Hubble points to our Milky Way's ancient past We've known for some time that the Milky Way is the result of a number of mergers and collisions with smaller galaxies stretching back billions of years. Some of these collisions such as the one with the Sagittarius Dwarf that started about 6 billion years are actually still underway! Before that, the Milky Way consumed a galaxy referred to as the Gaia-Sausage-Enceladus around10 billion years ago. In the distant future, the Milky Way will merge with the Andromeda galaxy, most likely on a Tuesday afternoon, although some astronomers are not certain of this happening.  Many of the larger galaxies we observe are the results of these types of mergers and we have a ring-side seat to see these. Being embedded into one of the arms of the Milky Way it's been harder to establish the history of own galaxy.  “Our home is the Milky Way galaxy, but we do not know how our house was built,” said Davide Massari, lead author, Astrophysics and Space Science Observatory of Bologna in Italy. “In this paper we discover where the first significant batch of bricks came from: a dwarf galaxy that we call LKH.” An illustration of the early collision of galaxies in the Milky Way's history. Image via NASA, ESA, Joseph Olmsted (STScI) The used the Hubble Space Telescope to examine globular clusters, large groups of stars that are so tightly bound together by gravity and their stars tall formed at the same time and evolve together. They're also some of the most spectacular objects to view through a telescope and we've covered them in more detail in a blog post here. Stars in some of these globular clusters were found to have formed outside the Milky Way and are remnants of the earlier LKH galaxy.  This discovery points to have merger occurring 11.8 billion years ago, extending the known merger timeline 1.8 billion back in into the past. The LKH dwarf galaxy is estimated to have contained around 500 million solar masses in stars which was a significant percentage of the mass of the Milky Way at the time.  “Some past studies have argued that the earliest phases of our galaxy’s evolution were defined by stars born only in our galaxy,” says Massari. “Here, we have shown that stars born in external galaxies also need to be considered.” More studies of these globular clusters are planned to continue digging into the Milky Way's past.  One thing to note about galaxy mergers is that while billions of stars, planets, vast interstellar gas clouds and dark matter "whack" into each other, due to the enormous distance between these objects, physical collisions between stars don't occur. Think of it more as thin clouds of smoke blowing into each other,   Read more here Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is about to launch An exciting time for astronomers as the latest space telescope is heading to space ahead of time and under budget! It's due to head into space aboard a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket next Sunday our time from the Launch Complex 39A at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Named after NASA's Dr. Nancy Grace Roman who was the space agency's first chief astronomer and often called the "mother of Hubble". A NASA illustration of the Roman Space Telescope Roman's main 2.4 metre diameter mirror is the same size as Hubble, but only a quarter the weight due to advances in material technologies in the decades since. Camera This wide-field space telescope carries The Wide Field Instrument, or WFI.  This is a 300-megapixel infrared camera that will give Roman the sameangular resolution as Hubble, however it will capture around 100 times the field of view of Hubble and larger than a full Moon.  It will also carry a Coronagraph, which will cover the bright disk of stars in the hope of revealing faint details of their exoplanets.  Science We'll cover what Roman hopes to achieve in coming articles, but some of its main objects include study dark matter and energy, explore exoplanets and the structure of the Universe. Where is it being sent to? Roman is headed to the second Sun-Earth Lagrange point, about 1.6 million km away, where its stable orbit will be balanced between the Sun and the Earth. The Earth won't block much the view, and the space telescope will be less impacted by heat. This is also the same orbit where the James Webb Space Telescope is located. Very chance of them colliding however as they'll be in orbits millions of kms apart... Catch the best globular cluster tonight  Speaking of globular clusters, you can easily spot tonight the brightest of them and the largest one in the Milky Way galaxy, Omega Centauri. The view from Sydney towards the southwest tonight, 22nd Aug, at about 6.30pm You will see the Southern Cross on its "side" and Omega Centauri sits in the rich star clouds that in that part of the sky. It's just on the edge of visibility with your eyes, a small fuzzy ball in binoculars and a simply amazing sight in a telescope of any size.  How good is the view? Many of our customers just starting out on their astronomy journey pop in to see me at BINTEL and ask whether they'll be able to see rings of Saturn or the bands and moons of Jupiter. I tell them, "Yes, but just wait until you see Omega Centauri!" Plus, Omega Centauri mightn't be from the Milky Way.  Astronomers consider it a left over core of a dwarf galaxy the Milky Way ate billions of years ago.  When you peer up at it tonight, you're looking at the same kind of galaxy leftover the Hubble team has been checking out. Cheers, Earl White BINTEL 22nd August 2026 

