My neighbor's backyard telescope photo of Jupiter last week vs. 3 years ago is NIGHT and DAY

3 years ago he had this cheap department store scope and got a blurry orange blob, but last week he upgraded to an 8-inch Dobsonian and the detail on the bands and Great Red Spot is insane. Did anyone else have a moment where gear completely changed your photo results or was it just me?

3 comments

3 Comments

smith.elliot5d agoMost Upvoted

Gear makes a difference sure, but let's not act like a $50 department store scope is even in the same league as a Dobsonian. That's like comparing a flip phone to a modern smartphone and saying "wow gear changed everything!" Yeah, of course it did, because the cheap one was basically a toy. People post these before and after shots all the time and it's always the same story, junk scope vs something that actually works for the hobby. Not really a revelation if you ask me.

laura_black5d ago

Grabbed my old department store refractor from the garage the other day thinking I'd look at the moon and ended up spending 20 minutes trying to figure out why everything looked like a blurry blob. Turns out the eyepiece was held in with duct tape and pure hope. That Dobsonian upgrade hit different, like going from squinting through a dirty straw to actually seeing what's up there. My flip phone days are over.

mark_green3d agoMost Upvoted

I had a friend who spent a thousand bucks on a top end mount and still got lousy photos because his alignment was off by half a degree. Sometimes the gear isn't the real problem, it's knowing how to use what you already have. That cheap scope could still pull in good Saturn rings if you collimate it right and wait for steady seeing. People blame the tool way too fast when the real fix is just more practice and patience.