The OPPO Find X9 Pro, equipped with a Hasselblad lens kit boasting a 230 mm lens and up to 40x digital zoom (roughly equivalent to 920 mm), is sparking a question among amateur astronomy enthusiasts: can a smartphone truly compete with a telescope for casual sky-watching?
Smartphone Astrophotography: A Realistic Look
Is your smartphone camera capable of capturing stunning images of the night sky, or are dedicated telescopes still essential for serious stargazing?
- The OPPO Find X9 Pro’s telephoto lens offers impressive zoom capabilities, but falls short of a telescope’s performance.
- Smartphone camera sensors are significantly smaller than those used in professional astrophotography, limiting light capture.
- While capable of capturing some celestial objects, the phone’s software and hardware present limitations for detailed astrophotography.
- Using the phone’s primary camera, rather than the telephoto extender, yields better results for broader night sky shots.
Before venturing into the cold, a bit of perspective was needed. A Newtonian telescope, with a 750 mm focal length, is just bright enough to reveal nebulae and galaxies like Andromeda with a 28mm lens (27x magnification). The OPPO’s lens kit, while offering a 10x zoom compared to the phone’s primary 23 mm lens (or 6.6x relative to 35 mm, approximating human vision), doesn’t quite reach that level of capability—unless you rely heavily on software zoom.
Digital zoom, pushing the magnification to around 40x, doesn’t help with the crucial task of light capture. Furthermore, the X9 Pro’s 1/1.56-inch periscope camera sensor is roughly 0.4x smaller than an APS-C sensor and significantly smaller than the full-frame cameras typically used for amateur astrophotography. Stacking glass and mirrors inevitably reduces light and introduces imperfections like chromatic aberration and vignetting.
The moon, visible even through binoculars, was the first target. The exposure was accurate, but even at 40x zoom, the moon didn’t fill the frame. Cropping revealed a lack of detail; craters were present, but lacked definition. It wasn’t a promising start.
Star Clusters and Nebulae
Shifting focus to star clusters like Pleiades and the region of the Orion Nebula, the results remained underwhelming. Even with a tracking mount, pinpointing targets on the screen was difficult due to the darkness.
While the zoom is impressive, the results were underwhelming, even without expecting images comparable to professional gear. Star clusters were visible, and some stars emerged with RAW editing, but they appeared as blurry blobs rather than distinct points of light, lacking vibrant colors.
The OPPO camera app proved unsuited for this type of photography. Manual controls for long exposures and high ISO settings resulted in unfocused images, and the extender mirrored the picture. Switching to the Tele Lens Extender mode improved focus but disabled manual controls. A maximum 10-second shutter time wasn’t sufficient to capture many stars.
Experimenting with other camera apps and RAW stacking felt futile. Truly capturing astrophotography requires a bright sensor, quality optics, and robust software. A smartphone telephoto extender simply doesn’t deliver.
Shooting with the phone’s primary camera and widest aperture yielded far better results, comparable to images from the Pixel’s astrophotography mode and Samsung’s Expert RAW. Even a simple shot through a telescope eyepiece, while not perfect, surpassed the quality of those taken with the extender.
Smartphone telephoto extenders aren’t a substitute for a proper telescope or a large sensor for serious astrophotography. For casual shots, a stable tripod and the primary camera lens—or mounting the phone to a telescope—will deliver superior results. The Hasselblad lens is a fun addition, but the stars remain largely out of reach. Lesson learned.
