What They Can Do

Observer's Note Many beginning or first-time astronomers see pictures in magazines from the Hubble Space Telescope, or large telescopes from various observatories, and think that they will see these quality images in the telescopes that they purchase. When they don't see these quality images, they stop looking. Keep in mind that you will not see "Hubble-quality" images in your amateur telescope; but what you will see will amaze you.

Telescopes can bring the night sky closer to you, and make it less mysterious. You don't have to have the most powerful telescope to see incredible detail in some part of the sky. But figuring out what you would like to see is the most important thing you need to settle on before you decide which telescope you want to buy. In this section, we will discuss the various types of observing that you can do with a telescope. Here are some of the celestial objects that you might like to see:

• the moon
• the sun
• planets
• stars
• comets

We'll discuss these and others, and give you an idea of what you will actually see through a telescope.

To give you an idea of how the objects we discuss will look in a small telescope, I will describe how many of them appear in the 4-inch, rich-field, reflecting telescope that I use for observing.

Then, we'll discuss how they might appear in a larger, more powerful telescope.