Shooting stars

[TonyG44]

Has anyone used the X pro2 shooting stars/moon through an 80mm Scope with an adapter. Does it work? I'd like a scope to watch birds, they are around £300 for something half decent. Or, do I go for the 50-140 f2.8 zoom for around £895

[jerryy]

I take it from the way you are phrasing your question you mean a spotting scope instead of a telescope. Yes, it should work to give you some pretty good “wide field” images — these are ones like the Milky Way as opposed to “deep sky objects” — these are the ones like close ups of nebulas and galaxies. Take a look over in the Landscape section for some examples that members have posted.

The spotting scope will also allow you to enjoy your bird watching hobby and get some photos as well. You will probably need to get a T2 to Fujifilm adapter to mount your camera to the scope. One note of caution, check with the adaptor maker and the scope maker to make sure the amount of back focus between the two match up or else things can get complicated, meaning everything is working but the images are blurry or non-existent.

The camera lens will also give you wide-field images and bird photos, but that setup is a little more cumbersome for casual bird watching.

One last note, stars and moon photos are usually long exposure shots, so you will most likely need a good tripod to keep the camera steady.