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I thought the Orion Nebula was just a fuzzy blob until I saw it through a 10-inch scope
For years, I only saw it as a gray smudge in my old binoculars and figured the colorful photos were all fake. Then a friend let me use his big Dobsonian last fall, and I could actually see the green glow and the Trapezium stars clear as day. Has anyone else had a basic piece of gear totally change how you see a famous object?
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the_daniel5mo ago
The first time I really saw Saturn's rings was through a cheap department store scope my uncle had. It was one of those 60mm refractors on a wobbly tripod, total junk by any standard. But that night the seeing was steady and I could actually see the gap between the rings and the planet, Cassini's Division. It was just a faint line but it was there, and I realized all those textbook drawings weren't exaggerating... they just didn't capture the feeling. Made me want to save up for something better immediately.
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the_nora6mo ago
Green glow? Seriously? My club's 12 inch dob only ever shows it as gray and white, even from a dark site. You must have had some insane seeing that night or your friend's mirror is just magic. I've never heard of anyone visually picking up color in M42 outside of long exposure photos.
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lucashenderson6mo ago
Remember thinking the Andromeda Galaxy was just a faint cloud. Borrowed a decent refractor one night and finally saw the dust lanes. Felt like a total fraud for all my earlier "observations.
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the_mary6mo ago
Wait you could actually see dust lanes with a borrowed scope? What kind of refractor was this, some museum piece?
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