Resolution and Sampling
Know what the aperture can resolve.
Compare the telescope's diffraction limit with your camera sampling and local seeing. Change any input to see the consequences immediately.
Inputs
Optical path
Use physical dimensions and canonical units for the estimate.
Unit: mm
Unit: nm
Unit: mm
Unit: µm
Unit: ×
Unit: arcsec
Calculated now
Resolution and sampling
These are ideal optical estimates, not a guarantee of image detail.
- Rayleigh limit
- 0.692″at 550 nm
- Dawes estimate
- 0.580″empirical double-star limit
- Image scale
- 0.776″ / px3.76 µm effective pitch
- Pixels per Rayleigh limit
- 0.89undersampled
- Pixels per seeing FWHM
- 2.58for 2.0″ seeing
- Critical focal ratio
- f/11.22,241 mm for 2 px
How to read this
The Rayleigh limit is the ideal diffraction separation. The detector samples that scale with the image scale; two pixels per Rayleigh limit is the minimum target used here, while seeing usually becomes the practical limit from the ground.
θᵣ = 1.22 λ / D · 206264.806″ image scale = 206.265 p / fAtmospheric turbulence, focus, obstruction, tracking, contrast, processing, and target brightness can all reduce real-world resolution. Treat these outputs as planning guidance.