The largest 2D map of the Universe has been released. 5.6 trillion pixels and you can explore from your computer Astronomers have released the largest 2D map of the Universe this week, with 5.6 trillion pixel and almost 4 billion celestial object and maps about three-quarters of the sky. It contains nebulae, black holes, asteroids, and of course, lots and lots of galaxies. It builds on previous DESI Legacy Imaging Surveys which in themselves have become standards for referencing the known Universe. The NSF Víctor M. Blanco 4-meter Telescope in Chile which contributed data to the survey “It’s part of the fabric of astronomy research now,” says David Schlegel, a co-lead of the Legacy Surveys and scientist at the Department of Energy’s Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (Berkeley Lab). “When you're working with astronomical objects today, you often start by pulling up the Legacy Imaging Viewer to see what you’re looking at.”  There's an online viewer where you explore the data here. (Warning though, it is addictive and I'm probably already spent too much time cruising around the night sky with it....) Read more here Venus reaches greatest elongation for 2026. A great time to see it! Greatest elongation is when an inferior planet, one closer to the Sun than the Earth, ie Mercury or Venus, appears furthest apart from the Sun, For Venus, this happens at 4.00pm Sydney on the 15th August 2026. (August 15, 2026, at 06:00 UTC).   As Venus appears at its longest distance from the Sun in the sky, it will be visible for quite a while in the early evening and appear high in the sky. After the Moon, Venus is the brightest object in the night sky and is certainly putting on a display at the moment as it shines at about magnitude -4.4.   Venus and a very thin crescent Moon at around 6.30pm, Saturday 15th August 2026 as seen in the westerly sky from Sydney. Image via Stellarium.  Here's a map that shows where to see Venus in the next few nights, although it will be very hard to miss! You can enjoy the planet with just your eyes as a bright "star" and even a small telescope will reveal it as about half phase.  What's a Black Hole Star? Say G'day to MoM-BH*-1 It's not often scientists announce an entirely new type of astronomical object, but that's what happened this week with what's been labelled a Black Hole Star. (Not to be confused with the Soundgarden song "Black Hole Sun"...) Along the way, it might just have help solve a recent cosmic mystery. Not long after the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) began observations, it started finding what have been called "Little Red Dots." These are were announced in March 2022 and had astronomers scratching their heads as to what they were. They appeared in large numbers and dated back to some 600 million to 1.6 billion years after the Big Bang. What these compact, luminous, red sources of light were in the early Universe, and their nature remains under active investigation. MoM-BH*-1 was the brightest object of this type spotted during the Mirage or Miracle (MoM) survey by Webb. Its red colour was made even redder by the expansion of the Universe, but its colour would normally suggest something surrounded by a cloud of dust, however its appearance suggested there wasn't much there.  It's surprisingly bright, with the exception of a wavelength where a sharp change in brightness occurs. This is called a Balmer break, often a sign of dense gas absorbing light from a star forming without much dust around it.  As a further head scratcher,  MoM-BH*-1’s Balmer break was stronger than ever observed with a star. It's way too bright to have been generated by the nuclear fusion process, which powers stars such as our Sun. “It is a very special thing to find an object with no comparison, given the vast stores of data on billions of stars, galaxies and black holes that we have in our archival databases,” study co-author Rohan Naidu, said study co-author Rohan Naidu, an astronomer at the University of Hawaiʻi., “MoM-BH*-1 is one in a billion!” Computer simulations by Naidu and his team point towards a strange hybrid object, which is a combination of a central black hole some 50 millions times the mass of the Sun surrounded by a cloud of gas about the size of the Solar System. The brightness of these little red dots is so bright it outshines its host, early galaxy in a range of wavelengths. MoM-BH*-1 as seen by the JWST image via the researchers The odd little red dot “shines with the energy typically associated with black holes, but at the same time bears signatures classically associated with stars,” said Naidu. There will be further studies of other little red dots especially about early galaxy and black hole formation, but it looks we can add Black Hole Stars to the growing list of astronomical objects that have been discovered.  Cheers, Earl White BINTEL 15th August 2026

