Disclaimer - The eVscope shown in our comparison video is a first-gen eVscope as this is the only one we could get our hands on. Thanks to our friend Patrick for letting us use his! To keep things fair, we have populated the specifications table with the Gen 2 eVscope as it has better specs than Gen 1 and is more up-to-date. - Several types of these telescopes are available, for example, Vespera comes in different versions (Vespera Pro, Vespera Passengers, etc) and Unistellar sells different versions of their smart telescopes (EVscope, EQuinox, etc). We chose the models we could get our hands on, but please keep in mind that different versions might get better results than shown here! - The moon picture with Seestar was taken on a different day, because the moon was setting behind the trees and we didn't have time to point the Seestar there after the three others. Overall it shouldn't matter though. Much more information is available on our written blog post at www.galactic-hunter.com !
1. You show the specs for the eVscope 2 but the pictures were taken with the eVscope 1. Totally misleading! 👿 You can't even buy the eVscope 1 anymore. So, who needs a review for an obsolete telescope? The eVscope has 1.2 Mpixel; the eVscope 2 has 7.6 Mpx. But you show the pictures of that old garbage together with the specs of the new one. 🤦♂ 2. According to your table the eVscope has a field of view of 3° and the Dwarf has up to 3.2° You really want me to believe that a telescope with of focal length of 450 mm has the same field of view as one with 100mm? How can you miss such an obvious mistake? *The eVscope actually has a field of view of 34 x 47 arcmin. So, it's about 0.6° x 0.8° - not 3° * 🤦♂ 3. The Vespera has a focal length of 200mm, the Seestar has 250mm. Both have the same sensor. So, obviously the Vespera must have a wider field of view. In your table it narrower 🤦♂ *The correct FoV is not 0.78° x 0.57° but 1.6° x 0.9° * How can you miss such an obvious mistake? 4. Surely, it would have been possible to take pictures with all telescopes at the same time. You just have to press a button to start the imaging. But you didn't. The objects you photographed could be high in the sky in one night, low in the other; with haze in one, without haze in the other. There was another big error in your first review (focal length of the Dwarf). At this point I don't trust any information in your video. Your reviews are just too sloppy.
You misrepresented the Unistellar scope, not only because the version you are using is several years old, more comparable with the Stellina, but you also didn't control the exposure... so of course the center was blown out.
@@GalacticHunterVespera only has at best four hour battery. It needs a dew heater. Its tripod is too small. Okay on a flat patio. But in a real garden, totally useless!!! You can’t recharge a cold lithium battery or you will break the unit and so you missed the clear skies!!! Also the Vespera shape looks very dangerous to handle. Easy to drop, but yes beautiful. The Dwarf defaults to 1 second, not automatic, actually has manual control of the shutter length, which is rather nice. Evscope is 4 seconds and Vespera 10 seconds.
You need to redo the Dwarf II's session on M42, but now with more seconds exosure and binning off. You'll get a far better result. You had the wrong settings for the Moon (low resolution and exposure). For the Sun you need to adjust the white balance. You can give it any color you want. Orange looks nice to our eyes, but it isn't the natural color of the Sun (which is actually white). The new application for the Dwarf II has been published a few days ago and it makes a huge difference in quality and usability 👍
The ultimate ? Vespera pro(april) Unistellar Odissey(available) , Célestron Origine(summer in Europe) and may be Seestar 80 ... So, we'll see you here another time this year, with pleasure . Thank you for your time and your tests. Kisses from France!
Seestar seems to be winning over cost/value. The Dwarf is nice because it's so small and portable. The others cost too much for what they offer compared to those two.
I like my Dwarf II as it is a lot more portable and has better field of view for bigger objects. With the new 4K resolution and proper processing workflow, the images come out a lot better than what's shown in this video
I think Dwarf2 and Dwarf3 bringing the portability to the next level, putting this into a backpack and hopping onto a Ebike. Riding to any close open field closeby or maybe an higher vantage point. Make a big difference than just doing it in your backyard. Also popping this into your boot or taking with you when camping or hiking is now an option. vs The big gear might be better and crisper but the limitation of setting it up and the bulky-ness is a negative. Think Dwarf2/3 brings Astrophotography / video to the market and people who would like to dabble in this field as a hobby or just people who like photography in general. This adds a new layer and its very user friendly.
I own a SeeStar. It is a little powerhouse. Images are bright and beautiful. I shot several images of a full moon and they are breathtaking. For just under 500 Euros this is a great companion which you can take anywhere in the included case , love it.
The Seestar s50 now has a planetary mode and a 4x zoom. It has a better image of Jupiter now than anything you showed in this video. For the price, the Seestar blows away all of these others. It's remarkable.
I think whats important for people also is price. 2 of these are 500 dollars, the others are Mortgage payments. I have a dwarf II and I love it. It's my first telescope since I can't spent 6 grand to get into Astro. So I was wanting to buy a Dwarf III but I am also looking at the ZWO s50. I would like to see some carisons between the updated S50's and Dwarf 3
Great comparison video guys! I have both the Dwarf II and Seestar and with my back they allow me to do astrophotography again after an almost 3 year hiatus and that makes them both winners to me!
Great review folks. I have the current Vespera for quick access to DSOs and I love it. I process my DSOs with PixInsight. I’m primarily a planetary imager using a C14. I’ve been in this hobby for 50 years. I firmly believe that smart telescopes are the future as technology evolves and prices come down
The Dwarf II has a new version of firmware and the app in beta. It allows for shooting in Bin 1 (currently the Dwarf II only shoots in Bin 2), which should greatly improve resolution. Also the new version of the app has an improved UI and a larger database of objects for automatic go to. Once the new software is generally released, it would be interesting to revisit the Dwarf II to see how it stands up to the others.
