It’s a busy day and getting near the holidays, so we figured it would serve all well to reprint our Telescope Buyer’s Guide:
There are several telescope buyers guides available on the Internet, some good, some not so good. At Spectrum we are writing from our experience with customers and hope to make this simple and […]
On August 11th, Saturn’s rings disappeared from Earth’s view. This is because from our perspective the rings appear to ‘wobble’ over the period of years; showing us their tops and bottoms from differing angles.
But part of that ‘wobble’ is that every 15 years or so the rings are edge-on the earth and disappear from […]
Continued from Part 1
OK, Now you can look at the Moon!
OK, having gotten a quick glimpse you can take your telescope to the Moon! If you’ve chosen wisely, the Moon will only be half full, waxing or waning. The Full Moon looks like it might be a great target, but it lacks the shadow detail […]
So you read our telescope buyer’s guide, you did even more online research, you chose a telescope, you took it home, you went managed to put it together, you aligned the finderscope, heck you may have even taken the time to collimate it if you got a reflector! Now the skies are clear tonight and […]
….if you are on the opposite side if the world from where this is being written.
That right, if you haven’t heard there is a total eclipse taking place this evening at 8:50 EDT. Sadly for us, it is visible in India, China, and other nearby nations.
So for the rest of us, no Eclipse for […]
Many filters are available for telescopes these days. Each of them does something different to get a different effect. Some filters are used to reduce light, others to reduce light pollution, others to bring out other colors of The Planets, etc. Filters can help enhance a viewing session to make it more pleasant […]
In less than one month, one of the keystone events of the International Year of Astronomy will take place: 100 hours of astronomy. This takes place from April 2nd through the 5th, which is some of the best viewing times for astronomy. During this 100 hour period new and experienced amateur astronomers alike are encouraged […]
Sounds like a bad 50’s superhero, but actually it is an astronomical event worthy of our attention!
The Green Comet, also known as Comet Lulin, is coming to a night sky near you! The comet was nicknamed ‘Green Comet’ because of its appearance in astrophotos as having a greenish tint.
Lulin will be closest to Earth […]
Here we go. We finally made a telescope buyer’s guide video to help people choose the correct telescope. We had some trouble with the first minute or so and had to reshoot, so we apologize for the static images. Parts 2 and beyond shouldn’t have such problems.
Anyway, here is the video:
If you enjoyed this post, […]
One thing even the most pedestrian of telescopes should be able to show you is the rings of Saturn. In fact, given that the rings should become visible at about 12-14x magnification a good selection of Astronomy binoculars should let you view the rings and light pollution barely effects viewing at least the shape of […]
