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I got a new pair of 10x50 binos this month from Orion. I wanted them to do the Bino Deep Sky pin and Bino Double Star pin from the AL. Anyway in the process it has been really fun observing DSOs with them. Yes the view is not impressive but the challenging objects are still challenging... with finding them being the main challenge. I think completing these pins both will really help in developing my observing skills.
Anyone else enjoy observing with binos for a change?
Anyone else enjoy observing with binos for a change?
Using Binos for Double stars has the advantage of not having to go to a dark site and is convenient to do from polluted backyards. Having completed the Advanced Bino Double Star, I might suggest you do both the Bino Double Star AND the Advanced Bino Double Star at the same time and submit both at the same time, as one is a Bino Double Star is a prerequisite for the Advanced. A club member is doing that now and thought I would pass his idea along to you. The 10x50s might be a challenge for the Advanced, but who isn't up to a challenge, particularly if you have better skies?
Makes efficient sense as you are pointing in the same region of the sky.
Al
Al,
I have been having lots of fun using the binos for both the DSOs and Doubles. I have been alternating each night between the scope and binos. I am fortunate to have an okay site about a mile from the house.
How hard did you find the Bino Double star pin? With all these binocular pins I wonder if they will do a Master Observer Bino Pin soon.
Over the last few months I have started playing more and more with binoculars. One of the highlights occured Sunday night, when I spotted NGC 3628 (from the Leo Triplet) with my tripod mounted 22X60 Takahashi binoculars. It was very faint but I could hiold it steady with direct vision as a barely detectable longish ghost, while with averted vision it seemed to grow in size. Binos can be very rewarding for deep sky...
Here in the Great White North I especially appreciate binoculars in the winter as they are much easier to set up in the snow and cold compared to my 18-inch Dob. I use older GDR Zeiss 7x50s and tripod mounted Oberwerk 25x100mm binoculars. Had the 25x100mm’s out last night to follow 2004 BL86. These binos are great for observing hundreds of deep sky objects, especially open and globular clusters, dark nebulae, bright nebulae and galaxies that are within about 50 million light years. Superb for scanning around the Virgo Cluster. My most interesting challenge so far was picking up Barnard’s Galaxy from my backyard... very faint but definitely there. Consistently see the reflection nebulosity around the Pleiades on all but the crummiest of nights. I can see a day in the far future when I am too old and weak to haul out a 100+ pound Dob when tripod mounted binoculars will be my instrument of choice.
Binoculars provide an interesting perspective. What I like the most is the kind of immediacy from bringing the binoculars into the light path of the naked-eye observation. That's as relates to normal binoculars. The image-stabilized ones and the 90-degree "binoscope" that I also own are instruments with pretty curious capabilities too. One could build an observing program around each. Next to nothing, of course, by way of structure in "external galaxies". With the exception of the Magellanic Clouds. What an exception that is though!