@@DouglasLippertyeah hardware wise it's at its maximum, maybe dwarf III will solve the issue. Still looks like an all round, trying to do everything smart scope.
One way to generate a "goodness factor" for deep sky extended objects is to compute the number of pixels on the sky times the collecting area of the telescopes... npix * r^2. If you plot this factor on the x-axis, and the price on the y-axis, you will see that the Dwarf2 and SeeStar are in a very different league than eV and Vesp... much more performance per price. If you make the plot on a log-log graph, you'll actually see a line with Vespera, Stellina and eV2... while the Dwarf and SeeStar compare with off-the-shelf cheap systems and the 3d printed "Microscope". Between the D2 and SeeStar you trade aperture vs portability... and you can mount the D2 in equatorial mode to capture objects near the zenith and remove field rotation. Personally I love taking my D2 on hikes and using their landscape panorama feature to get Gigapixel landscape shots; makes incredible posters.
I purchased and recently returned the eVscope2. If it was going to be my only telescope, I would have kept it. The only Newtonian reflector of the group and the largest. While the size didn't really bother me for travel, but having to collimate did. I did not like the focus mechanism or the fact that the eyepiece focus had no "0" setting or indent. The included mask was nice, but the delay from imager to app or eyepiece made it somewhat frustrating and difficult to refine. I ended up going with the SeeStar for the value, included features, and portability. I'll confess I didn't know Vespera had mosaic mode already -- but I'm hopeful SeeStar can add this feature. Thank you for the review.
I ordered the seestar last week, plan to use it for the eclipse in April as a lightweight, portable, plug and play option. Outside of that I think it will be a lot of fun for friends and family at bbq's!
You guys did a great job on this. I would have liked to have seen a galaxy or cluster, but maybe that's asking too much. It's so cool that we have all these choices, and even cooler that we have folks like you willing to test them out and share your enthusiasm for astro imaging. Thanks for all your hard work, and hope you have clear skies.
Nice review. I really liked that you showed what came straight out of the respective setups, with no intense post-processing involved. I felt that was a great way to show what beginners can expect. Smart-telescopes aren't for me, but I still enjoyed watching what you managed to get with these. I can imagine the Seestar or the Dwaf Lab being very nice, affordable scopes to use in for example outreach or at schools.
Wow - just what I was looking for! Thanks so much! I was comparing the eVscope and the Vespera for my first telescope. You are the first astronomical site I've subscribed to. You've just saved me some bucks! :)
Excellent. Thank you for all the work needed for such a comparison. It’s a tough one to do, as they differ so much in their apps and what settings are adjustable or fixed. And that’s changing with every app and firmware update. And the user experience depends so much on the design and UI of the app. So more than any other astro products, these are constantly moving targets. Clear skies!
Really well done two part review. Certainly one of the most comprehensive. I really like the fact that you use the auto base settings with no post processing. For its cost I’m surprised the EV scope didn’t blow the others out of the sky. Keep up the excellent work.
Very defective review! Of course the eVscope was not good. They tested the Version 1 with 1.2 Mpx that's not even on sale anymore. I'm sure the new Version 2 with 7.7 Mpx is totally different.
Thank You so very much for a Fantastic Review...I wanted to view your presentation prior to spending my Dollars, and now I feel prepared to make the Right Choice for Me..PLUS YOUR LADY MAKES ME LAUGH THROUGH-OUT THE PRESENTATION...
It’s a shame that you didn’t turn off binning on the Dwarf II, which is possible for solar/lunar mode (Astro in the next app iteration). You could have then gotten Sun and Moon shots that are effectively double the resolution of the ones you demoed here.
I have an eVscope (original; I got it for about 1,500 bucks via Kickstarter; I'd not buy it at the retail price) and Seestar. One important difference to me is that Seestar supports the Wifi station mode (you can connect it to your home wifi router or a portable wifi router if you're in the field), while eVscope does not support that. The difference makes a rather large difference for me in terms of the usability. WIth seestar, I can still use the Internet to look up things while being connected to Seestar. With eVscope, I have to keep switchin Wifi network between eVscope's and my home wifi. In addition, with seestar, you can control another astrophoto session (e.g. using ZWO ASIAir) in parallel with Seestar without swtiching Wifi networks.
At the moment I have the Dwarf II which with the last update has 1x1 binning and improves the image quality, with this I have enough to practice for months until the Vespera Pro comes out, which will be my next lens
UOOO-UO-UO-UO-UOOOOO!! Very nice video, thanks. It would be really interesting to see how much all these images (or, better, these series of exposures) could be improved with a good computer software. Built in functions are easy and quick, but I’ve seen gorgeous manual editings of some of Dwarf2 shots.
Dwarf II seems the all round smart telescope, with the latest firmware update. The thing about dwarf II that it is a simple point and shoot, but it also is smarter and capable of more, once you know how to use it. Landscape rather than portrait and that it is easily portable is the winning decider.
Thanks so much for the comparison of smart telescopes. Love the fun way that you introduce equipment options to many of us who are new to the hobby. I’ve just purchased the Vespera 2, and will review your courses available to determine where to start on post-processing curriculum. .
First, thanks for the nice review. It would be be nice to test battery performance in different modes for the telescopes. This would tell me what I need to bring for a full night of using the devices. For example 1 hours of 10 second captures in raw mode used x percent of the battery. Also if they can use an powerbank while operating.
The color of the sun is a function of the filter. Some solar film give an orange color, a glass filter will show white. The sun itself is a class G star, yellow in color. I already had a 5.81" glass filter that fits over an eVscope just right.
