Jeff Padell has been passionate about astronomy and astrophotography since the early 1990s — back in the days when capturing the night sky meant spending hours with one eye glued to a guiding eyepiece, only to have the shot ruined by a passing satellite.
Living under heavy light pollution (Bortle 7.5–8 skies) with a major mall just 300 feet from his home, Jeff gradually shifted his focus to solar imaging. Over the years, the setup became too much: large telescopes, heavy mounts, cameras, laptops, endless cables, and batteries. “I used to load up my car with all the gear,” Jeff shares, “ It all got to be to much and too heavy for this 72 year old man. I pretty much stopped using it all due to effort needed to do it.”
Until he discovered the Seestar S50.
“One day I saw a post about the Seestar on Facebook,” Jeff recalls. “It had everything in a single, lightweight case. I thought — this might be the solution.”
Since then, Seestar has completely transformed his experience. Jeff now uses the Seestar S50 and S30 primarily for night sky imaging, with occasional shots of the Moon and Sun — all from his own backyard. He even designed a custom A/C window mount so he can image in winter without stepping outside, controlling everything via Seestar’s built-in WiFi from the comfort of his den.
Setup takes less than 3 minutes. With built-in UV/IR and dual-band filters, the Seestar handles light pollution impressively well — even when imaging toward the glow of the mall. “All my shots are taken from home,” he says proudly. “And I’ve captured objects I never thought I’d be able to image.”
Jeff loves Seestar’s Plan Mode: “I can line up the targets, calibrate and focus, then start the plan and go to bed. In the morning, I just bring the scope back in.”
"The Seestar scopes are used by absolute beginners through experienced astronomers and you can as simple or complicated as you want. They are small enough to take on trips including plane trips."Jeff said.
Every image is edited right inside the Seestar app — no PC or expensive software required. “It’s a total standalone system. But if you want, you can still process externally.”
For Jeff, it’s not just the hardware that impresses — it’s the company too. “ZWO has been extremely helpful and is constantly updating the Seestars to make them even better. I have rarely seen a company that is more concerned about their userbase than ZWO! ”
“Seestar brought back the joy of astronomy — it made everything fun, fast, and simple again.”
