Telescope adapter?

[kid vishus]

I have a Nikon D5500 and recently acquired an old Tasco 10VR telescope. I was wondering if there is an adapter that will allow me to attach it to my camera? It was my grandfather's telescope and he had an adapter to attach it to his old 35mm Minolta, but no others.

Thanks.

 

[480sparky]

Here's an old thread on the matter, maybe not much help, but it appears it IS possible.

Tasco 10VR 80mm x 400mm (Vixen) - Classic Telescopes - Cloudy Nights

 

[KmH]

I don't have the Tasco, but I do have a 80 mm f/5 (400 mm) Orion (1.25" focuser) that I attach my DSLR to.
You need the appropriate T-ring for your camera's lens mount and a T-adapter of the appropriate size for the focuser on the telescope.

Some composites of the September 2015 Lunar eclipse I took with my 80 mm f/5 (400 mm) and a Nikon D50.
Each Moon image is how big it is in the telescope (f/5) without any additional magnification:

The start of the eclipse. The lit part of the Moon is in the pre-umbra part of Earth's shadow

The dark part of the Moon (blood moon) exposed for during the eclipse

The eclipse ending

 

[petrochemist]

The adapter shown above gives prime focus photography which generally gives the best results, but there are other ways for those with scopes with fixed eyepieces or cameras with fixed lenses, or for scopes (like mine) where a DSLR can't get close enough for prime focus.

Afocal uses both the camera lens & the eyepiece - for bright enough objects this can be simply holding the camera to the eyepiece & snapping the image, but adapters are available to clamp it in place when longer exposures are needed.

Positive projection (AKA eyepiece projection) uses the eyepiece but no camera lens. One of my eyepieces has a T2 thread at the top for this, and my Tasco scope (a zoom eyepiece refractor) came with a threaded tube for it.

Negative projection uses a astronomy Barlow in the middle of the prime focus set up & allows my DSLR to reach infinity focus without an eyepiece on my Newtonian (it can't manage Prime focus on this scope, but my mirror-less cameras can via a c-mount variant of the T adapter shown by Keith).

The setups with eyepieces can give loads more magnification, but IQ can suffer...

 

[kid vishus]

Thanks guys.
I have a T adapter that was used with the Minolta T Ring, so it looks like I need to find a Nikon T ring if the same T adapter can be used for both. I would assume it could be used for both, but since I dont know anything (I was going to say much but that would have been wrong), about this kind of stuff I am just guessing here.

Here is the telescope.

 

[petrochemist]

Yes it will work with Nikon as well. The T2 thread is designed for a registration of 55mm, so the Nikon adapter will be about 9mm thick.
Getting prime focus shouldn't be a problem with that scope as you can always remove the diagonal if you need to get the camera closer.

Your Tasco looks a much more practical range than mine being 400mm F5, as opposed to 1000mm f16 to 4000mm f64!

 

[KmH]

Yep. Note that I didn't have the 90° diagonal in place for mounting my camera.
With the diagonal in place the DSLR's image sensor is further from the prime focus
The telescope then needs sufficient in focus movement to focus the image on the image sensor.

Celestron T-Ring for Nikon Camera Attachment

What are you planning on photographing using the telescope as a lens?

 

[kid vishus]

Yep. Note that I didn't have the 90° diagonal in place for mounting my camera.
With the diagonal in place the DSLR's image sensor is further from the prime focus
The telescope then needs sufficient in focus movement to focus the image on the image sensor.

Celestron T-Ring for Nikon Camera Attachment

What are you planning on photographing using the telescope as a lens?

The moon for sure, other than that, not sure. But I thought it would be cool to have it at my disposal in case I wanted to try and get some long range wildlife or something.