Thanks for that great show Iam aslo thinking about a smart telescope maybe iam on the fence still. It looks like you guys are ina heavy LP skies like iam. But i still try to show people Astronomy still can be done cheers i just subscribed
??? Does Seestar S50 has the capability of a USB or an HDMI output ??? Where you can directly plug into a computer real-time viewing ?? I been in the market for a smart telescope that I can hook to a wall projector For outdoor viewing on a large screen
Avec le Seestar, vous pouvez faire mieux que dans le test : améliorer le focus sur M42 et le soleil, utiliser le mode Planète sur Jupiter pour voir les bandes... Au final, peu de différences entre Seestar et le Vespera !
The Orion nebula is not good target as a test for deep sky objects. It is very bright. You should compare faint nebula and galaxies. Here is the Unistellar very impressive. Also it is not fair to compare the eVscope 1. Compare the eQuinox2 with the competitors. The Unistellar scopes have problem with their deep dark technology which suppresses faint details. Hopefully Unistellar will correct this. Otherwise they will loose a lot of customers.
If we want to compare several products on which is best for a same object, this should be done on the Same night, Same target, Same time, Same location etc. Otherwise, the results are not fair.
Can any of these smart telescopes be reasonably used in an urban environment and from behind a double glazed window? From someone who lives in a high rise building in an apartment without a balcony or terrace.
I almost ordered a Vespera, but then decided I needed to be more frugal. The SeeStar being a third of the price won out. I'm loving that I can set this up in my light-polluted city and actually view the night sky, see nebula, and photograph the Sun and Moon.
Thanks much for the reply. I am new to the hobby and appreciate your videos. I have a Celestron EdgeHD C8 SCT that I've been trying to configure for planetary pics (not so successfully so far!) and will be pre-ordering the Vespera Pro for DSO exploration.@@GalacticHunter
How do you compare a $5k scope with a $500 one? Based on this review it makes no sense since such minor differences in end result. For $5k you could get a very serious kit.
Like your idea of this comparison, but i have to say that you didnt do a fair comparison. Moon and Solar photos from the Seestar were taken in different times
I went with a Seastar S 50 seems to fit my needs none of them really produce planetary astrophotography very well so I was going with easiest to use for deep space. The EVScope is way way overpriced
1. You show the specs for the eVscope-2 but the pictures were taken with the eVscope-1. Totally misleading! 👿 You can't even buy the eVscope 1 anymore. So, who needs a review for an obsolete telescope? The eVscope has 1.2 Mpixel; the eVscope 2 has 7.6 Mpx. But you show the pictures of that old garbage together with the specs of the new one. 🤦♂ 2. According to your table the eVscope has a field of view of 3° and the Dwarf has up to 3.2° You really want me to believe that a telescope with of focal length of 450 mm has the same field of view as one with 100mm? How can you miss such an obvious mistake? *The eVscope actually has a field of view of 34 x 47 arcmin. So, it's about 0.6° x 0.8° - not 3°* 🤦♂ 3. The Vespera has a focal length of 200mm, the Seestar has 250mm. Both have the same sensor. So, obviously the Vespera must have a wider field of view. In your table it narrower 🤦♂ *The correct FoV is not 0.78° x 0.57° but 1.6° x 0.9°* How can you miss such an obvious mistake? 4. Surely, it would have been possible to take pictures with all telescopes at the same time. You just have to press a button to start the imaging. But you didn't. The objects you photographed could be high in the sky in one night, low in the other; with haze in one, without haze in the other. There was another big error in your first review (focal length of the Dwarf). At this point I don't trust any information in your video. Your reviews are just too sloppy.
I would add the narrow field of view means you can go for things that will not be more than a spec in Vespera. Meanwhile you can use MICROSOFT ICE to stitch Evscope images for Pleiades and save in TIFF format. You can put the Dwarf2 on a standard photographic tripod and see over the neighbours bushes and trees.
The amount of these gadgets reviewed by different channels shows there is some interest for sure They do serve a purpose but the hype is overkill, but really let's get back to what this hobby is really about.
I regret to say that on your channel, product promotion videos have begun to take precedence over the channel content and main theme, space and sky observation videos. While promoting the product, if you also display the objects you target with professional equipment, the content will be more satisfactory. Good luck.
I was thinking the same. It would have been much better to compare basic set up then go back and compare what could be accomplished with tweaked settings. IMHO, the zwo did really well considering the cost. But this also, for me, begged the question of what are they missing with evscope. Is it really that bad at imaging, or are they not setting it up properly?
@@StaticGamerYT The biggest problem with all these optics is that they sit on Altitude/Azimuth mounts. This means they only move up/down and left/right. This means when you start taking pictures of deep sky objects the telescope does not rotate on an equitorial axis leading to field rotation. That is where the sky changes its angle to the horizon. So the nebula in your picture is "rotating" while your camera does not. With an equatorial mount the mount rotates with your object and you are able to take nicer photos without the vignetting caused by field rotation.
but it is only dwarf 2 which doesnt have eq. tracking capability right???, or is it seestar also ? ;-; , i feel that vespera is the best right now@@viniguez487
@StaticGamerYT I have a Dwarf II: it is an alt-az mount, too, but it's quite easy to polar align, with a simple tripod and a ball head (or, better, a pan/tilt head). Just a raw polar alignment helps a lot in reducing field rotation. I don't know if ZWO has some ideas to make an equatorial base for Seestar. If they do, I'll consider a buy ;-)
I wonder if these smart telescopes are just super imposing Internet images instead of providing a real photo similar to what the Galaxy ultra phones do.
Or just buy a GOTO telescope - this is what originally smart telescope meant - with a decent optic so can actually use an eyepiece with it because you can see something. With an EQ mount, they can follow objects as long as they are visible in the sky so can attach a camera. After you know what you are looking at - you know, through the eyepiece (?). The strangest thing is that you can't even get an EQ mount with these wich is the minimum requirement for photography. Without that objects rotate, so the exposure can be minutes long max. But you can make pictures, so they can keep your money, win-win. Win for the manufacturer, and win for the shop - for you: not so much.
