What do you do when the weather turns?

[shelby90]

Mak, why go outside when you can travel to the stars instead?!    Celestia looks like a great program, though! Since I'm studying astronomy in a course right now and we're learning about stars, I think it could be a nice addition to visualize some stellar phenomena. And I'll keep my fingers crossed for mossy grounds when you fall 

Oh... so many things.  Tonight I spent some time playing my hurdy-gurdy, trying to remember some 3-time bourrees since I'm playing some music for a local dance club next week, I watched some football (Italy vs. Norway) with my son and also helped him with his maths homework. I did some d-i-y physio on my injured arm (cycling accident) and also decided not to try to fix the central heating boiler myself. Insomnia has now kicked-in and it's about 2.00 am  and I'm surfing a little.  The sky is now clear with Orion looking magnificent, but I do need to be able to function tomorrow, so after this small glass of wine to keep the sandman away, I'm off to bed.

Zzzzzzzzzz......

SR

Insomnia can be the worst! But I suppose if there is clear weather, there can be something to do when sleep won't come. But if not, wine is always a nice option 

I have a fairly new hobby of flying quadcopters, still not brilliant at it but i can keep the bird in the air till the battery runs down, its great fun  

That sounds like a lot of fun, but maybe not so fun if you're prone to crashing. Now, if a heat shield is made so it could fly to the Moon and back...hm that would be fun!

[gooseholla]

Strange John as I just thought you built telescopes now ha ha

Who says I can't have a bit of fun as well

Is thus the alternative entertainment for the neighbours when a planned friendly starparty gets called off? 8-)

At least they're guaranteed a full moon...

[shelby90]

And by boating I mean grade 4 white water kayaking, as per my avatar.. That's me on the Isere river, French Alps, a few years back. More rain the better, once it's actually raining, at least then there's a chance that the steeper rivers have enough water to risk being wet in them. Not enough to actually flood the main rivers, that causes too much human suffering..

Sent from my SM-G920F using Tapatalk

Never been white water kayaking, but I love "nice, calm, friendly" kayaking The intensity of white water seems like a thrill, though. Being out in the rain is really nice, I agree. 

[shelby90]

I get my grass skirt on and dance around outside doing the ancient dance to scare clouds away before sacrificing Huygens lensed eyepieces. So far it hasn't worked.

I'm sure it's just a matter of time before the clouds float away in fear, the best of luck to you with your next sacrifice! 

[Mak the Night]

Mak, why go outside when you can travel to the stars instead?!    Celestia looks like a great program, though! Since I'm studying astronomy in a course right now and we're learning about stars, I think it could be a nice addition to visualize some stellar phenomena. And I'll keep my fingers crossed for mossy grounds when you fall    

Yeah, I don't mind falling just as long as I don't break anything expensive lol. There are quite a few good freeware astronomy programs and even good online ones which should be very useful if you are studying astronomy. 

Online:

The Full Moon Atlas: http://www.moon.com.co/atlas/

Consolidated Lunar Atlas: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/resources/cla/

Solar System Scope: http://solarsystemscope.com/

Cartes du Ciel (Skychart) is by Patrick Chevalley, who also releases the Virtual Moon Atlas. They can work together if you have both installed: http://www.ap-i.net/skychart/en/start

Regardless of what it claims on the homepage CDC is a fully functioning virtual planetarium and can control a GOTO similar to Stellarium. Here it shows an early morning Mars.

This is a view of a setting Venus and Earth from the Martian surface with Stellarium 12.4 running on Ubuntu. If you click the cursor on a planet in Stellarium then press the 'G' key whilst holding down the Ctrl key it will take you to it. Although you have to change the background yourself.

KStars is also similar to Stellarium and Cartes du Ciel and is usually coded for UNIX systems (here on Ubuntu 14.0.4 LTS). I think it can be compiled for Windows although I don't believe it's an easy thing to do. It is in the Ubuntu repository though and should install on most Ubuntu/Debian based operating systems.

If you have an Android device Celestron SkyPortal can be downloaded as freeware from the Google Play Store. I am pretty sure it employs the same artwork as Stellarium.

So yeah, you can explore the cosmos without leaving your computer screen! lol

A bit of fresh air under a cloud free night sky would be nice though ...

[Wardr77]

I check the met office on my in phone every chance I get. Its become an addiction . My mrs thinks I'm joking when I suggest lets start a clean slate in the dessert.

I bet she does! Would that be Angel Delight or Apple Crumble? .... Now the desert on the other hand...

