Jump to content

Another Nooby saying hi!

Twiggles

By Twiggles
in Welcome

Recommended Posts

Twiggles

Twiggles

Posted
Posted

Got my interest renewed so to speak after my lad got a telescope for christmas. Well...I say a telescope, even I know he'd be better off with a pair of binos to sart with, its a toys'r'us style telescope by vivitar. As I say though, it has renewed my own interest, often enjoy watching sky at night and enjoy the stargazing events on BBC2. Used to have a pair of binos when I was a lad and spent many a night in the back garden looking at the moon, visiting comets etc. Seriously considering buying a slightly better piece of equipment now as the boy also enjoyed watching the Stargazing events and I'm sure he'd get a kick out of looking at some of our celestial neighbours.

I've had a browse around the site and forums, quite a lot of useful information, but forgive me if I post the same old questions and ask for the same advice that I'm sure you are all probably tired of giving out ;)

Link to comment
Share on other sites
  • Replies 29
  • Created
  • Last Reply
JamesM

JamesM

Posted
Posted

Hi Twiggles and welcome to the forum. Don't worry about asking the same old questions because in fact we were all beginners once and if you think a question is worth asking - then it is certainly worth answering. We are also human here in that we have all made silly mistakes such as setting up the scope, looking though the eyepiece with no image only to find we have forgotten to take the scope cap off (...still doing it :eek: ) and plenty more. The key thing is to get you up and running as soon as possible so that you can start to enjoy astronomy and to be to find an area within it that interests you further. To help you learn the night sky and to work out where objects are, you might want to consider downloading a free piece of planetarium software called "Stellarium" which you can read more about here. It has lots of features to both educate and to entertain and one of the most useful is the advance date/time facility which allows you to progress the night sky forward to see when objects are going to appear, especially useful if you view is obstructed in any way. You can also configure Stellarium to your exact viewing location which enables you to also identify what you are looking at in real time. Hope that helps.

Clear skies for now and enjoy the forum

James

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Scott

Scott

Posted
Posted

Hi mate and welcome, as you may have noticed, this is possibly the most friendly and helpful forum of any kind to be found on the net. ask away. there's always someone who will be able to get you sorted. Great that your lad is showing an interest. my kids just look at me and mumble "lame" under their breath although saturn ALMOST got my daughter interested once :)

Scott

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Twiggles

Twiggles

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Hi and welcome.

Remember, Stargazing Live is back on TV between the 8th and 10th January.

Clear skies!

Can't wait! Just had the kids hooked on Stellarium asking me all sorts of questions which helped get them excited about what they could potentially see. Lad wanted to run out with his telescope but unfortunately cloudy here tonight and a lot of light pollution. Have warned him that his little present won't be great, but if he's this excited already.... Told him I'm looking at buying a better one though, so hopefully we'll get good use out of it and if all the kids are this interested then should be a worthwhile investment.

Many thanks to everyone for the welcome, already learned a lot from the forums. Looking forward to picking your brains a little more!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Mr Q

Mr Q

Posted
Posted

Hello Twiggles and welcome to the forums. To get you started out, you can print out monthly sky charts at SKYMAPS for free. They are excellent to take outside while learning the night sky and also offer naked eye, binocular and telescopic objects to observe.

Hope your boy has lots of fun with his scope - I did when I was 10 years old and got my first "toy" scope but it worked and sparked my stargazing interest to this day (now 65). How old is he and how much does he know about the night sky?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Twiggles

Twiggles

Posted
  • Author
Posted

Hello Twiggles and welcome to the forums. To get you started out, you can print out monthly sky charts at SKYMAPS for free. They are excellent to take outside while learning the night sky and also offer naked eye, binocular and telescopic objects to observe.

Hope your boy has lots of fun with his scope - I did when I was 10 years old and got my first "toy" scope but it worked and sparked my stargazing interest to this day (now 65). How old is he and how much does he know about the night sky?

He's thirteen and doesn't know a great deal but can pick out one or two common constellations. Just been out to look at the moon with him through his toy scope (he's been itching to go outside since we looked on stellarium). Very shaky and poor quality, used to see more detail looking through my old binos, but if he's interested and excited about something then I believe in encouraging it. Even the two girls were amazed. Took the Mrs to work tonight and on the way to the car the four year old asked which star was Jupiter!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
glowjet

glowjet

Posted
Posted

Hi Twiggles and welcome to SGL, if your Son has an interest in the subject then by all means encourage him, a visit to your local library maybe fortuitous as they usually stock the most popular Astronomical literature, investing in your own copy of TL@O would be very helpful as this written with the small scope in mind and will help you both find targets to observe in the Constellations throughout the year. Whatever you do enjoy your Astronomy :)

John.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.