It's white if seen above the atmosphere. Obviously, from the surface of the earth the colour is different than that observed in space. Here is an excerpt fro NASA page on that topic: " (...) on Earth, the atmosphere plays a role in the color of the sun. Since shorter wavelength blue light is scattered more efficiently than longer wavelength red light, we lose some of the blue tint of the sun as sunlight passes through the atmosphere. In addition, all wavelengths of visible light passing through our atmosphere are attenuated so that the light that reaches our eyes does not immediately saturate the cone receptors. This allows the brain to perceive color from the image with a little less blue - yellow."
@@maciejzmuda1339 interesting. But basically the Sun is white. It's the blue light that is being scattered by ray light scattering. The moon at low altitude in the horizon also looks orange. Tough the hue isn't that yellow of the sun or it shouldn't be that yellow i suppose
You should remove the evscope from this lineup or make it abundantly clear in the video that this is not the evscope 2. The images you captured are nowhere near what an evscope2 or equinox 2 actually put out (i have an ev2 & dwarf2). I see you added that as a "disclaimer" but you're not really doing a fair comparison when you're not using the latest version of one of the scopes. Alternatively, you should have used pictures (non-processed) captured by users who have the latest versions of the scope. Also shooting targets on different days can result in different quality as weather conditions (humidity, clouds, wind, seeing, etc) will affect results. They're all good smart scopes. The smaller ones excel at portability & more geared towards astrophotography (take long captures and post-process images later) whereas the unistellars excel at real-time observing given the much larger aperture & focal length (meaning it takes seconds to capture & generate a good image without need to edit/post-process).
The eVscope lists for $2000-$5000 depending on the variant. The Seestar which in many ways is a superior instrument is $500. There's your in-depth comparison.
@@captainkoloth1631 Seestar looks a good product - there are already two users in my Astronomy society - and I have handled them. If you have driven a BMW, which is still just a car, you will know why it is better than a Renault, which is also a car. There is another in-depth comparison. Price is just one variable in any comparison. Quality, functionality, and finish are others. It is good to have choices.
@@psyborg1981 absolutely not. Depends on how much you are interested in DeepSky…but people who are interested in telescopes like that, usually want to see planets and the starts they kind of know. Or let’s say maybe to see things like the Orion Nebula and the result on the Nikon is better there, it’s better on every planet on our solar system and it’s better on the sun…you can catch even satellites…AND you can use the camera for normal photography with great zooming possibilities. So for 80% of the people a Nikon would be the better choice, only for the 20% really far DeepSky group a telescope like this would fit more. Like I said, satellites, planets, sun and things like the Orion Nebula…the results are better on a Nikon then on this things.
@@amarbosanac54 Yeah,I have watched some more smart telescope video's now. And you are right. This was my first video. After that I started to get more interested in it. But the planets look like crap yeah.
Disclaimer
- The eVscope shown in our comparison video is a first-gen eVscope as this is the only one we could get our hands on. Thanks to our friend Patrick for letting us use his! To keep things fair, we have populated the specifications table with the Gen 2 eVscope as it has better specs than Gen 1 and is more up-to-date.
- Several types of these telescopes are available, for example, Vespera comes in different versions (Vespera Pro, Vespera Passengers, etc) and Unistellar sells different versions of their smart telescopes (EVscope, EQuinox, etc). We chose the models we could get our hands on, but please keep in mind that different versions might get better results than shown here!
- The moon picture with Seestar was taken on a different day, because the moon was setting behind the trees and we didn't have time to point the Seestar there after the three others. Overall it shouldn't matter though.
Much more information is available on our written blog post at www.galactic-hunter.com !
1.
You show the specs for the eVscope 2 but the pictures were taken with the eVscope 1.
Totally misleading! 👿
You can't even buy the eVscope 1 anymore. So, who needs a review for an obsolete telescope?
The eVscope has 1.2 Mpixel; the eVscope 2 has 7.6 Mpx. But you show the pictures of that old garbage together with the specs of the new one. 🤦♂
2.
According to your table the eVscope has a field of view of 3° and the Dwarf has up to 3.2°
You really want me to believe that a telescope with of focal length of 450 mm has the same field of view as one with 100mm?
How can you miss such an obvious mistake?
*The eVscope actually has a field of view of 34 x 47 arcmin. So, it's about 0.6° x 0.8° - not 3° * 🤦♂
3.
The Vespera has a focal length of 200mm, the Seestar has 250mm. Both have the same sensor.
So, obviously the Vespera must have a wider field of view. In your table it narrower 🤦♂
*The correct FoV is not 0.78° x 0.57° but 1.6° x 0.9° *
How can you miss such an obvious mistake?
4.
Surely, it would have been possible to take pictures with all telescopes at the same time. You just have to press a button to start the imaging.
But you didn't.
The objects you photographed could be high in the sky in one night, low in the other; with haze in one, without haze in the other.
There was another big error in your first review (focal length of the Dwarf).
At this point I don't trust any information in your video. Your reviews are just too sloppy.
You misrepresented the Unistellar scope, not only because the version you are using is several years old, more comparable with the Stellina, but you also didn't control the exposure... so of course the center was blown out.
@@williamhaskett4371 Automatic settings were used for each telescope
@@GalacticHunterVespera only has at best four hour battery. It needs a dew heater. Its tripod is too small. Okay on a flat patio. But in a real garden, totally useless!!! You can’t recharge a cold lithium battery or you will break the unit and so you missed the clear skies!!! Also the Vespera shape looks very dangerous to handle. Easy to drop, but yes beautiful. The Dwarf defaults to 1 second, not automatic, actually has manual control of the shutter length, which is rather nice. Evscope is 4 seconds and Vespera 10 seconds.
