Shoutout to the park ranger at Grand Canyon who called me out for using a phone camera through a telescope

I was at the South Rim last October trying to get a photo of the Andromeda galaxy through my 8-inch Dobsonian. This ranger walked up and said "you realize a phone sensor can't catch that detail, right?" I argued that modern phone processing could handle it. Then he pulled out a DSLR adapter and showed me the difference in 2 minutes flat. So what do you all think, is it worth investing in a dedicated astrophotography setup for mobile or should I stick with what I've got?

3 comments

3 Comments

mason.brian11d ago

Buddy of mine tried the same thing at Yosemite with a cheap spotting scope and his iphone. Ranger just laughed and handed him a pair of binoculars, said "try these for 10 bucks instead." He still brings it up every time someone mentions astrophotography lol.

john6506d agoMost Upvoted

I tried the exact same thing at Big Bend last year with a $30 spotting scope from Amazon and my Samsung. Took about 50 blurry photos of Jupiter that looked more like a glowing jellybean than a planet. The ranger at the Chisos Basin campground saw me struggling and just handed me his own 20x80 binoculars and said "you're welcome." I didn't even get a joke out of him, just a pity look. My buddy still sends me screenshots of those jellybean photos every time I complain about phone cameras.

averymartin11d ago

That "try these for 10 bucks instead" line from @mason.brian's story is brutal but honestly kind of fair. I bet that ranger had a whole cabinet of confiscated phone-scope pics from tourists who thought their iPhone could outsmart physics. Last time I tried something similar at a dark sky park, the ranger just shined his flashlight on my phone screen and said "that's not Andromeda, that's a smudge from your finger." So yeah, maybe drop the phone and just enjoy the view through the eyepiece instead.

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