Hello from United States (1 Viewer)

Hello all I’m looking for info on mid to high end spotting scope I can use for wildlife viewing, and digiscopping.

Hi Arhino and a warm welcome to you from all the Staff and Moderators.

I've moved your post to the Telescope forum and subscribed you to the thread so you can find it easily. I'm sure someone will be along before too long to advise you.

Hi ya Arhino and a warm welcome to you from me in Myrtle Beach :t:

Hi Arhino and welcome to BirdForum.

Rich

Arhino04 said:

Hello all I’m looking for info on mid to high end spotting scope I can use for wildlife viewing, and digiscopping.

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Did you have any criteria for the scope? Is weight important or is a larger image / brightness more important? Is it for really long distances (45x or higher mag)? And where are you on budget? $500, $1000, $2000? You will also need a tripod and tripod head.

I personally wanted a compact, lightweight scope that is easy to carry and pack. I picked the Opticron MM4 60mm. I use a 32x fixed eyepeice with a wide field of view. In a kit, the MM4/60 with 15-45x zoom is about $800 and weighs about 32oz (scope + zoom), though I think it is better with a wide angle fixed eyepiece.

Other popular scopes are the Nikon ED, Kowa, and Swarovski.

You can digiscope with all of them. I use my iPhone. Opticron has a gadget to mount your phone on the eyepiece. It's ok. The Swarovski one is probably better (at least their one for binoculars is really nice). They all make adapters for various camera formats too.

Marc

My budget is under 2k. I’ve looked at several definitely like Swarovski. Other I really like due to warranty and I use there viper H-D binos is vortex. Weight isn’t a huge concern, my plans will be to use for glassing at national parks and wildlife around the house. I will also use it for digiscopping with my camera phone and a dslr both mirrored and mirror less dslr.

Arhino04 said:

My budget is under 2k. I’ve looked at several definitely like Swarovski. Other I really like due to warranty and I use there viper H-D binos is vortex. Weight isn’t a huge concern, my plans will be to use for glassing at national parks and wildlife around the house. I will also use it for digiscopping with my camera phone and a dslr both mirrored and mirror less dslr.

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Too bad you just missed the kowa TSN-883 for $1699. That's an excellent 88mm scope, but $2k new without eyepiece. The Kowa TSN-773 (77mm) is about $1600 new, plus zoom $700, plus tripod + head, will be over $2k.

The Opticron MM4 77mm with 18-54x is $1400. The Nikon ED 82mm 20-60x is $1600. The Vortex Razor HD is I think about $1600 for an 85mm. The higher mag scopes all need a good sturdy tripod and probably a fluid head. Those are likely your large objective options in your price range for new. I've used the Nikon Monarch ED and it is a nice scope. If you look at the brand-specific forums, you can find lots of reviews and discussion (e.g. for Nikon https://www.birdforum.net/forumdisplay.php?f=417, for Kowa https://www.birdforum.net/forumdisplay.php?f=298).

To save some money, you could go with a 60mm scope, which will be about 40x - 45x tops mag, which is still a lot. You'll probably knock $200 - $500 off the price and could get away with a lighter tripod.

You can find the Swarovski ATS65 for about $2000 - $2500 with eyepiece used. There's also the various previous Nikon ED's (pre-monarch, called ED and EDII I think) used. I don't know the detailed differences between them, but I'm sure there's another thread on birdform about it.

If you are going to put the weight of a mirrorless DSLR (like an A7?), you need a good tripod head to handle that torque and extra weight.

Marc