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What would we do without Saturn to get people interested in Astromony.


Garethr

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Still remember my first live view of Saturn through a cheap Tamron refractor to this day.

Reading through the threads here this seems to be the one view that gets people hooked on the hobby

What were your first views that gave the WOW factor.

Below is a snapshot of my journey into this hobby/obsession :)

1st is my first image from a cheap webcam over processed but still one of my favourite pics

2nd is the Obsy I then built a few years later which really got me going

Last is an image from late May of m17

All of this from our back gardens who would have thought 15 years ago.

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I remember being about 10 when my dad bought me a cheap Tasco refractor, was probably about 70mm.  Child's thing really.  Anyway, it was seeing the 4 Galilean moons that did it for me.

Also, the moons lining up in front of a monolith in 2001: A Space Odyssey  :tongue:

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In terms of wowing another person, Saturn is beautiful. Seems to have an impact more so than Jupiter. It's the rings. 

But, the Moon close up is the one I remember that has elicited great responses from non-stargazy people - the sheer level of feeling, as my sister in law raptly put it, that she was looking on 'another world '. Excited as if she was 10 again. 

The moon's a commonplace object for most people: lovely, romantic, nice but...we've all got used to it.

Seen through a telescope however it is utterly real, as if one could step out onto the ashen lunar dust...

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I got my first scope (SW 200p) last week and last night was the first time I had a chance to use it. Looked around and then found Saturn. First time using a scope and what an experience. I don't know how good my view was but to me it looked fantastic. It was yellow and I could clearly see the rings. Looking forward to developing my skill and understanding and seeing this has really made me more keen on my new hobby.

Les

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I'm with Ghostdance above. The moon is a fantastic object and the more time and effort put in to know our neighbour is time well spent. A short while ago I showed the two children next door the moon and they were both impressed.

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I dont think Saturn gets people interested. They have to have an interest before that to even bother to look at/for Saturn. For most people, i would say the 1st thing they look at is the Moon. I will say however that Saturn is a "WOW" moment and one you never forget, the 1st time you see it.

The first time i saw Saturn was with a 90mm refrac. There were 5 words out of my mouth and the last one was WOW (i cant type the other 4 here on a family forum).

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+1 again with Ghostdance, not because it was the first thing I looked at in the early '70's with my home made scope, but because it is special to be 

" up close " with another world, to be able to see not just the surface, but detail in the surface, so much that some times it is almost overwhelming.

The Moon, my first and last love ! :smiley:

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My first view of Saturn was at a star party and it was a wow moment,but for me seeing the moon through my very own scope was amazing,even now whenever I am outside in the evening/night/early morning I find my self constantly glancing up to it

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Totally agree. The first view of Saturn is a real wow moment but I always return to the close up view of our nearest neighbour. The lunar landscape and it's ever changing appearance under the sun's light will always keep me coming back for more.

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Saturn sure is the most wow sight I've ever seen - but the moon in bins is what got me started - Jupiter too is pretty awesome. I made a girl cry once with astronomy - showed her M42 in a dob and she thought it was so beautiful she burst into tears - that was a fun night at the club lol :grin:

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Saturn got me. Simple as that. A thin crescent moon on the same night didn't do any harm either!  I was on holday and, when I got home, I started reading about astronomy. I suddenly discovered that the universe was a lot stranger than I'd ever realized and that a lot of my assumptions were up a gum tree. This was exciting so I read and read - and am still at it 19 years later.

Olly

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yip it was the moon for me but when i moved the scope to Saturn (little 3 inch reflector on a camera tripod) i grazed my chin on the patio floor when my jaw dropped and the wife was not happy when i ran upstairs and woke her up to show her lol.

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I had a 114eq celestron scope, way before I'd heard of this place, or knew what an eq mount was, or that there were things like clusters and nebulae I could view. I remember first few nights not seeing anything and getting frustrated, then decided to point the scope at some bright light that started to appear over rooftops and it was Saturn in all its beautiful glory. Think I shed a little tear too.

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Saturn is certainly the attention grabber for most people.

My wife has absolutely no interest in astronomy, but after I had convinced her that what she was seeing in the eyepiece of my 

home made 8.75" f6 reflector, was the Ringed planet  Saturn,              (She actually thought I had stuck a picture of it in the scope somewhere).

She was converted.  Since that time, she does a better job than me telling everyone we meet about the splendid live view she experienced of

the planet.

Personally, whilst not wishing to dilute anyone's  enthusiasm over Saturn, I have always got the best reactions from first time casual observers whilst showing them the moon

 When in it's waxing phase. Most are in bed when It's going the other way :grin:

 The sharpness of the craters and mountainous regions always bring the gasps of awe, especially when a peak is illuminated above  the terminator, with the rest in black shadow.

Even in this day and age, where lunar Imagery abounds in the Media, those live views make a huge impression on many first timers at an eyepiece.

after almost 60 years as an amateur, I still regard the moon an exciting and interesting body.

Ron.

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When I had my Meade 12" LX 200 the first thing was the Moon. Absolutely Stunning! Spent all night just hopping about the surface. I felt like I could almost touch it. Some time later I got Jupiter in the scope. My wife thought it so nice to see she rang her father and we ended up bringing him down to the house to get his first view. He was astounded! He said he had never thought he would ever see such a sight in his lifetime, he was 80 then. I think he will never forget it.

There is something for everyone in our wonderful night skies.

Derek

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My first viewing was a very drunken one. I was Showing off to friend that i bought a telescope. Thought i would ahow him Mars. I had no idea what i was doing at all. When i focused in. Saturn appeard I have been hooked on to my 1st love since then. My wife thinks ahe should change her name now.

Sent from my LG-H815 using Tapatalk

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Jupiter is so fickle though with the seeing conditions - I agree it is a wonder when the seeing is superb and you can really bump up the magnification to see some proper detail and of course it maintains a bit more interest because it is ever changing so I have spent many sessions just observing it.  Saturn is always a pleasure to look at and is much less prone to issues from seeing conditions imho if only to glean a bit more detail from the rings and the subtleties of weather bands.

If you take Saturn out of the equation there is so much more though that is equal (or better) to show to get another person interested in astronomy.  The obvious candidate would be M42 but also a globular cluster such as M13.  Many of the open clusters are spectacular.  M11 was actually the 1st object I ever looked at and got me hooked on DSOs (so perhaps i'm a bit biased).  The Double Cluster is perhaps one of my favourites however he entire region around Sagittarius / Ophiuchus is visually stunning with a wide-field view far better than Saturn imho :)

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My hook was an out of focus photo of the dumbbell Nebula using a 300mm lense.  Until that point, I wasn't aware that the stuff in the sky that isn't visible to the naked eye could be captured using "home" devices.  I thought that kind of thing was reserved for space agencies with multi million pound kit.

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Saturn will always be a beguiling object, whether it's your first or thousandth view of it.  Another object that can really get peoples juices moving is the Sun in HAlpha.  Up at The Astronomy Centre I've seen many people have their first view of the Sun in HA, and most people are completely wowed by it - at least enough to make them want to come back when it's dark to look at some other objects.  Also, if you like it or not, the Sun is the most dynamic object we have to observe - nothing else comes anywhere near.

And yes, I admit it, I am a Solar nut :smiley:

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