Rubin peers deep into Sextans  Astronomers would know that Sextans is one of the faintest, dullest constellations in the night sky. The brightest star in the entire constellation is only about magnitude 4.5 and there's not exactly a lot of them!  Not much happening in the that region above our heads and because this, it provide a rare viewport into much deeper space. When we look toward Sextans, we're looking "out" through our local spiral arm and into intergalactic space, rather than along the flat plane of our galaxy, the pale white river of stars we see on clear nights and simply call the Milky Way. It means there's a clear view with fewer stars and interstellar dust clouds between us and really, really open space.  Sections of sky that telescopes can stare at for extended periods are called "Deep Fields" and this area in Sextans is referred to as the COSMOS Field. This area of about two square degrees has been extensively studied to learn about how galaxies form, including an extended period of observation with the HST (Hubble Space Telescope). There's been some two million galaxies observed in this region, of all ages.  Now the 8.4-metre Simonyi Survey Telescope at the NSF–DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory has peered into the COSMOS Field and released Rubin’s Early Data Preview 2 (EDP2), the first data preview based on observations from the LSST Camera. The EDP2 release covers some 3000 square degrees or around one-sixth of the visible southern sky. The COSMOS Field is no doubt the highlight of the views! We're used to seeing rich star Milky Way star fields, capturing vast numbers of individual stars and dust clouds. In this new image, with so few Milky Way stars in the foreground, almost all of the points of light we see are not distant suns, but zooming further in reveals them to be individual galaxies.  Even with so few foreground stars, Rubin's sensitivity picks up faint glowing galactic cirrus, wisps of interstellar dust in our own galaxy.  Despite the COSMOS Field being observed for more than two decades, it's of immense value for Rubin as it allows further fine tuning of the instrument while also watching for any observable changes.  “The COSMOS field is a very important one for LSST science,” says Phil Marshall, Deputy Director of Rubin Observatory at SLAC. “Its wealth of prior observations, and its repeated targeting both during commissioning and as one of the LSST’s deep fields, will make it very valuable as a testing ground for scientists as they get ready to take on the survey data.” Read more here. Why is the Sun's corona so hot? A massive Solar Telescope reveals a hidden process on the Sun Some amazing images coming out the week from the world's largest Solar Telescope, NSF Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope near the summit of Maui’s Haleakalā. (We featured this telescope last year in another blog article.) The U.S. National Science Foundation Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope in Maui, Hawaiʻi. Image via: NSF/NSO/AURA/MPS They confirm the discovery of regions Kelvin-Helmholtz instability (KHI) in the form of small, swirling, intense patterns on the surface of the Sun in regions of magnetic activity. These are visible on the photosphere, which is the lowest layer of the Sun's atmosphere and the part of our nearest star that we actually see. KHI had been theorized for some time, but these observations are their long awaited confirmation.  “We believe that the discovery of Kelvin-Helmholtz instability in the solar photosphere, backed up by analysis of numerical simulations, is a major step forward in our understanding of the dynamics and evolution of solar and stellar plasma, and will serve as a basis for future discoveries.“ said Dr. David Boboltz, Deputy Director at the National Solar Observatory. One of the mysteries that has baffled astronomers is while the temperature of the photosphere is approx. 5,500 degrees C, the outer reaches of the Sun or the corona that we can see during total Solar Eclipses like the one in Europe next week or in Australia in 2028 and 2030 can be over a million degrees even though it's much further away. What appears to be happening is that KHI events causing swirling vortexes around the edges of magnetic regions on the Sun and these vortexes are maybe a key part of the mechanism that increases the temperature of the corona.  Part of the discovery process used computer simulations of KHI regions that were compared with observations to help confirm astronomer's theories about their formation and structure.   ”Kelvin-Helmholtz instability is likely a mechanism that contributes to the heating of the outer atmosphere and is part of the solution of the longstanding enigma of why stars have a million degrees Kelvin hot corona.” said Dr. Thomas Rimmele, Chief Technologist at the National Solar Observatory. The Sun is immensely complex and still we're still learning about how our nearest star works. You can read more about the discovery of this hidden Solar process here.  Korean probe spots the SpaceX rocket impact site on the Moon You've no doubt heard about a SpaceX Falcon 9 upper-stage rocket booster hitting the Moon during the week. This was used to send the Blue Ghost and Hakuto-R probes to the Moon in 2025. There were quite a few keen sky watchers keeping an eye out for the impact, but it was always going to be too small and awkward to be spotted from here on Earth with amateur telescopes. ESO reported that astronomers using the Very Large Telescope detected sodium and lithium gas in lunar material thrown up by the roughly 4,000 kg piece of debris, with the plume lasting five to ten minutes after impact. Korea Aerospace Research Institute images, showing before and after images of the Moon’s surface of there the SpaceX booster impacted this week. Check out their post here. The region where booster impacted into the surface was spotted by Danuri, a Moon orbiting spacecraft from the Korea Aerospace Research Institute. Danuri made multiple passes over the site taking from photos from Lunar orbit. The impact was confirmed in the images. NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) will pass over the region in the coming month or so and provide better imaging of the crash site.  Next week: What the El Niño pattern could mean for astronomers over the next few months.  Cheers, Earl White BINTEL 8th August 2026

Do thousands of satellites bother astronomers? Wait until the sky is full of massive orbiting mirrors! Sunshine is good, right? Who doesn't like sunlight! A US company, Reflect Orbital, has decided the Earth simply doesn't have enough of it and has a fairly radical solution: it's going to place in orbit a fleet of 18 x 18m highly reflective mirrors that can be positioned to reflect sunlight to areas on the Earth's surface that are underdoing periods of "sunlight deficiency." In other words, night time.  These will be used to power solar panels arrays, provide extra light for growing crops around the clock and even illuminate emergency and disaster areas. The first of these has received clearance to launch this year on the Eärendil-1 satellite, carrying an 18m x 18m mirror, with fleet of...wait for it...50,000 in place by 2035. Some of the proposed satellites in orbit. Illustration via Reflect Orbital I think it would be a fair to say that this might impact astronomers and astrophotographers and possibly even dwarf the impact of light pollution in many areas.  These satellites need to be repositioned every few minutes when operating and with chances of "flashes" while this is happening landing in the eyes of drivers or pilots, disorienting animals or straight down a telescope tube.  Interestingly this was approved by the American FCC (Federal Communications Commission) who regulate satellite and radio transmission. As these satellites "transmit" on the visual spectrum and not on radio frequency, they decided that they have no authority to regulate the project. (Read more about that here if you're having a slow afternoon and have got nothing better to do....) The space above our heads is becoming increasingly crowded. Apart from the thousands of existing satellites which are already impacting astronomy, there are plans for strange and weird programs like artificial meteor showers, space hotels, space burials and more.  In fact, the American FCC has a new document called "Spectrum Abundance for Weird Space Stuff" (seriously, that's what it's called!) and you can read it on their government website here. I'd be out there enjoying the dark skies while you can. A companion found for Betelgeuse  One of the brightest stars in the sky is the ruby red "shoulder" in the constellation of Orion. It's not visible all night sky during our Australian winter, but as the months roll on, it will be shining brightly in the summer months. It's one of the best known stars in the night sky and it's also known to vary in brightness over long, semi-regular periods  The exact reason for the variation in Betelgeuse is still unknown and it's thought be to caused by dust clouds, the star contracting as it prepares to go supernova or even an unseen companion star passing in front it.  Announced this week is the discovery of the long proposed companion for Betelgeuse. A team lead by an astronomer from Paris Observatory spotted this hidden star in images taken by the European Southern Observatory’s (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT). One of the problems with observing faint companion stars like this is the glare from the brightness of the main star. Betelgeuse is hundreds of thousands of times brighter than the newly discovered star orbiting it.  The image was obtained using SPHERE, the high-contrast imaging instrument installed on ESO’s VLT in Chile.  