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Good morning everyone,
I’m considering purchasing the much-hyped Smart Telescope AP 50/250. Despite numerous presentations, I can’t quite figure out what this device can actually achieve. It’s advertised as useful, if not absolutely indispensable, for deep-sky observations: It allows for easy imaging of nebulae, clusters, stars, and even some planets. At first glance, it seems like you could reach the sky with it; even the Moon and Sun are targets of its small F250 D50mm apochromatic telescope. It’s incredibly portable; it can send frames (even processed ones) to your phone while you’re at the table. In short, this little instrument seems to be the gateway to an astronomical revolution, following Galileo and Newton. However, upon reflection, none of the numerous presentations seem to cover all the technically necessary and essential details. Can it be used for serious amateur astronomers? Before deciding whether or not to buy it, I’d seek technical and objective advice from someone who understands optics and telescopes. Is it a gem, or is it little more than a toy—a piece of junk?
ThankWhich “Smart Telescope AP 50/250”? A web search on that term shows the Vespera II (https://www.apm-telescopes.net/en/86732-smart-telescope-ap-50250-vespera-ii-x-edition) and the ZWO Seestar S50 (https://www.astroshop.eu/telescopes/zwo-smart-telescope-ap-50-250-seestar-s50-with-universe2go-/p,84933). The latter is much cheaper and I own one myself.
The S50 most certainly can be used for scientific research as well as the canonical “pretty picture” field which is where most of the marketing is targeted. Precision photometry down to around 15th magnitude is possible with reasonable exposure times. Transformation coefficients to convert from its G channel to Johnson V are available. A 15 minute exposure seems to show a detection limit (SNR ~4, so useless for photometry) of around 17th magnitude.
https://astrobackyard.com/seestar-s50-review/ gives some detail but I don’t know how much more than that you want.
Very much not a piece of junk, IMAO.
Paul
Thanks, Paul. I had a tooth pulled. I struggle to believe all the possibilities attributed to it, but if you confirm it, I’ll begin to dispel my doubts.
I’m referring here to the cheapest telescope AP 50/250 Seestar S50.
I’ll tell you, it’s a little hard to imagine having Pluto within reach. It seems that on M13, M31, M42, the Pleiades, etc., it’s truly miraculous. For “beautiful” photography, I think it’s a good instrument, even if the resolution leaves something to be desired. I wonder: what does it provide on Epsilon Lyrae?
Given its light weight, I’d take it to high mountains, to the Gran Sasso, even at altitudes above 2,800 meters, to photograph lunar eclipses, which I study seriously. At F=250mm, the lunar and solar disks have a diameter of about 2.5 mm. So I wonder what the quality of lunar photography is, taken for photometric purposes? No description provides information about the actual resolution on the Moon and Sun.
I would like to see some photographs of the Moon and the photosphere, taken without any post-production or retouching with various soft-focus techniques.
ThankP.S. Sorry for my poor English, I don’t know much and I have to use a translator.
The wide variety of smart telescopes are great, but as with anything you get what you pay for. Putting together a custom setup where you get a high quality 50mm apochromatic lens, a good quality mount and a good quality CCD or CMOS camera is going to give superior results but will be a lot more expensive. Smart telescopes are designed for convenience and ease of use, and that is where they will beat a custom rig. Also, some smart telescopes like the Seestars and Dwarfs are designed for portability.
You can do science with them, but look into the capabilities to understand the pros and cons. For example, they have colour chips so you can’t just add a photometric filter. Though we already have a couple of observers submitting photometry to the Variable Star Section database taken with Seestars using the green channel from the colour camera. I got myself a Dwarf for its ease of use, portability, and easy access to the fits files and calibration frames.
The resolution will be the same as any traditional telescope with that aperture, focal length and pixel size. You can find results taken with a variety of smart telescopes in the BAA image gallery. Click the images to see the details of the equipment used to find those taken with smart telescopes
https://britastro.org/observations/
You can also search for ‘Seestar’, giving these images.
The best images are obtained by people who do post-processing of the results, rather than relying entirely on the inbuilt processing.
If you want ease of use and portability then they are hard to beat. If you want to extract the maximum science potential then a custom rig is the way to go.
Andy
Thanks, Paul. I had a tooth pulled. I struggle to believe all the possibilities attributed to it, but if you confirm it, I’ll begin to dispel my doubts.
I’m referring here to the cheapest telescope AP 50/250 Seestar S50.
I’ll tell you, it’s a little hard to imagine having Pluto within reach. It seems that on M13, M31, M42, the Pleiades, etc., it’s truly miraculous. For “beautiful” photography, I think it’s a good instrument, even if the resolution leaves something to be desired. I wonder: what does it provide on Epsilon Lyrae?
Given its light weight, I’d take it to high mountains, to the Gran Sasso, even at altitudes above 2,800 meters, to photograph lunar eclipses, which I study seriously. At F=250mm, the lunar and solar disks have a diameter of about 2.5 mm. So I wonder what the quality of lunar photography is, taken for photometric purposes? No description provides information about the actual resolution on the Moon and Sun.
I would like to see some photographs of the Moon and the photosphere, taken without any post-production or retouching with various soft-focus techniques.My image of the Sun, one in the list given by Andy, is exactly as it came off the S50. No post-processing at all. Another image in the list shows Pluto. I can’t help with epsilon Lyrae, sorry. An image of Polarissima Borealis, aka NGC 3172, appears at https://britastro.org/observations/observation.php?id=20241121_180849_58cdbd49c5f6525c — that image took only 11 minutes to take. The galaxy is not very impressive in appearance, true, but it is magnitude 14.9 and the exposure was quite short. What really surprised me was LEDA36268 appearing — that one is 17th magnitude!
Re: Andy’s comment about access to the raw data. On the Seestar the lights frames, in FITS format, are easily available for subsequent post-processing. The calibration frames are not, as far as I know, but perhaps they may become available in subsequent versions of the firmware if enough people ask ZWO for them. The telescope firmware automatically applies dark frames. Flats can, presumably, be taken in the usual manner but I have not yet ventured there.
Paul
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