How about to compare it it DWARF in EQ mode?
You need to redo the Dwarf II's session on M42, but now with more seconds exosure and binning off. You'll get a far better result. You had the wrong settings for the Moon (low resolution and exposure). For the Sun you need to adjust the white balance. You can give it any color you want. Orange looks nice to our eyes, but it isn't the natural color of the Sun (which is actually white). The new application for the Dwarf II has been published a few days ago and it makes a huge difference in quality and usability 👍
The dwarf 2 after firmware update now shoots 4k... wider field of view and fits into the bottom of my backpack when travelling...love it.
The seestar S50 now has a planetary mode and you can see Jupiter. It's tiny but you can see the bands.
Thanks! My Vespera II arrives tomorrow and this makes me feel like I didn’t choose badly. Now off to watch your video on Vespera. . ..keep ‘em coming!
The ultimate ? Vespera pro(april) Unistellar Odissey(available) , Célestron Origine(summer in Europe) and may be Seestar 80 ... So, we'll see you here another time this year, with pleasure . Thank you for your time and your tests. Kisses from France!
Seestar seems to be winning over cost/value. The Dwarf is nice because it's so small and portable. The others cost too much for what they offer compared to those two.
I like my Dwarf II as it is a lot more portable and has better field of view for bigger objects. With the new 4K resolution and proper processing workflow, the images come out a lot better than what's shown in this video
I think Dwarf2 and Dwarf3 bringing the portability to the next level, putting this into a backpack and hopping onto a Ebike. Riding to any close open field closeby or maybe an higher vantage point. Make a big difference than just doing it in your backyard. Also popping this into your boot or taking with you when camping or hiking is now an option. vs The big gear might be better and crisper but the limitation of setting it up and the bulky-ness is a negative. Think Dwarf2/3 brings Astrophotography / video to the market and people who would like to dabble in this field as a hobby or just people who like photography in general. This adds a new layer and its very user friendly.
I own a SeeStar. It is a little powerhouse. Images are bright and beautiful. I shot several images of a full moon and they are breathtaking. For just under 500 Euros this is a great companion which you can take anywhere in the included case , love it.
The Seestar s50 now has a planetary mode and a 4x zoom. It has a better image of Jupiter now than anything you showed in this video. For the price, the Seestar blows away all of these others. It's remarkable.
Vespera has Mosaic Mode.
@@hunter133officialSeestar is getting mosaic mode. Beta testing is already happening
@@EricWZ yay
I think whats important for people also is price. 2 of these are 500 dollars, the others are Mortgage payments. I have a dwarf II and I love it. It's my first telescope since I can't spent 6 grand to get into Astro. So I was wanting to buy a Dwarf III but I am also looking at the ZWO s50. I would like to see some carisons between the updated S50's and Dwarf 3
Great comparison video guys! I have both the Dwarf II and Seestar and with my back they allow me to do astrophotography again after an almost 3 year hiatus and that makes them both winners to me!
Great review folks. I have the current Vespera for quick access to DSOs and I love it. I process my DSOs with PixInsight. I’m primarily a planetary imager using a C14. I’ve been in this hobby for 50 years. I firmly believe that smart telescopes are the future as technology evolves and prices come down
You guys make a great team. This was a great review. Thanks for posting. I'm a Vespera owner and absolutely love it
The Dwarf II has a new version of firmware and the app in beta. It allows for shooting in Bin 1 (currently the Dwarf II only shoots in Bin 2), which should greatly improve resolution. Also the new version of the app has an improved UI and a larger database of objects for automatic go to. Once the new software is generally released, it would be interesting to revisit the Dwarf II to see how it stands up to the others.
It still only has a 25mm aperture. Major Achilles heel.
@@DouglasLippertyeah hardware wise it's at its maximum, maybe dwarf III will solve the issue. Still looks like an all round, trying to do everything smart scope.
One way to generate a "goodness factor" for deep sky extended objects is to compute the number of pixels on the sky times the collecting area of the telescopes... npix * r^2. If you plot this factor on the x-axis, and the price on the y-axis, you will see that the Dwarf2 and SeeStar are in a very different league than eV and Vesp... much more performance per price. If you make the plot on a log-log graph, you'll actually see a line with Vespera, Stellina and eV2... while the Dwarf and SeeStar compare with off-the-shelf cheap systems and the 3d printed "Microscope". Between the D2 and SeeStar you trade aperture vs portability... and you can mount the D2 in equatorial mode to capture objects near the zenith and remove field rotation. Personally I love taking my D2 on hikes and using their landscape panorama feature to get Gigapixel landscape shots; makes incredible posters.
I purchased and recently returned the eVscope2. If it was going to be my only telescope, I would have kept it. The only Newtonian reflector of the group and the largest. While the size didn't really bother me for travel, but having to collimate did. I did not like the focus mechanism or the fact that the eyepiece focus had no "0" setting or indent. The included mask was nice, but the delay from imager to app or eyepiece made it somewhat frustrating and difficult to refine. I ended up going with the SeeStar for the value, included features, and portability. I'll confess I didn't know Vespera had mosaic mode already -- but I'm hopeful SeeStar can add this feature. Thank you for the review.
I ordered the seestar last week, plan to use it for the eclipse in April as a lightweight, portable, plug and play option. Outside of that I think it will be a lot of fun for friends and family at bbq's!
You guys did a great job on this. I would have liked to have seen a galaxy or cluster, but maybe that's asking too much. It's so cool that we have all these choices, and even cooler that we have folks like you willing to test them out and share your enthusiasm for astro imaging. Thanks for all your hard work, and hope you have clear skies.
Yey🎉🎉 great review. I have a Dwarf2. If seestar improves their fov in their next version I will buy it, but otherwise will wait for Vespera pro!