VLT images of Betelgeuse and its companion (Image via: ESO/M. Montargès et al. Background: N. Rissinge)   "This is the conclusion of a century-long quest." says Miguel Montargès, deputy astronomer at Paris Observatory PSL and lead author of the study. "We have shown that Betelgeuse is not single, it is accompanied by a faint stellar companion.'" As often with these sorts of discoveries, this not something you'll be able to observe or image with your telescope.  Read more here.  The largest galaxy ever observed is even bigger than we thought Astronomers have considered a galaxy called IC 1101 to the largest ever measured. It belongs to a class called brightest cluster galaxies (BCGs), which form through the mergers of multiple smaller galaxies and are likely to be still growing. One of the problems working out just how large they are is the difficulty in finding out where their outer edges actually are. In other words, where does the galaxy end and where does intergalactic space start. Astronomers using Wide Field Camera (WFC) at the Isaac Newton Telescope (INT) in the Canary Islands have extended the size of IC 1101 to 1.7 million light-years (520 kiloparsecs) from the previous estimate of 370,000 light-years (114 kiloparsecs). It's a major upgrade which puts IC 1101 even further ahead of other galaxies.  IC 1101 is about 17 times the size of our own Milky Way and containing an estimated 3.4 trillion solar masses in stars, around 55 times the stellar mass of the Milky Way Unlike many cutting-edge astronomy discoveries, IC 1101 is within the reach of amateur telescopes. Located in Virgo, Its magnitude is about 13.2 and 14.7 depending on filters used. You'll need something in the range of 200mm (8") aperture or more but if you spot it, you can gaze at a faint smudge knowing is the largest galaxy ever found, and still growing.  Moon Phases for August 2026 Full Moon from Sydney on Thursday 30th July around 7.00pm. Taken with a DWARF mini. We get asked for local Moon phases as online and AI results can sometimes show them in US or European times.  For August 2026 they are:     Phase Date Time (AEST) Last Quarter 6 Aug 2026 12:21 pm New Moon 13 Aug 2026 3:36 am First Quarter 20 Aug 2026 12:46 pm Full Moon 28 Aug 2026 2:18 pm All times AEST (UTC+10), Sydney. Lucky 13 for SpaceX's Starship No big kaboom for the latest flight of the big rocket.  Last weekend saw the 13th flight of the largest rocket ever built, the Starship by SpaceX. Flight 13 lifted off from Starbase on Saturday morning our time, after a scrubbed attempt on 16th July when four engines failed to ignite, and a weather scrub on the 23th of July. It was the second flight of the V3 vehicles and the first Starship flight to deploy next-generation Starlink V3 satellites. The booster relit only 10 of 13 engines on descent, with five failing seconds later, resulting in a harder splashdown.  A nice planetary alignment for early risers If you like getting up pre-dawn (or maybe winding up from a big night before) there's some lovely planetary alignments in the pre-dawn skies in August. Here's the view low on the horizon from the north and northeastern skies on around 5.30am on the 9th of August 2026 as seen from Sydney. Speaking of Betelgeuse, you will see Mars and the Moon just below the red giant star, along with Saturn higher in the sky.  This image is produced with Stellarium which is popular here at BINTEL! Cheers, Earl White BINTEL  1st August 2026

It's been a little while since we did a full head-to-head smart telescope comparison and with recent announcements, it's a good time to again go over what's in the market and offer a bit of advice about the best model for you.  What's a Smart Telescope? We generally define a Smart Telescope as an all-in-one portable telescope that includes a mount, camera, telescope itself in a single unit. Most include internal filters, and many come with an external solar filter. Using all this built-in tech, they are able to automatically position themselves to observe the night sky.  You take them outside, connect to them using dedicated phone or iPad/tablet apps and then start observing and astro imaging.  The key to Smart Telescopes are their ease of use and quick setup. This lets you start your astronomy journey without having to spend time fiddling about with complex gear or working out how to run multiple software programs. While they're quick to get going, nobody stays a beginner forever as I'm always keen to point out, so they all have advanced features you can learn to use as your experience grows.  With the exception of some Unistellar models, there is no eyepiece on Smart Telescopes to look through.   Are Smart Telescopes just for beginners? Absolutely not! There are a large number of our experienced customers who've been observing and photographing the night sky, often for decades, who are now happy Smart Telescopes owners. Ease of setup, lightness and portability are big factors.  