Sorry couldn't resist

[employee2-4601]

_{Most of the time I either play my guitar or work on a writing project. I also spend a bit of time with my nephew when I can, though he's a little young for astronomy...}

[MattJenko]

Get into imaging, then all your non observing/imaging time will be spent endlessly processing and working out targets, field of views and pixel scales. It's a lot more fun than it sounds.

[Gareth88]

When the weather turns, I tend to buy more Astro stuff, I'm going to be skint once PayPal processes all my payments from the bank! And sometimes wonder if I can make a cloud filter.. No success yet.. Sigh

[darrenbushnalluk]

I descend to my other observation and study the pint nebula and packet of crisps cluster ;-)

[Davesellars]

Having a 2.5 year old daughter and a new-born means than any "free time" is automatically filled for me, clouds or no clouds...  Even when older one is in bed, there's never a shortage of "stuff" to do...   At least now I've got an imaging rig setup in the back room that only needs switching and after a quick check of the focus, imaging can pretty much commence in 1 minute flat and supervised elsewhere in the house (aah, the wonders of technology).   Observation sessions lugging my stuff out to a dark site, I've pretty much had to knock on the head for the time being (I miss it though, priorities have to be put in place...)

[JamesF]

I'm afraid experience suggests that this doesn't really improve in the next ten years, Dave.  In fact, if anything it gets worse once they reach double figures in age

Our current calendar goes something like: Monday - hockey, Tuesday - clubs after school then swimming, Wednesday - clubs before school, clubs after school then catch up on Monday and Tuesday homework, Thursday - swimming, Friday - clubs after school then swimming, Saturday - swimming and homework, Sunday - hockey.

James

[Davesellars]

That's a lot of swimming, James!   Yeah, that's quite an itinerary...   Perhaps I can shift them off to boarding school instead!

[shelby90]

Mak, you are stocked full of awesome computer programs! I love the shot of Earth and Venus from Mars. That is really cool. I don't have an Android, but I think the rest of your suggestions will keep me plenty busy  And yes, fresh air under the stars can't really be beat.

Get into imaging, then all your non observing/imaging time will be spent endlessly processing and working out targets, field of views and pixel scales. It's a lot more fun than it sounds.

I think eventually I would like to get into imaging, but for now i'll try to get some shots on my phone or point and shoot camera. It does sound fun, I just don't have the money to invest in any imaging stuff quite yet.

I descend to my other observation and study the pint nebula and packet of crisps cluster ;-)

That sounds like a lovely alternative!

[shelby90]

Having a 2.5 year old daughter and a new-born means than any "free time" is automatically filled for me, clouds or no clouds...  Even when older one is in bed, there's never a shortage of "stuff" to do...   At least now I've got an imaging rig setup in the back room that only needs switching and after a quick check of the focus, imaging can pretty much commence in 1 minute flat and supervised elsewhere in the house (aah, the wonders of technology).   Observation sessions lugging my stuff out to a dark site, I've pretty much had to knock on the head for the time being (I miss it though, priorities have to be put in place...)

That set-up sounds quite convenient! Hope you're able to get out to a dark site at some point soon 

[Matt2011]

Hi Shelby90, glad you are enoying this site and hope it is very informative for you and that you are getting a lot out of it and how's the observing going over there in the USA? 

[shelby90]

Hi Shelby90, glad you are enoying this site and hope it is very informative for you and that you are getting a lot out of it and how's the observing going over there in the USA? 

Hey Matt, things are pretty good over here  , been having a good number of cloudy nights but some beautiful, clear ones also. Got a few Messier's under my belt so far. By the way, thank you for the chair recommendation! I got mine a couple weeks ago and it is wonderful! I love laying back and taking in the night sky. And it's super comfortable. Got mine in the beige color, though, so I could find it in the dark backyard. How're things looking up over there in England?

[Matt2011]

Hi Shelby90, Glad things are good over there and shame about the cloudly nights but it's the same over here in the UK but have had some clear ones too but the messier objects are fun and I have been targeting some of the more fainter ones but my bincoculars which are the Helios Apollo 15x70s will show many of the more fainter ones but would need to up my aperture to make out a lot of detail on the more fainter ones but will show many and the Pleiades and Hyades in Taurus are a gem though. Glad you got the chair though and have one myself which is the red one and it's perfect for binocular astronomy and even better if you use a monopod with a trigger pistrol grip head with it and just aquired one from amazon and well worth investing in one for use with the chair and much better in my opinion than using a tripod, my mount seen in the photo is great for standing up but a monopod is perfect if you want comfort of being able to lay back in comfort and observe with the binoculars and it's perfect. Beige is a nice colour btw and hopefully will have some clear skies in the week as it's a little cloudy today but fingers crossed it will be clear tonight.

