Contents Part I Developing Your Skills 1 Accessing and Developing Your Observing Skills... 3 1.1 Stargazer or Amateur Astronomer?... 3 1.2 Perceptions and Expectations... 7 1.3 Assessing Your Skills and Identifying Your Interests... 7 1.4 Taking Stock... 11 1.5 Some General Observing Rules... 11 1.6 Managing Your Expectations... 12 1.7 How the Human Eye Works... 13 1.8 Dark Adaptation... 14 1.9 Factors That Can Affect Your Night Vision... 16 1.10 Maintaining Your Dark Adaptation... 17 1.11 Eyesight Correction... 18 1.12 Set Yourself Realistic Targets... 19 1.13 Evaluate Your Favored List of Targets... 20 1.14 Assess Your Abilities... 20 2 Planning and Recording Your Observing Sessions... 21 2.1 Preparing for an Observing Session... 21 2.2 Weather... 21 2.3 Gain Knowledge of Your Quarry... 23 2.4 Keep an Observing Notebook... 24 2.5 Date and Time of Observation... 24 2.6 The Seeing Scale... 26 2.7 Note Down How and What You Observed... 27 xi
xii Contents 2.8 Astronomical Drawing... 28 2.9 Getting Started with Drawing... 29 2.10 Equipment Needed for Drawing... 29 2.11 How to Draw... 30 2.12 Finalizing Your Drawings for Presentation... 35 3 Equipment... 37 3.1 Telescopes and Accessories... 37 3.2 A Long Hard Look at Your Equipment... 39 3.3 General Notes About Telescopes... 40 3.4 Binoculars... 41 3.5 Choosing Binoculars... 42 3.6 Telescopes... 43 4 Accessories... 47 4.1 Finder Scopes... 47 4.2 Eyepieces... 49 4.3 Star Diagonal or Right-Angle Prism... 53 4.4 Barlow Lenses... 54 4.5 Filters... 55 4.6 An Occulting Bar... 58 4.7 Dew Prevention... 59 4.8 Collimating Your Telescope... 60 4.9 Cleaning/Resurfacing Lenses and Mirrors... 61 4.10 Aperture/Equipment Fever... 62 4.11 Your Own Observatory... 63 Part II Practical Observing: Your Quarry Awaits 5 Constellations, Asterisms and Stars... 69 5.1 Star-Hopping... 70 5.2 Learn to Star-Hop... 70 5.3 Positions of Objects on the Sky... 73 5.4 Asterisms... 76 5.5 The Brightness of Stars... 78 5.6 The Bayer Designation... 80 5.7 Limiting Naked Eye Magnitude... 81 5.8 Estimating Star Magnitudes... 82 5.9 The Colors of Stars... 84 5.10 The Hertzprung-Russell Diagram... 84 5.11 Investigating the Colors of Stars... 85 5.12 Simple Spectroscopy... 87 5.13 Star Catalogs... 88
Contents xiii 6 Variable and Double Stars... 89 6.1 Variable Stars... 89 6.2 Naming of Variable Stars... 89 6.3 Types of Variable Stars... 90 6.4 Supernovae... 91 6.5 Naming of Supernova... 93 6.6 Variable Star Observing Programs... 93 6.7 Double and Multiple Stars... 96 6.8 The Main Types of Double Stars... 97 6.9 Measuring Double Stars... 98 6.10 Instruments for Splitting Double Stars... 99 6.11 The Airy Disk... 99 6.12 Dawes Limit... 101 6.13 A Couple of Challenging Double Stars... 102 6.14 Double and Variable Star Resources... 105 7 The Solar System: The Sun... 107 7.1 Observing the Sun... 107 7.2 Observing the Sun Indirectly... 108 7.3 Observing the Sun Directly... 111 7.4 Sunspots... 113 7.5 Counting Sunspots... 114 7.6 Counting Sunspot Groups... 115 7.7 Classification of Sunspot Groups... 115 7.8 Hydrogen Alpha and Calcium Solar Observing... 117 7.9 Solar Eclipses... 117 7.10 Solar Resources... 118 8 The Solar System: The Moon... 119 8.1 Observing the Moon... 119 8.2 Common Lunar Features... 123 8.3 Transient Lunar Phenomena and Impact Flashes... 127 8.4 Lunar Eclipses... 127 8.5 The Danjon Scale... 129 8.6 Lunar Occultations... 129 8.7 Lunar Resources... 131 9 The Solar System: Observing the Planets... 133 9.1 Mercury & Venus: The Inner Planets... 133 9.2 Visibility of the Inner Planets... 134 9.3 Observing the Inner Planets... 136 9.4 Observing Features on the Inner Planets... 137 9.5 Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus & Neptune: The Outer Planets... 138 9.6 Retrograde Motion of the Planets... 139 9.7 Observing Mars... 140