I've had more than a few of our regulars who said to me something along the line of "Earl, I've done more astronomy in the last three months with my new little scope than I've done in the last three years with my old gear..." We're also finding them being used more and more at astro open nights and even training workshops.  Are Smart Telescopes upgradeable? Apart from the Celestron Origin, the hardware of Smart Telescopes is generally not upgradable. This is much like what you'd find with most modern phones.  There are a small number of add on filters, tripods and EQ wedges. There's a growing cottage industry that are producing 3D printed lens shades and other accessories, however there's nothing we've seen so far that BINTEL has decided to stock.  What are these Equatorial head or wedge things I hear about?  An EQ mount, Equatorial Mount or "Wedge" all do the same thing. They tilt your Smart Telescope to allow it to not just follow your target but avoid the slight twist or "field rotation" that happens when they work in just up-down, left-right or Alt-Az mode.  This allows longer exposures for even more detailed images.  Using a Smart Telescope in EQ mode will need it to be "Polar Aligned" and pointed at the South Celestial Pole. This process used to be fiddly for beginners to get right, but their apps feature tools to do this in a couple of minutes. Please note that having an EQ mount such as the ZWO TH10 Head is a nice upgrade, however it's in no way essential. We often advise customers just starting out to use their new telescopes without EQ accessories while they get going.  Can Smart Telescopes be left outside? Smart Telescopes often have extensive observation planning features that allow you to capture an entire evening (or even more!) of astro images across multiple targets. You can leave them outside, sleep soundly and see what they've accomplished the following morning. If they cop a brief shower or heavy dew during the night, they'll be ok. They're NOT designed to be left outside for multiple days and nights.  Can I use Smart Telescopes to photograph the Sun? Yes. Make sure you have a Solar Filter installed on the front of your telescope before you do! DWARF Lab DWARF Lab were one of the early Smart Telescope suppliers. They currently have the   super compact DWARF mini, which holds the title of the smallest Smart Telescope. (The DWARF 3 model has just been discontinued as of time of writing.) We are quite fond of the DWARF mini as it has shrunk a full astrophotography rig down to the size of something you can carry around with you in a coat pocket or small bag. It's also only 840g or about the weight of midsized pair of binoculars.   A DWARF mini at BINTEL during the week. That's the entire telescope, camera and mount! It has a 30mm wide main lens and a Sony IMX662 sensor based camera, with a smaller wide-angle lens using a OmniVision OS02K10 based camera. For those used to traditional camera setups, think of the DWARF mini as having 1016 mm (telephoto) and a 45 mm (wide-angle) lenses. You can use it on a flat, solid surface or mount your DWARF mini on any standard photographic tripod. Despite its small size the DWARF mini produces stunning images.  You can check out more images from the DWARF Lab gallery here. Who the DWARF mini is ideal for: The DWARF mini is perfect for anyone after an affordable way to get into astro imaging or those who need an ultra portable little telescope for travelling.  You'll find the DWARF mini at BINTEL here. ZWO ZWO kicked off the trend of amazing small Smart Telescope with the original Seestar S50 which was followed by the Seestar S30. We now have the Seestar S30 Pro, a significant improvement to the previous Seestar S30.  The ZWO Seestar S30 Pro is one of the most popular and bestselling products we've ever sold here at BINTEL, with many hundreds going out the door.    It combines a 30mm four element "APO" main lens with a Sony IMX585 based camera and a wide-angle lens using a Sony IMX586. These allow you to shoot the night sky in 4K resolution.  Two of the main highlights of the S30 Pro is its wide field of view, along with the sensitive widefield camera. This has made it popular for capturing wide portraits of deep-sky objects. Here's a view of winter favorites, the M8 Lagoon Nebula and M20 Trifid Nebula captured with a ZWO Seestar S30 Pro and by Darren Rickett from Wyoming in NSW and posted to the BINTEL Society Facebook group here. Apart from close ups of deep-sky objects, the widefield camera on the S30 Pro can stitch 180-degree Milky Way panoramas and star trails.    Who the ZWO Seestar S30 is ideal for: This is a great choice if you're after an affordable Smart Telescope that offers a range of flexible imaging options in a compact package. There are lots of reasons why these are so popular.  Check out the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro at BINTEL here. Special note: both the DWARF mini and ZWO Seestar S30 Pro can be used during the day for scenery and even wildlife photography. It's also well worth exploring both the ZWO Seestar and DWARF Facebook and Instagram accounts and user groups to see examples of what others are doing with these small Smart Telescopes.  