Focusing distances (1 Viewer)

Hi, I am new to digiscoping, have recently bourght a Canon A610, and a 80mm scope. I have seen some wonderful images here and was wondering, what sort of subject distances are we looking at. I have tried a few test shots of static objects with good results so far. Any help will be much appreciated. Ernie

Hi erniehatt

I only have a very inexpensive Opticron 60mm (non ED scope), but can get stunningly good photos up to 45 feet away (15 metres) with my 20x eyepiece. Over 100 feet away things are not so good however, as Chromatic abberation + the smaller image tends to make things worse.

Digitalbirdy, thankyou so much for the reply, as this has been posted for quite a few weeks, I had just about given up. My scope is not of top quality either, but I have had acceptable results from static subjects. The weather is not being kind where trying it on birds, my garden is to small. Adrian, have just seen your post on Dpreviews, brilliant.Regards Ernie

I think this thread must have somehow got missed by everyone - me included. The scope model you're using does play an important part. An 80mm with APO/Fluorite/ED etc. glass should give decent results up to 60-70 yards easily - even at 20x eyepiece. However even with those scopes, the closer the distance the better. If you can keep it down to 15-20 yards then results should be very good.

With CA I find the main thing to do to minimise it is to make sure the sun is somewhere behind you and try not to take shots against the sky.

IanF said:

I think this thread must have somehow got missed by everyone - me included. The scope model you're using does play an important part. An 80mm with APO/Fluorite/ED etc. glass should give decent results up to 60-70 yards easily - even at 20x eyepiece. However even with those scopes, the closer the distance the better. If you can keep it down to 15-20 yards then results should be very good.

With CA I find the main thing to do to minimise it is to make sure the sun is somewhere behind you and try not to take shots against the sky.

Click to expand...

Thanks Ian, your help is much appreciated. Ernie

The whole issue of focus is tricky, I find.

I've only been digiscoping for a few weeks, and I have found I can get superb (to me) shots of nearby garden birds at feeders : even though they are small, and despite shooting through normal window glass (which I thought would kill the sharpness), I am very pleased with results at 20 or 30 feet.

Once it gets to 75-100 feet, quality drops off very noticeably, even though I have an 82mm scope (plenty light) with ED glass, so no CA. The pictures are slightly soft, even with pretty static subjects and at real scoping distances - 100 yards or more - the definition is disappointing, even when the scope image is tack-sharp. And yet, people post on here with pro-quality images taken with the same set-up at 200 yards.

I have the tradtional CP4500 and I did see some good advice on this forum about turning off some automatic setting or other to improve sharpness. If only I could remember where that post was............