Smart telescopes have made stargazing far easier than ever, allowing you to simply pick a celestial body you want to observe and wait for the telescope to align itself towards that object’s direction. And they continue to bring even more advanced features that make amateur astronomy such an accessible hobby. Celestron is one of the outfits that are really active in the space and this time, the outfit is releasing what might be their best smart telescope ever in the form of the Celestron Origin.
Billed as an “intelligent home observatory,” the device is built with user-accessibility in mind, making it easy to not just locate and focus on a celestial object, but also to view it even with an entire group of people with you. That’s right, your nightly astronomy activities don’t have to be a solitary pursuit, as this allows you to enjoy the night skies along with a roomful of people.
The Celestron Origin works much like many smart telescopes in that it can position itself autonomously and stream what it’s capturing on a companion app, so you can watch the celestial views on your phone or tablet. In this case, though, the app offers the option to cast the live feed to your smart TV, allowing you to share what the telescope is observing with an entire room of people, making it possible to have a stargazing party right from the comfort of your living room with the cutting-edge smart TV.
To use, simply place the telescope outside where it has a clear view of the night sky, turn it on, and pair it to the companion app. From there, you just use the outfit’s planetarium interface to find any celestial body and prompt the telescope to face its direction. Once that’s done, the device will capture 10-second exposure images, then use AI algorithms to process and combine the frames to create a sharp, detailed, and vibrant-looking scene that’s then sent to the app, with supported for multiple devices simultaneously. Of course, there’s also the option to cast to a TV, so you all can enjoy from a single large screen. Experienced astronomers, though, also get the option of doing things manually by fiddling with a number of parameters to get more custom-processed visuals.
The Celestron Origin uses a six-inch Rowe-Ackermann Schmidt Astrograph (RASA) design that puts the imaging sensor at the front of the tube, which enables faster captures, a wider field of view, and images that don’t have blurring around the edges that many other telescopes produce. All the processing, by the way, is handled by a Raspberry Pi 4 Model B, which controls the camera, focus motor, dew prevention system, and the sky recognition tech that allows it to quickly align the camera towards any specific point in the sky.
It comes with an integrated filter drawer that accepts standard 1.25-inch and 2-inch format filters, allowing you to get a clearer view during nights where there’s an excess of light pollution in the sky. Other features include a full-height tripod, a rear-illuminated 6.4MP Sony IMX178LQJ CMOS sensor, and a 97.9 Wh battery that’s rated for six hours of continuous use.
The Celestron Origin is now available for preorder, priced at $3,999.