References for Binocular Astronomy

Web Pages

The Recreational Astronomer: In-depth info on binoculars and binocular observing.

Jay Reynolds Freeman'a Advice on Picking an Astronomical Binocular: Excellent practical advice on choosing a pair of binoculars. Have some Oreos ready.

PATFAQ, the sci.astr.amateur Purchasing Amateur Telescopes Frequently Asked Questions document contains a lot of good info on binoculars as well. Especially see the section on holding binoculars.

Books

Phil Harrington's Star Ware: A comprehensive guide to all "things" astronmical, with specific reviews of actual hardware, and more. Highly reccomended.

Craig Crossen's & Wil Tirion's Binocular Astronomy: Covers basics, plus about 250 objects for binoculars. As a bonus, includes Tirion's Bright Star Atlas 2000, and detailed finder charts for some objects.

Phil Harrington's Touring the Universe Through Binoculars: A comprehensive intro to binocular astronomy. Needs a good atlas to go with it.

Atlases

Wil Tirion's Bright Star Atlas 2000: My favorite atlas. Easy to carry, inexpensive (usually under $11), with just the right level of detail to make finding most binocular objects easy. I use it for 90% of my observing, but sometimes it's limiting magnitude of 6.5 doesn't go deep enough. A bonus is the list of star clusters and other deep-sky objects for each chart, many of which are excelent binocular targets.

Edmund Mag 6 Star Atlas is another excellent bright-star atlas with lots of deep-sky objects. Also highly recomended, although the highish price would make me lean towards Crossen's and Tirion's Binocular Astronomy (see the listing in books above.

Binocular
Vendors

Orion Telecope and Binocular Center: excellent service and the best guarantee in the business (don't like it, send it back, you get a refund). Higher prices than most, but it may be worth it for the service and guarentee. Their "Scenix" binoculars are very good values, with high quality optics and tripod adaptor sockets for under $80

Pocono Mountain Optics: Highly regarded, with knowledgeable people, good service, and decent prices and guarantees. Their web site is organized by vendor, so you'll have to hunt a bit to find the binoculars. Reading the web pages and books (especially Starware) will give you ideas for what to look for.