Gazing at the night sky and pointing out constellations is all well and good, but the arrival of smart digital telescopes has given stargazers the power to capture and share celestial majesty with relative ease. At under 3 lb, the Dwarf III is one of the most portable around.
Until relatively recently, capturing images of galaxies, nebulae and stars would be a complicated endeavor involving specialist knowledge, expensive equipment and infinite patience. Digital telescopes that tap into the power of smartphones have made such things a whole lot easier – not just for budding astrophotographers and their wallets, but also for their poor backs too.
The Dwarf III tips the scales at 1.35 kg (2.97 lb), which makes it one of the lightest smart telescopes available, and a fairly painless carry when combined with its book-like shape and 222 x 142 x 65-mm (8.7 x 5.6 x 2.6-in) dimensions.
It's built around a Sony IMX678 (STARVIS 2) image sensor, and comes with built-in VIS, Astro and Dual-Band filters to capture cosmic imagery at different wavelengths. The heavens above and beyond are fed to the sensor via a 35-mm periscope telephoto lens made up of extra-low dispersion elements, or through 3.4-mm wide-angle optics. An onboard noise-reduction algorithm is said to make for "clarity and texture even when shooting in less-than-ideal conditions."
In a similar fashion to the likes of the Hestia, Vespera II and the Odyssey range, the Dwarf III works with a paired smartphone running a companion mobile app, which will be your guide to the celestial bodies above you. The star map will help users lock onto targets of note, after which the digital telescope will auto rotate to locate and track objects using AI smarts.
A new mode caters for long exposures, and multiple images can be stitched together to form an expansive cosmic mosaic. The unit can also be left outside thanks to its IP54 rating for dust and moisture resistance, and scheduled for overnight capture, so you can go to bed and wake up to celestial wonders.
There's no need to worry about cabling to a wall outlet as the smart telescope comes with an internal 10,000-mAh battery, and content can be stored locally on 128 GB of internal solid-state storage for retrieval later.
Nature lovers will appreciate the auto tracking and capture features for daytime birding or critter watching, and the device is also reported capable of producing stitched giga-pixel panoramas. As well as still imagery, the Dwarf III can record 4K video at 30 frames per second or 1080p at 60 fps, too.
This latest offering replaces the Dwarf II that launched on Kickstarter in late 2021 and attracted nearly HKD 7 million from more than 2,000 backers. The original Dwarf telescope from 2020 was also successfully crowdfunded, but the latest model is jumping straight into production and is up for pre-order now priced at US$479. Shipping is estimated to start from September.
Product page: Dwarf III
