Custom printable star charts?

[DevonSkies]

Hi,

I'm looking for some software for generating custom, printable star charts. The idea would be to produce one-off star charts of selected areas for my observing sessions, in a format similar to those used in Turn Left at Orion for example. I see the TLAO authors used Starry Night to generate their charts, but I was wondering if there was anything cheaper (preferably free!) available to do this job.

What I would like to do is select an area of the sky and print a black-and-white chart at A4 or A5 size. I have Stellarium, but I'm not aware that it has this functionality. I am mainly using a Mac, but I also have a Windows laptop I could use for this if need be.

Thanks in advance for any pointers!

Ed

[kev100]

Hiya, Cartes du Ciel is pretty good : http://sourceforge.net/projects/skychart/

[Tinker1947]

I use Sky Safari, it works with scalable maps, stays on if required, it allows for different type of DSO's to be highlighted, or just one type, works on Mobile Phones or Tablets these pop in and out of a pocket when required...... 

[ollypenrice]

Any planetarium software at all can be used. Even if it doesn't offer you a printable version of the page you can just use the screen grab or 'Capture scissors' thing in Windows to select the part of the chart you need. Stellarium is free.

Custom charts are a great idea. I use them for new targets and on a couple of scales, the broad overview and then a closed-in star hop.

Olly

[DevonSkies]

Thanks for the ideas so far. I'm not so keen on using a phone/tablet app, as I find the screen spoils my night vision (even in "red" mode there is still a grey glow from the backlight on my Galaxy Note 8). That's why I was thinking of printing charts on paper. I do use my tablet for browsing the heavens when planning sessions though.

Doing a screen grab from Stellarium is a good idea, I hadn't thought of that!

[MarsG76]

Carte Du Ciel definitely....

[DevonSkies]

Thanks. I'll check out Cartes du Ciel.

[happy-kat]

Thee is a guide somewhere on how to print from stellarium so you don't use loads of ink up

[Tinker1947]

Thee is a guide somewhere on how to print from stellarium so you don't use loads of ink up

Invert the picture so the stars are black.....???