The ZWO Seestar S30 Pro and DWARF mini at Macquarie University Observatory during a recent imaging session run by BINTEL's Jess Gilmore. A handy way to compare their sizes! Vaonis Another pioneer in the Smart Telescope arena, French designed Vaonis Vespera telescopes are a big step up in terms of optical quality and imaging abilities. The three models in their current Vespera range all use a 50mm main lens and share the same general size and body shape, while differing in internal systems.  They are also small enough to be carried under one arm and would be easy to transport. A Vaonis Vespera 3 observing in a city environment Their Vaonis Vespera II was introduced a couple of years ago and uses a 4-element (quadruplet) APO 50mm f/5 lens with a Sony IMX585 sensor based camera. This is a significant jump in size from the 30mm class optics you'll find on the S30 Pro and DWARF mini telescopes. Larger optics reveal more details and produce better quality astro images.  The Vaonis Vespera 3 released a couple of months ago keeps the same camera sensor, while bumping up the quality of the main lenses to a more advanced  3-group flat-field APO quadruplet + baffle. Memory moves to 115 Gb with an 11 hour battery meaning you can image throughout the night.  Imaging sessions can even be spread multiple evenings with 15 Multi-night slots.  Moving up to the Vaonis Vespera Pro 2 will bring further refinements to same size 50mm optics while improving the camera sensor to a 12.5 megapixel Sony IMX676. The total size of the mosaic images doubles to 50 megapixels, along with onboard storage jumping to 225 Gb and 30 Multi-night slots. Some images captured with a Vaonis Vespera Pro 2 and Vespera 3.  Head over to the Vaonis gallery for more. Vaonis Design and Software Experience Smart Telescopes are as much software as they are hardware. The Vaonis Singularity app for Apple iOS and Android devices stands alone in design elegance and functionality.  There's also no doubt about the stylish, European design of the Vespera telescopes. We can't think of another piece of gear sold by BINTEL that, frankly, looks so bloody good! They're more like pieces of modern art that will stop people either when displayed in your home or out in the observing field.  Who the Vaonis Vespera telescopes are ideal for: The Vespera II at the current price of $3,499 is possibly the best value premium Smart Telescope available today. Its 50mm APO optics and 8.3 Megapixel camera combined with the Vaonis Singularity software suite are going to deliver some stunning images right from your first night out, while allowing you to further build and process your data as your skills grow. Additional features and upgrades to the Vespera 3 bring further image details and capabilities. The main lens baffles shield the telescope from stray street lighting and the bumps to the memory and battery capacity expand your sessions under the night sky. If you want the best looking star clusters, nebulae or galaxies of any Smart Telescope, this might be the one for you,  We'd probably point you towards the Vespera Pro 2 with its larger camera sensor if you'd like to go after more challenging astro targets or want to stitch together larger mosaic images either for printing or projection onto a larger wall display.  Learn about Vaonis at BINTEL here. Unistellar Another Smart Telescope pioneer and also another French company, Unistellar have two ranges of reflector based devices.  They are also the only Smart Telescopes that have models with eyepiece that you can look through.  Their ODYSSEY Smart Telescopes feature an 85mm reflector, with super easy setup and use. The Unistellar evScope2 uses a 114mm main mirror, a Nikon electronic eyepiece with micro-OLED display meaning you'll see down the 18.2 magnitude stars, live in your backyard.  Unistellar ODYSSEY Pro with Nikon eyepiece  One of the major highlights of the Unistellar Smart Telescope range is the company's heavy involvement in citizen science programs. If you'd like to join with other Unistellar owners to observe and discover asteroids, observe exoplanets, and study supernovae and even publish genuine scientific research, this might be your perfect choice.  Who the Unistellar telescopes are ideal for: Unistellar Smart Telescopes are great for their ease of use and if you'd like the experience of live viewing through a telescope eyepiece. They also have a vibrant citizen science community.  You can find out more about Unistellar at BINTEL here. Celestron The Celestron Origin Intelligent Home Observatory Mark II is bit of a mouthful of a telescope name but it's also the largest and most capable Smart Telescope available today.  It uses a large 152mm (6") RASA Optics running at f/2.2, along a mount with built-in battery and Wi-Fi.  The Celestron Origin is famous for capturing large swathes of the night sky in fine details, and quickly too. It's also the only Smart Telescope that allows you to upgrade the hardware, with the main camera being at the front of the telescope.    