Last night with the clear skies I took the opportunity to look at the stars in Orion and Taurus with binoculars.
It was interesting to see how well different binoculars showed the small stars above and below Orion's belt. It would have been easier to see differences if there weren't so many lights in the area but at least I could see stars instead of the bottoms of clouds.
The small Leica 8x20 and 10x25 didn't show as many stars, no surprise, as the larger binoculars but the stars the did show were very sharp. With all the light there was not much difference between the larger binoculars. The stars in and around Orion's are very interesting, little points of light against a black sky.
I was surprised how easy the heavy Fujinon 10x70 Polaris were to hold. A binocular mount is far better than hand holding with any binocular but still the 76 oz Fujinons were not bad at all to hand hold. The stars look just great in the big 10x70.
I was trying to see if one binocular stood out but I'll have to wait use them at a darker site. The Celestron Ultima 9x63 has a relatively narrow apparent field but the star images are very sharp. It is easy to hold with very good eye relief for its apparent field.
The Leica 10x50 feels great, holds very well, a wide apparent field and quite wide true field. The image sharpness and contrast are outstanding. They are a little softer at the edges of the field but I wonder if they might not look sharper if the binocular was used without glasses. Unfortunately they don't quite come to focus at infinity for me without my glasses.
The Nikon 12x50 Superior E is relatively light weight, 31 oz. They hold very nicely. It has a sharp, wide field.
I also looked at Orion's sword. With a telescope I'm usually looking at M42 but with binoculars and their wide field the sword shows it is full of stars. Even with all the lights M42 was easy to see. Later I looked at the Hyades and the Pleiades.
The "double triangle" in the Hyades looks like a large jewel. Next I aimed the binoculars on the Pleiades. When I look at the Pleiades I like to observe the chain of small stars falling away from main group. They looked very nice in the 10x50. I looked back again at the Hyades then picked up the 10x70 and looked once more at the Pleiades. To my surprise the small chain of stars was very difficult to see. In another minute and they were gone. $#@%&$ clouds!
Can't wait to get to the Peak with clear skies.