# Tips on Getting s Telesscope?



## Carpetfizz (Jul 5, 2011)

Hello everyone, 
I hope I'm not in the wrong forum for this, but I guess astronomy counts as photography to som extent. I'm looking to buy a good telescope but I have no experience in this category. What kind of things should I look for in a telescope? I want one powerful enough to see at least the moon and to see some close by planets. The main feature I want is for it to take a picture of whatever it is looking at so that I can save it to my computer. Are there any good brands/models that you would recommend, and how much would something like this cost?
Thanks,
Carpetfizz


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## WereBo (Apr 5, 2008)

Hi Carpetfizz :wave:

There's a lot of helpful info *here* and for further research, try Googling 'choosing an astronomical telescope', I got 53,500 hits about it - *Google Search link* :grin:


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## Basementgeek (Feb 7, 2005)

I assume that you have a digital SLR camera?

BG


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## Carpetfizz (Jul 5, 2011)

Thanks for the site WereBo, and BG, we do have an SLR camera. I read something about having mounts for them?


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## rgsalinger (May 18, 2009)

If you have a dslr then you can adapt it to do "prime focus" photography using a telescope of pretty much any design by just buying a "T" adapter and the appropriate adapter for whatever scope you will buy. However, if you want to take pictures of anything other than the moon you will need to invest in some kind of cable release for the camera so that shaking isn't a problem. For the moon the exposures are so short - 1/1000 of a second or so that you can probably get away with just a gentle press on the shutter. Same thing pertains to the other problem - tracking an object - for easy shots of the moon and planets pretty much any scope will do. I'd suggest taking a look at smallish 4-6 inch reflectors from meade (ETX) or celestron (NexStar SLT) which also have computerized goto built into them if you budget reaches to that level - around $500. If you don't have that much money look at those two brands and see what they offer in your price range.


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## Carpetfizz (Jul 5, 2011)

rgsalinger said:


> If you have a dslr then you can adapt it to do "prime focus" photography using a telescope of pretty much any design by just buying a "T" adapter and the appropriate adapter for whatever scope you will buy. However, if you want to take pictures of anything other than the moon you will need to invest in some kind of cable release for the camera so that shaking isn't a problem. For the moon the exposures are so short - 1/1000 of a second or so that you can probably get away with just a gentle press on the shutter. Same thing pertains to the other problem - tracking an object - for easy shots of the moon and planets pretty much any scope will do. I'd suggest taking a look at smallish 4-6 inch reflectors from meade (ETX) or celestron (NexStar SLT) which also have computerized goto built into them if you budget reaches to that level - around $500. If you don't have that much money look at those two brands and see what they offer in your price range.


Thank you very much for the valuable information!!! This will help me research this more


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