The Celestron Origin is larger and closer to more traditional telescope in size. It's portable, although will require a little bit more effort to transport the mount, the Origin and tripod compared to smaller, more portable options The new Mark II version of the Origin features an upgraded camera that features a Sony IMX678C camera with significant improvements in image quality. This is the only difference. If you have one of the original Celestron Origin telescopes, you can upgrade it to Mark II specifications here. Find out more about the Celestron Origin at BINTEL here. Who is the Celestron Origin telescope ideal for: If you're after a system that will produce best quality astro images, the Origin would work for you. As it captures the light from deep-sky objects quickly, it would also be ideal for anyone running an astro tourism business or carrying out astronomy outreach and educational activities. We have a number of Celestron Origins performing these duties nightly around the country and would be happy to chat to about them to you if you're interested.  Do Smart Telescopes use AI to generate their images? No. The sophisticated software suites that are part of Smart Telescopes do not use generative AI to look at an image you've taken and then fill it in details either by using a library of existing images or using AI tools to simply make things up.  Image processing is a central part of astronomical imaging at all levels.   Experienced astrophotographers often use sophisticated software to reveal hidden details. What they will do is "tweak" a wide range of options as they combine multiple images into a single astro photo. We often have our customers go back to earlier datasets they captured once their skills have improved to mine and explore what details can be revealed with these new skills.  The apps powering Smart Telescopes are now automating these processes to a growing degree. This lets even beginners extract more from their images without the need for expensive software or hours of learning and processing.  You can turn these features off if you'd like. It means you can still process everything yourself and pull unprocessed data from your telescope.  Can I control my Smart Telescope from inside my house? Yes. Smart Telescopes produce a Wi-Fi network that your phone or iPad/tablet joins. They can also join an existing Wi-Fi network, so if your backyard has Wi-Fi coverage, you can set them up outside, then head indoors and your app will find the telescope on your home network. If you can cast or display your device's screen onto your big screen TV, you'll be able to see what your Smart Telescope has been working on your TV as well. A great way to share your astro images with friends and family. Do I need Internet access for my Smart Telescope to work? No. Astronomers like to head into the middle of nowhere to explore dark skies.  If you don't have 4G or 5G phone access there, don't worry! All the data needed to run your Smart Telescope will be downloaded when you install their apps.  Some of the more advanced cloud based image processing tools will need Internet access, but these are not needed to control the telescope and image the night sky. Will there be a new Smart Telescopes introduced and should I wait?  The answer to these questions is yes and no! As I say to customers, unless a company has announced that they have sacked all the engineers and designers who produced their current models, these companies are more than likely working on new models that will be introduced at some point.  You can say pretty much the same thing about phones, TVs, cars and so on.  One thing to remember about Smart Telescopes is that the telescope companies are very aware of the competition and in a race to introduce new features and capabilities via free app and firmware updates.  The Smart Telescope you purchased a year ago is probably quite different to the same telescope you're using today despite looking much the same and not having spent a cent upgrading it.  Wrapping it up BINTEL has a wide range of Smart Telescopes that start at just under $700. These wonderful gizmos have opened up the world of astronomy and astrophotography to folks who thought they'd never be able to afford to use more complex equipment, as well as making it easier for experienced astronomers to simply get out under the stars.  Smart Telescope Ideal For DWARF Lab mini Budget focused astronomers, travelers ZWO Seestar S30 Pro All-around deep sky imaging Vaonis Vespera Ultra detailed astro images, superb design & app Unistellar eVscope and ODYSSEY Live eyepiece viewing, community projects Celestron Origin High-end, fast capture of astro images   The crew here at BINTEL are more than happy to go through the features of various models at length to make sure you'll be starting out with just the telescope for you and the family. If you've ever wanted to get into astronomy, Smart Telescopes have made it the perfect time! Cheers, Earl White BINTEL  25th July 2026