A sleek, new app-controlled telescope
The sleek new Stellina telescope from Vaonis in France weighs only 7kg and fits in a backpack, making it easy to take along on camping trips or carry on board a flight.
Presented in January 2018 at the international CES technology show in Las Vegas, Nevada, USA, it won the CES 2018 Innovation Award in the Digital Imaging category. With its simple operation, it both opens astronomy up to a broader audience, well beyond traditional ‘prosumer’ astronomers, and also turns star gazing into a truly social activity.
Typically, personal telescopes require time to set up and make fine adjustments. Stellina alleviates the hassles of complicated setups, as it automatically handles the fine adjustments with a mobile app. Just mount it on a tripod, open the app and it is ready in under five minutes.
Once connected to a smart phone or tablet, an observer simply selects from a variety of targets, ranging from stars, nearby nebula or entire galaxies to our closest neighbour, the moon. Stellina will then find and image the selection. The final images are sent to the connected device for viewing and convenient sharing on social media with friends and fellow astrophotographers.
Stellina has an 80mm aperture lens with a 400mm focal length and captures the sky at 3096 x 2080 pixel resolution both in JPG and RAW formats. Powered by a battery pack it can run for up to 10 hours.
The telescope’s maker, Vaonis, is hosted at ESA’s Business Incubation Centre (BIC) Sud France, at their Montpellier incubator centre.
To date, a network of 18 ESA BICs across Europe have fostered over 600 start-ups, helping create thousands of new jobs in Europe, with some 150 new start-ups joining each year.