FIRST LIGHT
imaging before detail, structure and colour reach their maximum. At any stage of the process a composite image of the frames taken so far can be saved to a smartphone or tablet camera roll, or easily shared to social media. There is no branding on the images whatsoever, with finished JPEGs saved in their native 1,920 x 1,080-pixel resolution. That’s about two megapixels, technically making Vespera the lowest-resolution ‘smart’ telescope around.
Vespera has a few tricks up its sleeve for anyone wondering if it is only good enough to be considered an astrophotography novelty. For starters, it is possible to export and share images as RAW image files. Advanced users can also engage full manual mode and bypass the default image parameters for deep-sky imaging. There is also a new mosaic mode that allows it to take multiple separate images of objects that don’t fit in its field of view – such as the full extent of the Andromeda Galaxy, M31 – and automatically stitch them together. The feature wasn’t available to review at the time of testing, but is expected to be live at the time of publication.
Using Vespera is child’s play. As well as its excellent Singularity app, it comes equipped with star pattern recognition software that takes just a few minutes to align using plate-solving. Unlike other smart telescopes, it has auto-focus, though the images it produces do lack a little sharpness. Vespera cannot take images of planets. Nor does it produce fabulous lunar images; even a bright full Moon looked rather dull in finished images. It can be used for solar observing, if you pair it with Vaonis’s specialist solar filter. But what Vespera excels at is battling light pollution. With its optional light pollution filter in place – and even without it – it is possible to get exquisitely bright and surprisingly colourful images of the kind of deep-sky objects that are impossible to see with the eye from light-polluted locations.
Although it performs even better under dark skies, where its limiting magnitude is 13, Vespera is an ideal option for urban astronomers frustrated by their lack of access to galaxies, nebulae and star clusters, with pockets deep enough to pay its premium price.