Nice review. I really liked that you showed what came straight out of the respective setups, with no intense post-processing involved. I felt that was a great way to show what beginners can expect. Smart-telescopes aren't for me, but I still enjoyed watching what you managed to get with these. I can imagine the Seestar or the Dwaf Lab being very nice, affordable scopes to use in for example outreach or at schools.
Wow - just what I was looking for! Thanks so much! I was comparing the eVscope and the Vespera for my first telescope. You are the first astronomical site I've subscribed to. You've just saved me some bucks! :)
Vespera????
eVscope e o Vespera
Having that modest price tag and pretty good IQ Seestar looks like a winner 😉
The vespera pro comes next year with an entire new Chip new lens and more megapixels can you make a new test with vespera pro?
Excellent. Thank you for all the work needed for such a comparison. It’s a tough one to do, as they differ so much in their apps and what settings are adjustable or fixed. And that’s changing with every app and firmware update. And the user experience depends so much on the design and UI of the app. So more than any other astro products, these are constantly moving targets. Clear skies!
Galactic Hunter, thanks for these two videos.
For Dwarf 2 to have orange Sun, you just have to change the AWB to Sunlight
Oh thank you for letting me know, I'll do this for the review!
Really well done two part review. Certainly one of the most comprehensive. I really like the fact that you use the auto base settings with no post processing. For its cost I’m surprised the EV scope didn’t blow the others out of the sky. Keep up the excellent work.
Very defective review!
Of course the eVscope was not good. They tested the Version 1 with 1.2 Mpx that's not even on sale anymore.
I'm sure the new Version 2 with 7.7 Mpx is totally different.
Thank You so very much for a Fantastic Review...I wanted to view your presentation prior to spending my Dollars, and now I feel prepared to make the Right Choice for Me..PLUS YOUR LADY MAKES ME LAUGH THROUGH-OUT THE PRESENTATION...
I wonder how the Dwarf 3 would do in this comparison?
Great review, looking forward to reviewing the new Unisteller Odyssey and Vaonis Vespera 2
Thanks friends for the great review. Im very happy with my vespera and i feel i made the right choice. Thanks again.
It’s a shame that you didn’t turn off binning on the Dwarf II, which is possible for solar/lunar mode (Astro in the next app iteration). You could have then gotten Sun and Moon shots that are effectively double the resolution of the ones you demoed here.
Just ordered the seestar. Can't wait
Just ordered my seestar 4 hrs ago, lol. Super excited!!
Nice review. Thank you! I just pre-ordered the Vespera Pro, so I'll see how that goes...
I have an eVscope (original; I got it for about 1,500 bucks via Kickstarter; I'd not buy it at the retail price) and Seestar. One important difference to me is that Seestar supports the Wifi station mode (you can connect it to your home wifi router or a portable wifi router if you're in the field), while eVscope does not support that. The difference makes a rather large difference for me in terms of the usability. WIth seestar, I can still use the Internet to look up things while being connected to Seestar. With eVscope, I have to keep switchin Wifi network between eVscope's and my home wifi. In addition, with seestar, you can control another astrophoto session (e.g. using ZWO ASIAir) in parallel with Seestar without swtiching Wifi networks.
At the moment I have the Dwarf II which with the last update has 1x1 binning and improves the image quality, with this I have enough to practice for months until the Vespera Pro comes out, which will be my next lens
Thanks very much , i really enjoyed your video , exactly what i was looking for .
This was great! Thank you - I would really, really love to see the same comparisons done on planetary nebula! 🤞🏻
great reviews and comparison. thank you for putting this together.
UOOO-UO-UO-UO-UOOOOO!!
Very nice video, thanks.
It would be really interesting to see how much all these images (or, better, these series of exposures) could be improved with a good computer software. Built in functions are easy and quick, but I’ve seen gorgeous manual editings of some of Dwarf2 shots.
Dwarf II seems the all round smart telescope, with the latest firmware update. The thing about dwarf II that it is a simple point and shoot, but it also is smarter and capable of more, once you know how to use it. Landscape rather than portrait and that it is easily portable is the winning decider.
Great video! Very informative. Will subscribe and like.
Thanks so much for the comparison of smart telescopes. Love the fun way that you introduce equipment options to many of us who are new to the hobby. I’ve just purchased the Vespera 2, and will review your courses available to determine where to start on post-processing curriculum. .
Thk you for sharing this
I'd say that the Seestar is the best bang for the buck here. Vespera is the best one.
Price is a deciding factor for me, especially the significant difference among them.
First, thanks for the nice review.
It would be be nice to test battery performance in different modes for the telescopes. This would tell me what I need to bring for a full night of using the devices.
For example 1 hours of 10 second captures in raw mode used x percent of the battery.
Also if they can use an powerbank while operating.
The color of the sun is a function of the filter. Some solar film give an orange color, a glass filter will show white. The sun itself is a class G star, yellow in color. I already had a 5.81" glass filter that fits over an eVscope just right.
Excellent review, agree with your findings
Awesome review 👌 thanks!
Thanks for that great show Iam aslo thinking about a smart telescope maybe iam on the fence still. It looks like you guys are ina heavy LP skies like iam. But i still try to show people Astronomy still can be done cheers i just subscribed
very usefu video, thanks
??? Does Seestar S50 has the capability of a USB or an HDMI output ???
Where you can directly plug into a computer real-time viewing ??
I been in the market for a smart telescope that I can hook to a wall projector
For outdoor viewing on a large screen
手机投屏啊
Thank you very much use full ❤
Avec le Seestar, vous pouvez faire mieux que dans le test : améliorer le focus sur M42 et le soleil, utiliser le mode Planète sur Jupiter pour voir les bandes... Au final, peu de différences entre Seestar et le Vespera !
well done...thank you
You need to check out the Celestron Origin...that's an impressive smart telescope.
