- The Seestar S30 Plus has dual 2K cameras for shooting galaxies, nebulae and the Milky Way
- It’s available today, priced at $499 / €499
- It looks like a big upgrade over the S30 and a great first smart telescope
Astrophotographers have never had it so good. Smart telescopes have completely changed the game, making it far easier and cheaper to photograph the night skies — and the new Seestar S30 Plus could be the perfect entry into the hobby.
Technically it slots into Seestar’s ever-expanding lineup between the S30 and S30 Pro models, but it’s effectively a replacement for the no-longer-available base model, offering Pro-level optics at a much lower price.
That price? A mere $499 / €499, compared to $699 for the S30 Pro and $999 for the bigger S50 Pro; I don’t have UK pricing, but expect it to be around £450.
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And you get a lot for your money: dual 2K (1440 x 2560) cameras with quality optics — one telephoto, one wide-angle — built-in duo-band filters, an included solar filter, tripod and carrying case.
Importantly, it’s also small and light enough to be easily transportable: it weighs just 1.65kg and could easily be slung in a backpack for a hike to a high spot with clear views of the skies.
It’s all controlled by Seestar’s slick and full-featured app, which does most of the heavy lifting for you and which contains a massive database of breathtaking objects to photograph.
Simply select your target and the S30 Plus will position itself and start snapping away, with the resulting image viewable on your phone screen and getting more detailed over time as the software stacks multiple images.
“Many people are interested in astrophotography but hesitate when they see the equipment and setup traditionally involved,” says Sam Wen, Seestar’s founder.
“With S30 Plus, we wanted to give beginners more room to explore and create without taking away the simplicity that makes Seestar easy to start with. It brings more imaging possibilities into one compact system, so users can spend less time thinking about equipment and more time exploring the night sky.”
Analysis: Beginners start here
I’ve owned and tested several Seestar models, including the original S50 — which reignited my love of astrophotography a decade after I’d all but given up on it because it was too time-consuming.
The S50 was a revelation, enabling me to spend far, far less time fiddling around with arcane software seemingly designed for masochists and far more time taking photos of galaxies and nebulae.
The S30 Pro was even better, with a higher-resolution sensor, wide-angle view and improved build quality in a super-compact and lightweight package. I loved it so much I declared it my favorite smart telescope earlier this year.
So, where does the S30 Plus fit in? Well, it’s best thought of as offering the S30 Pro’s optics in a cheaper package that represents a big upgrade over the original S30.
For instance, the telephoto camera has a larger 1/1.8-inch sensor and will give you bigger 2K (1440 x 2560) images versus the full HD shots on the older model. As with its more expensive sibling the S30 Pro, it has four-element apochromatic (APO) optics with ED glass — meaning images should be sharper — and comes with a wide-angle camera for grabbing Milky Way shots, a feature that was missing on the original.
There are a few compromises of course. Chief among them are the fact that its dual cameras are 2K rather than 4K as they are in the Pro, and that you can’t use the wide-angle camera at the same time as the telephoto one. You also get half the storage: 64GB versus 128GB.
However, the $200 price difference is substantial enough that beginners may well be better going for the S30 Plus and then upgrading to the much bigger S50 Pro when they’re ready for the next step. It’s certainly a far more exciting prospect than the original S30, which I always thought was a little too basic.
ZWO, which makes the Seestar smart telescopes, has shared some sample images shot on the S30 Plus and I’m impressed. You can check out some of the shots below:
The images are a mixture of straight-from-camera stacks and some that have been processed using specialist astrophotography software; they may also have been taken in darker skies than those which you have access to — so don’t take it as a given that you’ll get these results, or at least not without putting in a bit of effort.
But that caveat aside, they look great — there’s plenty of detail in the likes of the Rosette and Heart nebula, while it’s nice to see that Andromeda fits neatly into the frame without the need to use Mosaic mode.
Speaking of which, it’s worth noting that you can’t make mosaics with the wide-angle camera, but given that it has a 43.5-degree field of view you don’t really need to do that. Mosaic is much more important for the telephoto camera, which has a 3-degree FOV, enabling you to capture larger targets such as the Heart nebula in one shot.
The Seestar S30 Plus is available to buy today and I’ll be putting it through its paces for a full test once the skies over southern England finally lift. Look out for my verdict on it soon.
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marc.mclaren@futurenet.com (Marc McLaren)
