Episode two Stargazing Live - black holes and stuff

Watched episode two of Stargazing Live last night. It was ok, again very hurried explanations of things, wild discussions of black holes and disproving UFOs (which someone should point out means Unidentified Flying Object - an object that is flying and can't be identified - that doesn't in my mind say Alien Beings, its says It's in the sky and I don't know what it is. If you see a jumbo jet and you don't see the markings, that's a UFO by all intents and purposes, it's flying and I don't know who owns it.

Ok this is an extreme, but the way these popular scientists automatically think people assume UFOs are aliens seems belittling to me. anyhow, off my soapbox. And on with some nice photos of planets and the stars!

Jupiter with Marks 5 inch Cassegrain

Early morning Venus with my Canon IXUS950IS - no mount or telescope

Orion and its Nebula - taken by Mark using his Canon 550D on a tripod
and a 4 second exposure and maximum ISO

Posting these pictures here gives me the push to get our own kit and take such extraordinary photos. I asked the peeps at the Astronomy Now facebook page to give me an idea of a good scope to go for and they came back with some good advice -

Need some suggestions on an intermediate scope - equatorial mount, goto would be nice, to be used for planetary and wide field observations/photos/web cam work, brand name would be nice, purpose built metal shed to house mount so prefer to remove telescope for security. Budget £900. Michaels shots below are amazing as I want to introduce my kids to planetary observations over successive nights. Cheers


 A 150-mm (6-inch) reflector would do the job and it's possible to get a tube assembly for £300 and a suitable mount and tripod as a separate buy and be under budget. Also this would be easily portable enough. There are also combo systems under £900. Typical GOTO SCT's are too expensive unless you go for a small aperture under 150-mm. A 100-mm refractor performs like a 150mm reflector but a good quality one with a sturdy Equatorial GOTO mount and tripod would be hard to find on budget. If you look in Astronomy Now magazine you'll find a list of suppliers that you could follow-up with, but to get some more hands-on advice we'd recommend coming along to AstroFest next month to talk to our suppliers in person! - Mark (night sky expert)