How is it "impressive". It is expensive!
The Orion nebula is not good target as a test for deep sky objects. It is very bright. You should compare faint nebula and galaxies. Here is the Unistellar very impressive. Also it is not fair to compare the eVscope 1.
Compare the eQuinox2 with the competitors. The Unistellar scopes have problem with their deep dark technology which suppresses faint details. Hopefully Unistellar will correct this. Otherwise they will loose a lot of customers.
Thanks!
Dwarf gives the real colour of the sun. It is white, but as others have said you can change the colour balance on the app.
seestar with mosaic mode? is
the plan to add s30. Why you not starting all in smae time? for example moon phases?
I am interested in a telescope to attach my Nikon Z8 to and is a travel telescope. Any recommendations?
Was there a cool 3d animation countdown at the beginning of the video originally or did I imagine it?
That came from TH-cam as the video was a "premiere"
How would these compare to the standard photographer's kit (crop or full frame) using similar focal lenght, on a star tracker?
Best telescope for watch Andromeda galaxy or alpha century
If we want to compare several products on which is best for a same object, this should be done on the Same night, Same target, Same time, Same location etc. Otherwise, the results are not fair.
what scope is the best for terestial viewing
The Seestar is currently on sale for $449
Which ones also work in equatorial mode?
So which one would actually track a SpaceX falcon 9 or the Starship durring launch?
Why would you even ask?
Why didn't the first camera show the satellites of Jupiter?
Which of these can adjust for light pollution?
Having a son who has a penthouse in Byron is pretty spiffy, and I'm only 4 hours drive away
Can any of these smart telescopes be reasonably used in an urban environment and from behind a double glazed window? From someone who lives in a high rise building in an apartment without a balcony or terrace.
Double Glazed Windows? Are you serious?
I guess your answer is no. Thanks
If you want a colour sun with the Dwarf you need to set the white balance yourself.
Great telescopes seestar is the
I almost ordered a Vespera, but then decided I needed to be more frugal. The SeeStar being a third of the price won out. I'm loving that I can set this up in my light-polluted city and actually view the night sky, see nebula, and photograph the Sun and Moon.
How do you think the new Vespera Pro will stack up (now on presale)?
I think it will beat everything. I've recently processed data from Vespera "Passengers" and honestly I was blown away by the quality
Thanks much for the reply. I am new to the hobby and appreciate your videos. I have a Celestron EdgeHD C8 SCT that I've been trying to configure for planetary pics (not so successfully so far!) and will be pre-ordering the Vespera Pro for DSO exploration.@@GalacticHunter
How do you compare a $5k scope with a $500 one? Based on this review it makes no sense since such minor differences in end result. For $5k you could get a very serious kit.
Like your idea of this comparison, but i have to say that you didnt do a fair comparison. Moon and Solar photos from the Seestar were taken in different times
For the price of that eVscope, I'd be a bit angry with the quality of the DSO images. That Orion image was terrible.
7:04, why the moons look look different
For the price, Seestar wins hands down
Vespera should be the best considering it cost 3 times more than the rest, and the Evscope 5 times the cost of the Dwarf 2 and seestar.
Cost is irrelevant. Just because you paid more, does not mean, you get more.
I went with a Seastar S 50 seems to fit my needs none of them really produce planetary astrophotography very well so I was going with easiest to use for deep space. The EVScope is way way overpriced
not really fair on the moon. it is a lot fuller phase of the moon on three of the scopes.
1.
You show the specs for the eVscope-2 but the pictures were taken with the eVscope-1.
Totally misleading! 👿
You can't even buy the eVscope 1 anymore. So, who needs a review for an obsolete telescope?
The eVscope has 1.2 Mpixel; the eVscope 2 has 7.6 Mpx. But you show the pictures of that old garbage together with the specs of the new one. 🤦♂
2.
According to your table the eVscope has a field of view of 3° and the Dwarf has up to 3.2°
You really want me to believe that a telescope with of focal length of 450 mm has the same field of view as one with 100mm?
How can you miss such an obvious mistake?
*The eVscope actually has a field of view of 34 x 47 arcmin. So, it's about 0.6° x 0.8° - not 3°* 🤦♂
3.
The Vespera has a focal length of 200mm, the Seestar has 250mm. Both have the same sensor.
So, obviously the Vespera must have a wider field of view. In your table it narrower 🤦♂
*The correct FoV is not 0.78° x 0.57° but 1.6° x 0.9°*
How can you miss such an obvious mistake?
4.
Surely, it would have been possible to take pictures with all telescopes at the same time. You just have to press a button to start the imaging.
But you didn't.
The objects you photographed could be high in the sky in one night, low in the other; with haze in one, without haze in the other.
There was another big error in your first review (focal length of the Dwarf).
At this point I don't trust any information in your video. Your reviews are just too sloppy.
I would add the narrow field of view means you can go for things that will not be more than a spec in Vespera. Meanwhile you can use MICROSOFT ICE to stitch Evscope images for Pleiades and save in TIFF format. You can put the Dwarf2 on a standard photographic tripod and see over the neighbours bushes and trees.
The amount of these gadgets reviewed by different channels shows there is some interest for sure They do serve a purpose but the hype is overkill, but really let's get back to what this hobby is really about.
I regret to say that on your channel, product promotion videos have begun to take precedence over the channel content and main theme, space and sky observation videos. While promoting the product, if you also display the objects you target with professional equipment, the content will be more satisfactory. Good luck.
Nobody will use standard settings, you always will try to make the best picture. That makes this potential useful comparison worthless
I was thinking the same. It would have been much better to compare basic set up then go back and compare what could be accomplished with tweaked settings. IMHO, the zwo did really well considering the cost. But this also, for me, begged the question of what are they missing with evscope. Is it really that bad at imaging, or are they not setting it up properly?
