21st Century Star Map

 Starry Night Software is the 21st Century Star Map.  When I first started Stargazing all we had were paper maps.  OK, we are working outside, at night, with people that were sensitive about stray light, so using a flashlight was not a good idea.  Having a Full Moon helped, but was bad for deep sky observing.  So, tricky situation.  I've seen a lot of impromptu ways to accomplish the task, but we needed something a lot better.

Starry Night Software has dynamic annotations that change with your zoom level, and observing angles.  You can zoom at any portion of the sky up to like 65,000X.  Typically the zoom factor will be much smaller.    The zoom factor is the blue box at the lower, left part of the screen, and this shot is only 2.32X.  But say you wanted to look at M42 exclusively, letz go zoomin...

Now at zoom factor 11.5X, you can see other objects become bright enough to see, and get annotated.  The annotations have a number of selections as well, from large scale things, like planets, and moons, to the very finest NGC objects.  You can even track satellites, and space missions.

The shot above has a few LEO satellites which are SXM8, STAR ONE D2, and SBIRS GEO-5 (USA 315).  Low Earth Orbit Satellites track with the movement of the Sun, so they are stationary to the rest of the stars.  Then there also a couple geostationary satellites that are IRIDIUM-36, and SL-16 R/B.  The geostationary satellites will go flying past your viewpoint, and it is a neat feature.  With each object viewed you can click on the object, and get information on demand.  What is IRIDIUM-36?  Click on the object, then go to the description tab, and you get a synopsis of the object.

There are also real time information tabs.  When you hover the mouse over objects it provides some information about it.  When you zoom in to planets, and moons you can also get surface detail data.  The zoom factor in the Moon shot is 40.3X, so the movement of the sky becomes a factor, and your view keeps trying to get away.  So, another feature lets you freeze time, so you can take a long look.

The with the help of a GIF editor you can make these nifty animations.  This helps to explain the way the sky works visually.  Various motions that celestial bodies make are not always plainly obvious.  One way to understand these motions is to collect a bunch of data, and run it in a sequence.  Like making a little movie, but with astronomical data.  Starry Night Software is a pretty neat tool to use as a Star Chart, but also has voluminous information, some really neat space photography, and will even drive your telescope for you, LOL!

R U Sirius?

Sirius, The Dog Star, is now visible on the eastern horizon early in the morning. The first sighting on Sirius in the late summer is a harbinger of cooler weather coming, at long last. Sirius is a part of the constellation Canis Major, which literally means Big Dog, or Great Dog. LOL! I know something about that. Also in Canis Major you can find Messier 41 (M41), or The Little Beehive Cluster. Nice Stars this morning...

 Shot of M41, The Little Beehive Cluster...