Can you set how many exposures to take so they are taken automatically or do you have to select a shutter button every 15 seconds? If a meteor is caught in one exposure, can the stacked image be split into original raw images for post processing? Why doesn't it capture the rings of Saturn?
The images were ok, but I assume they were just the ones stacked by the Dwarf II itself? I've had much better results taking the individual .fits frames and stacking them separately with Siril.
Yep. I think the frustration definitely makes it more rewarding when it all finally comes together and you capture Horse Head or Pillars for the very first time .. or any others. I'm going through all of that now, as I'm new to the hobby (the photography aspect.) Sucks right now, but, it'll be that much better when I get it right!
Years ago I was thinking of getting a go to mount just for viewing, My mother said that would take away the challenge of finding manually. Yes, at times very frustrating but once found Yay yippie I found it
Bought mine about three months ago but due to light summer evenings and poor British weather, it's only within the last few weeks I've actually been able to use it. I bought it because I got into astrophotography about ten years ago but haven't actually done any imaging for about 5 years. This was my attempt to get back into it. And I love it! I used to hate the set-up process for my old telescope, but this makes things so simple. The skies where I live don't get really bad light pollution, but it's a long way from the best too, so I'm looking forward to being able to just take it out on an hour drive away from the lights to get even better results. The quick set-up will actually make this feasible compared to my old set-up. The results you get from the Dwarf II stacking are ok, but it's far better to take the individual .fits frames and stack them yourself through something like Siril (which is what I use). I've so far had some pretty decent results of M31 with about 78 minutes total exposure. The images are still a bit noisy, so I'm still playing around to get the right settings. But pleased with what I've got so far for the cost of the device. Looking forward to the autumn and winter months for longer imaging time and different targets. My M31 is much better than anything I got previously with my old Canon camera. Looking forward to doing the same with M42.
If you're from the US or Australia, then use this amazon link to purchase the telescope: amzn.to/3QO7Xtg If you're from anywhere else, then you can head directly to dwarflabs website: dwarflab.com?aff=37 Use discount code: " 05DAMONS " For a further discount on top of their current 8% back to school discount. Please consider using my affiliate links as I will get a small cut of each sale, which will go directly into funding future videos. I have been genuinely impressed by this telescope. If there are any similarly innovative telescopes I should try out, be sure to recommend them below. 👍🏻 Thanks x
I have this scope and can certainly attest that it is as good as Damon says. You can literally set this up and be shooting in no time. The price and portability is impossible to beat. However you can’t compare it to some of the “proper “ telescopes that some of you no doubt have… and I get that. I am new to the hobby, thanks to Dwarf 2. I think this is the thing with this scope it gets you interested. I’m already planning bigger and better scopes to purchase.. we all know how expensive this hobby is. To say it’s just for children is churlish (comments) in my opinion. Great review anyway Damon.., maybe a tidy up of the images would have given a better idea of what’s possible. Thanks. 👍🏻
I love the Dwarf 2 as it would be a great bit of kit to use at outreach events although the Seestar does look to be even better from what I've seen, in saying that it's nice to see smart telescopes at a more affordable price so may long it continue if it get's more people into the hobby.
I not convinced, if people want to simply see great pictures they can just download JW pictures. Those press and results scope s take away any involvement any excitement any interest
I just bought the Dwarf 2 after seeing Damon's 5% off code and stacked it with the 10% Amazon sale. I really wanted to buy the ZWO S50 but it looks like they aren't shipping until November at the earliest. I don't want to miss half the season!
I love my Dwarf but I think there is one thing that none of the reviewers have called out that could really open this up to people who aren't looking to spend hours letting the Dwarf stack images. If someone just wants to go out with the Dwarf and view objects, this little telescope can take a surprisingly good image by just stacking 3, 5 second exposures. Yes, you can get better quality by stacking hundreds of images but then you are burning through so much time and battery on a small handful of final images before your night is over. 3, 5 second exposures takes about 30 seconds between selecting your target and viewing your stacked image and you can go through the whole catalog in about an hour. Additionally, after the 3rd image has stacked I have noticed that the subsequent stacks make far less of an impact. i.e. One image looks terrible, 2 looks waaaay better, 3 is still a noticeable improvement but then you will probably need another 100 exposures after the 3rd one before you get the same improvement that you got going from 2 to 3 (diminishing returns).
There is a Facebook group where people post pictures they made using this telescope, one guy managed to make a Pillars of creation picture with 2000 pictures stacked together and the result is awesome
It is highly portable, and this is a great feature! Once I traveled to Malaysia, and I got frustrated because I didn't have my telescope to observe the southern hemisphere objecs, there was no way I could bring my heavy telescope with me; however, in this case, this little telescope would be my solution.