The natural color of the Sun is WHITE, not orange
See star low price and great
El seestar hizo la mejor imagen planetaria, es una broma que se lo den al evs que hizo la peor
I really hope ZWO adds equatorial support for the Seestar. Will really blow the competition out of the water.
hey, could you explain why ? :)
@@StaticGamerYT The biggest problem with all these optics is that they sit on Altitude/Azimuth mounts. This means they only move up/down and left/right. This means when you start taking pictures of deep sky objects the telescope does not rotate on an equitorial axis leading to field rotation. That is where the sky changes its angle to the horizon. So the nebula in your picture is "rotating" while your camera does not. With an equatorial mount the mount rotates with your object and you are able to take nicer photos without the vignetting caused by field rotation.
but it is only dwarf 2 which doesnt have eq. tracking capability right???, or is it seestar also ? ;-; , i feel that vespera is the best right now@@viniguez487
@StaticGamerYT I have a Dwarf II: it is an alt-az mount, too, but it's quite easy to polar align, with a simple tripod and a ball head (or, better, a pan/tilt head). Just a raw polar alignment helps a lot in reducing field rotation. I don't know if ZWO has some ideas to make an equatorial base for Seestar. If they do, I'll consider a buy ;-)
@@FabioPegli I hope so too. Beats lugging out my big telescopes most nights.
I wonder if these smart telescopes are just super imposing Internet images instead of providing a real photo similar to what the Galaxy ultra phones do.
Or just buy a GOTO telescope - this is what originally smart telescope meant - with a decent optic so can actually use an eyepiece with it because you can see something. With an EQ mount, they can follow objects as long as they are visible in the sky so can attach a camera. After you know what you are looking at - you know, through the eyepiece (?). The strangest thing is that you can't even get an EQ mount with these wich is the minimum requirement for photography. Without that objects rotate, so the exposure can be minutes long max. But you can make pictures, so they can keep your money, win-win. Win for the manufacturer, and win for the shop - for you: not so much.
The natural color of the Sun is white! Not yellow, orange, or red. Please stop saying the images with color are “natural”!
Yeah, it's apparently called a false colour. I think if i am not wrong the sun appears slightly green-ish or so
It's white if seen above the atmosphere. Obviously, from the surface of the earth the colour is different than that observed in space. Here is an excerpt fro NASA page on that topic:
" (...) on Earth, the atmosphere plays a role in the color of the sun. Since shorter wavelength blue light is scattered more efficiently than longer wavelength red light, we lose some of the blue tint of the sun as sunlight passes through the atmosphere. In addition, all wavelengths of visible light passing through our atmosphere are attenuated so that the light that reaches our eyes does not immediately saturate the cone receptors. This allows the brain to perceive color from the image with a little less blue - yellow."
@@maciejzmuda1339 interesting. But basically the Sun is white. It's the blue light that is being scattered by ray light scattering. The moon at low altitude in the horizon also looks orange. Tough the hue isn't that yellow of the sun or it shouldn't be that yellow i suppose
Yep, the dwarf 2 wins on that fact.
@@3ATTR1X nope the dwarf 2 cant win because it has 0 points
You should remove the evscope from this lineup or make it abundantly clear in the video that this is not the evscope 2. The images you captured are nowhere near what an evscope2 or equinox 2 actually put out (i have an ev2 & dwarf2). I see you added that as a "disclaimer" but you're not really doing a fair comparison when you're not using the latest version of one of the scopes. Alternatively, you should have used pictures (non-processed) captured by users who have the latest versions of the scope. Also shooting targets on different days can result in different quality as weather conditions (humidity, clouds, wind, seeing, etc) will affect results. They're all good smart scopes. The smaller ones excel at portability & more geared towards astrophotography (take long captures and post-process images later) whereas the unistellars excel at real-time observing given the much larger aperture & focal length (meaning it takes seconds to capture & generate a good image without need to edit/post-process).
It's a very sloppy comparison!
Also, the values for field of view are wrong for 2 out of the 4 telescopes 🤦♂
@@bobmusil1458And 11 hour battery on the Evscope
The eVscope lists for $2000-$5000 depending on the variant. The Seestar which in many ways is a superior instrument is $500. There's your in-depth comparison.
@@captainkoloth1631 Seestar looks a good product - there are already two users in my Astronomy society - and I have handled them. If you have driven a BMW, which is still just a car, you will know why it is better than a Renault, which is also a car. There is another in-depth comparison. Price is just one variable in any comparison. Quality, functionality, and finish are others. It is good to have choices.
Just buy the Nikon P1000 😂 you are good to go…better then all of them together with the right setting
You are joking,right?
@@psyborg1981 absolutely not.
Depends on how much you are interested in DeepSky…but people who are interested in telescopes like that, usually want to see planets and the starts they kind of know.
Or let’s say maybe to see things like the Orion Nebula and the result on the Nikon is better there, it’s better on every planet on our solar system and it’s better on the sun…you can catch even satellites…AND you can use the camera for normal photography with great zooming possibilities.
So for 80% of the people a Nikon would be the better choice, only for the 20% really far DeepSky group a telescope like this would fit more.
Like I said, satellites, planets, sun and things like the Orion Nebula…the results are better on a Nikon then on this things.
@@amarbosanac54 Yeah,I have watched some more smart telescope video's now.
And you are right.
This was my first video.
After that I started to get more interested in it.
But the planets look like crap yeah.
@@psyborg1981These are 300mm FL telescopes. They are NOT optimized for small objects, like a planet.
she belongs on a cringe video....😂😂😢
Orange is not “natural color” for the Sun. The Sun is white. 🙄