xiv Contents 9.8 Observing Jupiter... 144 9.9 Jupiter s Red Spot... 145 9.10 Other Jovian Features... 146 9.11 Jupiter s Moons... 147 9.12 Observing Saturn... 149 9.13 Saturn s Ring System... 150 9.14 Saturn s Cloud Structure... 151 9.15 Saturn s Moons... 152 9.16 Uranus and Neptune... 153 9.17 Moons of Uranus and Neptune... 154 9.18 Planetary Occultations of Stars or Other Planets... 154 10 The Solar System: Minor Solar System Bodies and Other Phenomena... 157 10.1 Minor Solar System Bodies... 157 10.2 Pluto... 158 10.3 Get a Permanent Observatory Number... 159 10.4 Measuring the Brightness of Minor Planets... 160 10.5 Observing Minor Planet Occultations... 160 10.6 Two Objects to Look Out For... 161 10.7 Meteors and Meteor Showers... 161 10.8 Meteorites... 163 10.9 Planning a Meteorite Hunt... 165 10.10 Observing Satellites... 166 10.11 Observing Geosynchronous Satellites... 168 10.12 Observing Passing Spacecraft... 171 10.13 Satellite Resources... 172 10.14 The Aurora... 172 10.15 The Zodiacal Light... 174 10.16 Atmospheric Effects... 174 11 The Solar System: Observing Comets... 177 11.1 Comet Behavior... 177 11.2 Comet Naming... 178 11.3 Comet Features... 179 11.4 Structure of a Comet... 180 11.5 Measuring the Comet s Coma... 182 11.6 The Comets Tail(s)... 183 11.7 Predicting a Comets Future Appearance... 184 11.8 Daylight Comets... 185 11.9 Hunting for New Comets... 186 11.10 Comet Resources... 189 12 Beyond the Solar System: Deep Sky Objects... 191 12.1 Observing Deep Sky Objects... 191 12.2 Deep Sky Catalogs... 193
Contents xv 12.3 Open Star Clusters... 195 12.4 Globular Star Clusters... 196 12.5 Planetary Nebulae... 198 12.6 Gaseous Nebulae... 199 12.7 Supernova Remnants... 201 12.8 Galaxies... 202 12.9 Quasars... 205 12.10 Deep-Sky Resources... 205 13 Basic Astrophotography... 209 13.1 Astro-imaging Background... 209 13.2 Basic Astrophotography Primer... 210 13.3 Taking Your First Images... 213 13.4 Processing Your Hard Earned Images... 214 13.5 Astrophotography Through the Telescope... 218 13.6 Imaging the Planets... 220 13.7 Imaging Deep Sky Objects... 220 13.8 Astrophotography Resources... 221 Part III Further Information Sources and Community 14 Online Resources... 225 14.1 Software... 225 14.2 Online Citizen Astronomy... 226 14.3 Remote Telescopes... 228 14.4 Astronomy Podcasts... 228 14.5 Mobile Phone/Tablet Apps... 229 14.6 Meeting Other Observers... 229 14.7 Local Astronomical Clubs/Societies... 230 14.8 National and International Organizations... 231 14.9 Online Discussions and Resources... 233 14.10 Astronomy Conventions... 234 14.11 Remote Dark Sky Observing. Going it Alone... 235 14.12 Remote Dark Sky Observing. Star Parties... 235 14.13 Basic Rules for Star Parties... 236 14.14 Some of the Biggest and Most Popular Star Parties... 237 15 Star Maps, Sources of Information, Publications and Further Reading... 239 15.1 Star Maps... 239 15.2 Other Publications... 241 15.3 Places of Astronomical Interest... 241 15.4 Astronomical Holidays... 244 15.5 Further Reading/References... 245 15.6 Space Travel and Exploration... 247
xvi Contents 15.7 Light Pollution and Organizations... 248 15.8 The History of Astronomy... 249 16 Conclusion... 251 16.1 Keep the Passion Burning... 251 16.2 Author s Closing Remarks... 253 Index... 255