Great that there's an option for those that want to dabble in astrophotography but don't have the time, patience or budget to do it properly. And don't really care about image quality!😉
I think it would be perfect for myself, as due to work commitments being self employed. Time is precious and if , a very big if we had a clear evening at a weekend then, it would be awesome to just go a plug and play as it were. Ive not even had the chance to look through my Teliscope much the whole summer. Manchester is rainy at the best of times.😢
Man...I've always loved the night sky, stars, space etc. But I never really put in any money to really get started. And looking at the price range and long complicated setups put me off a bit. But after seeing this, Im considering getting it and really starting out.
Amazing yet, nothing will beat us astrophotographers. We learned things the hard way, and are even better because of it. Give us something to outperform, and we'll do it. You especially could outperform ai
Well, thank you for this wonderful product. There is a very, very important question for me before purchasing: Can this telescope be an alternative to the Nikon P1000 camera in order to obtain a 125x zoom for photographing distant places? How much is the optical zoom and digital zoom of this telescope.
After just getting back from a visual experience with a goto eq with Newtonian in the field. I feel like this is a great tool to just leave on the roof of your car and let it shoot while you have your visual fun with other people.
You did a good job at introducing the Dwarf but sad to say you did not do the same with photos you showed towards end , surely the Dwarf, which I also own , can make far faaaaaar better images with only a little posrprocessing skills.
This may seem very ignorant and boring, but i prefer this type as i like the finished product over the journey, learning about the object im capturing is where make up for my laziness
Snapped up one of these a couple months ago, as with the english weather only had chance to use it twice on m31 and M101. Being pretty much a beginner i found it pretty flawless in setup and it ran no problems. I also believe its a great entry point into post processing even though you don't really have to with this. However i found that as may be obvious you can get get the most out of it with a little play after. All round i think it still has its challenges and frustrations (mainly in processing for me) which is the same with this £400 setup and £3000. Don't think you can wrong if you are new and interested of capturing the night sky with relative ease. I plan to take the knowledge of using this over the next year or so before possibly upgrading to a more advanced rig. Great review. I believe in time and with updates it will only get better! Clear skies
@epicjuice_ I wouldn't worry about it too much, i live in a bortle 7 area which is very light polluted and you can still achieve amazing images. Obviously i would suggest any time you can to get as far away from heavy light pollution but its not always an option. In my opinion i still think the dwarf does a great job, it could be worth adding a filter to help with the contrast if you are really unsure with your area.
Seems an excellent idea. I have been using a Celestron Auto-Align to set up an AVX in well under a minute but it still has to know where and when it is. To do that it needs to be connected to the phone and that uses up its only wifi internet connection, so wifi to house and wifi to phone/iPad. An AVX may be considered small but it's far from light. Dog poo is not so much of a problem as tripping over a big helpful dog.
Be aware they only post positive reviews on their website. I've purchased one back in like may. Its not bad but it definitely has its quirks. I wrote a comprehensive review and submitted it. The rating was like 3/5. My review never appeared on their website.
@@DamonScotting True. I had to learn not only from this experience, that when something is only positively reviewed, it may be a red flag. Not saying this device it bad though, its not! Just speaking in general regarding trusting reviews. Anyway, I agree with your note that this is great for quickly showing stuff to other people around you on a meetup. Also fairly easy to use. The alt-azi mount has some obvious limitations, and I find the picture quality to be medium-ish even after a long exposure. I also had some issues making it connect to certain phones (1 out of 3 worked, a cheap and an old phone didnt work). So if you have at least a medium quality phone and you want to tap into taking astro photos, this can work, but nowadays there are some other alternatives too in other brands and I don't think its the best out of all of them.
Also, I agree, this is a great way going forward, but I feel a bit like a lot of this is not completely fleshed out yet. There are some decent options, and also some of the lot more expensive gears still have annoyances. I think we need to wait a few more years to see products that can nearly 1-1 replace the complex expensive gears. In short, adjust the expectations accordingly.
I've gone through the reviews on their site yesterday, starting with a bunch of 1 star reviews. You should submit it again. Things can go wrong ofcourse
@@Marselaar I've just checked out their site again and there still isnt any bad reviews. The worst I could find was a 3/5 and I only found one of that.
That M51 shot brought a tear to my eye. Is there a polar alignment mode for putting it on an equatorial mount? Would be nice to have longer exposures and no rotation.
This looks like something that would be awesome to take on holiday with you. Would be interesting to see if there are any noticable effects from field rotation over multiple hours, or even if building a wedge is feasible. I feel as though that may be it's limiting factor within astrophotography. Great as an EAA device though!
Yes there is noticeable field rotation on images taken over a long time. You can actually see this in the image of the dumbbell nebula (at around 7:25). However, you can polar align the Dwarf II, which minimises field rotation significantly.
I'm pretty sure you don't have to go inside to get your GPS coordinates or your elevation. I think they're right there available for you on your phone.
