For the last few years we really embraced astronomy – and in particular astrophotography where we capture images of deep sky objects like nebulae and galaxies.
Of course – one of the most important components of this process is the telescope and Tech Guide has looked at the Svbony SV503 ED 80mm F7 Doublet Refractor.
The 80mm refers to the aperture size of the opening where the light comes into the scope.
The wider the aperture the more light that can come into the telescope.
For anyone new to astrophotography 80mm size is a good starting point – it’s more affordable and it’s a manageable size.
The Svbony SV503 is solidly built and coated with fine-grained paint to give it a premium polished finish.
The telescope has an ED doublet lens (ED stands for extra-low dispersion) which helps bring the light into the scope accurately.
It eliminates chromatic aberration, so all the light wavelengths are not dispersed but rather focussed at the same point.
The lenses also have ultra-wideband multilayer coating to eliminate glare and reflection.
When looking at objects that are tens of thousands and sometimes millions of light years away, the Svbony SV503 does a great job handling that light and providing a sharp result.
There are a lot of moving parts to astrophotography including the mount, proper polar alignment and your choice of camera.
For our review we used the SV503 with our Skywatcher EQ6-R mount, the ZWO ASI2400-MC colour CMOS camera and the ZWO ASI 120mm mini guide scope.
There is impressive onboard dual speed focusers – a larger dial to adjust the focus and a smaller dial to fine-tune the level of focus to ensure a pin sharp result.
The focuser can also be rotated around the barrel of the telescope to make it easier to achieve the correct framing for your image.
Now the magnification of the telescope is determined by the focal length which is 560mm with the SV503.
The higher the focal length the higher the magnification.
Put another way the field of view is wider with a lower focal length.
This gives astrophotographers different options and with the SV503 were able to capture a larger area of the sky.
With that in mind we decided to shoot an area of the sky where two nebulae are close to each other, and we went with Triffid Nebula (M20, NGC 6514) and the Lagoon Nebula (M8).
With a higher focal length we would have had to choose either one or the other. Not so with the SV503.
We were able to nicely frame the two nebulae and took three-minute exposures for two hours before stacking the frames and processing with Adobe Photoshop.
But even the stacked frames before we opened the file in Photoshop looked great.
You may notice on the outer edges of the image some elongated stars.
This distortion is normal because of field curvature and is inherent with all refractor telescopes.
What we would recommend for anyone thinking of purchasing the SV503 is to also add in a 0.8x focal reducer/field flattener which can take out that distortion.
The Svbony SV503 is a solid performer and a great option for the astrophotographer who want to add quality and variety to their choices.
The SV503 is available now through svbony.com and is priced at $US380. Tech Guide readers can receive $US40 off if they use the code: ste50340 at checkout.
