fairly distinct objects, M42 is actually the closest Nebula to us and that's one of the reasons it's so widely photographed and viewed. Andromeda with a 8' Reflector at a dark site would yield you something like this. On the other hand, an image from user /u/kindark with a less powerful scope but multiple stacked exposures was able to produce this. The former is more what you can expect to actually see.

The most common introductory book to astronomy is probably this one:

https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Modern-Astrophysics-2nd/dp/0805304029

It is pretty much the bible of undergraduate astronomy. Keep in mind, that a lot of it is going to be hard to follow if you do not have a couple of semesters of calculus and physics under your belt, but if you want an overview of the material you would be learning as an undergraduate. It is pretty thorough, though a bit outdated at this point.

There are also plenty of textbooks used to teach GE astronomy classes that do not have a steep math and physics assumption. You might want to find out what the local college or university uses for their GE astronomy classes and start there. Those books should be easier to follow.

The Cosmic Perspective is a pretty good introductory text for astronomy.

The most comprehensive text in astrophysics is An Introduction to Modern Astrophysics by Carroll and Ostlie (often referred to as the "big orange book," or BOB for short). This text is much more mathematically involved, but will teach you most anything you might want to know about astrophysics.

If you really want to understand astronomy, then BOB is the way to go, but you'll have to learn calculus and a couple of years of physics to understand some of the concepts. I would suggest starting with The Cosmic Perspective and learning some physics and math if you become interested enough to move on to BOB.

I'm not familiar with the book you mentioned, but the best one I know for people getting into astronomy is NightWatch by Terence Dickinson.

I also enjoyed this one: Link

It's not overwhelming and does a good job of explaining the basics.

A good place to start is Introduction to Modern Astrophysics, by Carroll and Ostlie:
https://www.amazon.com/Introduction-Modern-Astrophysics-2nd/dp/0805304029
It's a good upper-undergrad to grad-level textbook that covers a lot of topics.

I can indeed. I did the experiment myself a few months ago as a part of my course so I have the activity handbook. I'll go back and read it again tomorrow my time to refresh my memory and post some details at some point tomorrow. If you don't have one, try to get a star atlas. Stellarium is useful but I find using a book easier.

I use this one:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Sky-Telescopes-Pocket-Atlas/dp/1931559317/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1520534912&sr=8-2&keywords=pocket+star+atlas


Will post details of the experiment tomorrow. Am just going out for dinner.

I've owned about a dozen telescopes and the best beginner telescope is by far the Orion skyquest, 8 inch. You can find them used on craigslist for half the price. https://www.amazon.com/Orion-8945-SkyQuest-Dobsonian-Telescope/dp/B001DDW9V6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1491667181&sr=8-1&keywords=orion+skyquest+xt8

Thank you! I passed the link on to my parents, and I am considering getting him this book as well.

This, but here is a much better purchase

Hey,

Maybe you'll find this interesting:
https://www.amazon.com/Practical-Astronomy-your-Calculator-Spreadsheet/dp/0521146542


I haven't read the book, but by description,
"...this new edition shows you how to use spreadsheets to predict, with greater accuracy, solar and lunar eclipses, the positions of the planets, and the times of sunrise and sunset. Suitable for worldwide use, this handbook covers orbits, transformations and general celestial phenomena, and is essential for anyone wanting to make astronomical calculations for themselves...",
it may be what are you looking for.

You want these. This is such a ridiculously good deal--these should cost at least $200.

http://www.amazon.com/Celestron-SkyMaster-Binoculars-Tripod-Adapter/dp/B00008Y0VN/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1453001226&sr=8-1&keywords=skymaster

Carrol and Ostlie, a.k.a BOB (big orange book).

Start here and go through the trig and calculus videos, problems, etc. Then hit up the physics stuff. After that you might want to find other resources to learn Trig, Calc, and College level physics. Then you can think about picking up this hefty thing.

Edit: There is also an "ebook" version of the book above. I won't say where. But it's out there.