Most telescopes come with attachments that enable you to hook up a conventional camera to the eyepiece and take photos. The next step is to use a digital camera instead of a film camera.

Digital has a number of advantages over film in this regard. While film maintains an edge in quality, digital is far easier to manage, and you can easily manipulate and optimise your image with software. However, consumer digital cameras are not optimised for low light, which has led to specialised astronomical digital camera attachments, such as the Meade Deep Sky Imager.

It sports a 250,000-pixel CCD sensor optimised for astronomy, along with all the software you need to operate it via your computer. An updated version is also on the verge of release, the Deep Sky Imager II, with an improved sensor and higher resolution.