Two questions: 1) Can the Dwarf be plugged into a PC (you might answer this in the video, but I paused it early on. I'll edit if it is answered. Thanks. 2) Are the little filters proprietary or will any 1.25" filter brand work (for instance if a person wanted to use a NB filter instead of something included in the kit)? I don't think it's going to replace current methods of Astronomy, but it may very well bring more people into the hobby, as it takes the work out of a lot of areas (and $)! Enjoyed your presentation. Funny side note: I actually DO have my GPS coords memorized. I can't be the only one. Ha! lol
The D2 can be plugged into a PC to transfer files after an imaging session, but as far as I know, you can't plug it into a computer to control the device while capturing the images. It's all controlled from a mobile device - phone or tablet. I'm not 100% sure on your second question, but they would seem to be fairly standard.
Having answered Q1, I now see that it *is* possible to connect your D2 to Stellarium on your PC for tracking an object. It looks a little complicated to set up and you still have to use your mobile device to focus and callibrate, so to me it seems a little bit unnecessary to use it. But it looks like it *is* possible.
@@bujin1977 thanks for all the good data! I’ve been kind of intrigued by these things since they’ve come out. Not a terrible price for something small and portable, and would be more convenient for groups of people. Sometimes, I just don’t feel like dragging the scope out. 👍 Sounds a lot more practical just to run it from phone, too!
Hi damon Can you give advice to me for what type of telescope do i get for planets and galaxy and what should the budget be bcz Astronomy is pretty expensive And in astrophotography you need a fancy camera and a large telescope which cost around 1.5k At least anywhere you know that us astronomer need to take big risk that what are we expecting the result so pls can you give advice from your experience what type of telescope it would be Under 500 Cheers mate!
does anyone know if this requires cell service to use? The best places I've found with little to no light pollution tend to not have any cell service, TIA!
Just bought and its being delivered today, crossing my fingers theres no issues... but for someone who hasnt even done any sort of actual astrophotography due to the expensive costs, would this be considered cheating if you show the images to a space reddit where theres a lot of people with actual equipment who spend long hours taking long exposure photos?
Here in South Africa it's around 15k, I could get a 10" Dobsonian for that price. I think the Dwarf is quite nifty and portable, but if i must be honest I think the image quality is awful.
see, im oldschool, i wanna see the sky with my own eyes, if i wanted a photo, id look it up online :P so this telescope for someone like me wont work sadly :(
No, Damon, this is not the future of Astrophotography but this is the future gift for 10 year old boys instead to the 8'' Dobs (sorry Ed...) 😉 And thinking about it, it is not even that, if you have watched the review of the ZWO Seestar by Cuiv today - looks like the Seestar is way better than the Dwarf and not much more expensive. Yes, these gadgets are great and will allow children and people on a budget the entry in Astrophotography. That said, given physics still applies and optics are key in Astrophotography, also in the future "real" Astrophotography is done with "real" rigs and not with gadgets....
Well that's no fun at all! How am I supposed to to get the masochistic frustration that I have to power through to get that "Phew! Worth it!" sense of accomplishment with this thing? On the other hand... focusing my Tamron at -40C sucks donkey balls.
That's understandable, but everything I've experienced whilst using it indicates that is not the case. It's just a well put together smart telescope 👍🏻
This may sound silly, but I was thinking the same thing. What if these DSOs, etc., were preprogrammed into the scope computer, and what a person selected was just presented as the "live image" in all it's glory? Wouldn't be difficult to do. With a traditional scope/camera, you either get the real deal or you don't.
I have this telescope myself and have considered the same thing. I came up with a way to test it though and I am going to try it one of these nights unless someone beats me to it. Here is the test. First, the Dwarf can actually align with a partially obstructed view of they sky. I am thinking of putting a tree in the image, partially covering the Andromeda galaxy. Then taking a short 5 stack image and seeing if the tree covers part of the galaxy itself. I can't imagine they would have made it sophisticated enough to be able to put a DSO behind a tree in the output image. In case anyone is curious, and assuming that it is not some kind of digital hackery, a stack of 5 images at 5 seconds of exposure actually looks pretty good even under a Bortle 4 sky. I normally just do 3, 5 second exposures at 80 gain when I just want to view and they look excellent. More exposures do look a bit better but after 3 images the incremental improvements are pretty minor.
Is it the future of astronomy? No. Does it take amazing pictures? No. Does it take amazing pictures if you've never seen/taken an astrophoto before in your life? Probably. By any objective standard of quality the pictures are awful. Remarkable if you've never seen it before, but terrible if you're experienced. But perhaps they'll give people the momentum to get into the hobby proper, like a gateway drug. And that's a good thing.
Hi Mr. Scotting I just discovered your channel (and subscribed). Haven't seen all your videos yet, but understand you're looking for funding. Would you be interested in raffling or outright selling some of your photos? Thank you for being such a great teacher! All the best to you and yours. ~M@tthew
@@DamonScotting I guess it would be up to you. I thought you were wanting funding to help keep this (amazing) channel going. May you and yours enjoy good health.
I am an Optical Amateur Astronomer. If I want images, I'll just go and get them online from a professional observatory. I feel sad for people buying these. It's like porn instead of intercourse.