[Mak the Night]

Mak, you are stocked full of awesome computer programs! I love the shot of Earth and Venus from Mars. That is really cool. I don't have an Android, but I think the rest of your suggestions will keep me plenty busy  And yes, fresh air under the stars can't really be beat.

Yeah, I have to admit to being a bit of an astronomy software geek lol. I've been using Stellarium for years, I think it's most people's favourite. I like the fact you can sometimes watch Phobos and Deimos rise in the east as the Earth and Venus set in the west. With Celestia you can stand on the surface of Pluto to see the Sun as a bright star in the sky. I often wonder what the Earth would look like from that Martian surface through my 102mm Mak. 

[des anderson]

All of the above,gets a bit boring.....only 62 clear nights so far this year,and most of them around the full moon.Des 

[Astro_Baby]

I own a Newtonian so I do what all newt owners do - collimate it to ever sweeter limits - its the joy of a Newtonian scope

Otherwise I start drawing up plans for model rockets.  Working on a 56" tall Soyuz at the moment.

[shelby90]

Hi Shelby90, Glad things are good over there and shame about the cloudly nights but it's the same over here in the UK but have had some clear ones too but the messier objects are fun and I have been targeting some of the more fainter ones but my bincoculars which are the Helios Apollo 15x70s will show many of the more fainter ones but would need to up my aperture to make out a lot of detail on the more fainter ones but will show many and the Pleiades and Hyades in Taurus are a gem though. Glad you got the chair though and have one myself which is the red one and it's perfect for binocular astronomy and even better if you use a monopod with a trigger pistrol grip head with it and just aquired one from amazon and well worth investing in one for use with the chair and much better in my opinion than using a tripod, my mount seen in the photo is great for standing up but a monopod is perfect if you want comfort of being able to lay back in comfort and observe with the binoculars and it's perfect. Beige is a nice colour btw and hopefully will have some clear skies in the week as it's a little cloudy today but fingers crossed it will be clear tonight.

Yes, fingers crossed for some clear nights soon! I like to alternate between laying back doing some naked eye observing and getting up to use my binoculars on the tripod for a while. I have a small pair of 10x25's to scan a little while laying back. I love how you can get almost totally horizontal and it's so much more comfortable than craning your neck back to get to zenith! Now I think I need to spend some bad weather time to find a dark site spot I can get to in a reasonable amount of time 

Yeah, I have to admit to being a bit of an astronomy software geek lol. I've been using Stellarium for years, I think it's most people's favourite. I like the fact you can sometimes watch Phobos and Deimos rise in the east as the Earth and Venus set in the west. With Celestia you can stand on the surface of Pluto to see the Sun as a bright star in the sky. I often wonder what the Earth would look like from that Martian surface through my 102mm Mak. 

Nothing wrong with being any kind of geek  I'm real happy with Stellarium, it is so useful. I can see why it's so popular. Seeing the Sun from such a distance that it resembles a typical star would be fun. If only we could swing by other planets during some down time!

All of the above,gets a bit boring.....only 62 clear nights so far this year,and most of them around the full moon.Des 

Ah yeah that's a bummer. Although I love observing the Moon, it can really turn into a pest when I want to actually see stars!

I own a Newtonian so I do what all newt owners do - collimate it to ever sweeter limits - its the joy of a Newtonian scope

Otherwise I start drawing up plans for model rockets.  Working on a 56" tall Soyuz at the moment.

Oh interesting. I don't know much about Newtonian scopes. Something new to google!

[Chris Hopson]

I start virtual shopping for nice new astronomy equipment, non of which I can afford.:-)

[Mak the Night]

Nothing wrong with being any kind of geek  I'm real happy with Stellarium, it is so useful. I can see why it's so popular. Seeing the Sun from such a distance that it resembles a typical star would be fun. If only we could swing by other planets during some down time!

Well, here's what the Sun looks like from Pluto. 

[Matt2011]

Sounds good Shelby90 and I am thinking of buying some hand held binoculars and looking at some Japanese Optricron 11x80s to go with my Helio Apollo 15x70s. Naked eye astronomy is something that I enjoy a lot myself and checking out the sky and what is visible. I am enjoying my set up at the moment with the monopod and binoulars and being able to recline on the chair and lay back and observe the night sky. I normally when it is cold take a flask of hot soup outside and that works wonders here in the UK