Book Project: Discovering Double Stars

[Ags]

I see I provide decimal degrees and degrees with minutes. I will release an emergency patch.

[JeremyS]

Just ordered 👍🏻

[Knighty2112]

Me too! 👍🏻

[Ags]

@JeremyS and @Knighty2112 many thanks!

I uploaded the cosmetic change to RA to use hours/minutes. No space for seconds so I have used a decimal place on the minutes, which matches what some of my sources do. 

[Ags]

It's been a hectic day with rapid-fire changes. People don't know how exciting being a technical writer is. 🤣

A cup of tea and bed for me... 😴

[JeremyS]

21 minutes ago, Ags said:

It's been a hectic day with rapid-fire changes. People don't know how exciting being a technical writer is. 🤣

A cup of tea and bed for me... 😴

Exciting for us too Agnes. You’ve done very well. Have a well deserved rest.

But tomorrow can you let us know your schedule for releasing the Messier and Caldwell books please? 👍🏻

Edited August 8, 2021 by JeremyS

[badhex]

This is fantastic work Ags, ordering a copy now! Thanks so much for your hard work. I will no doubt be using the book in combination with my ZS73 for the most part so I will report back! 

[Ags]

@badhex I have been testing with a ZS66 so I expect the ZS73 will work really well.

@JeremyS I will start work on my next book shortly, probably a Messier/Caldwell spotting guide and log. That's the one I will use most myself. Although I am tempted to also add a bunch of planetaries and globs to the book too, simply because I like looking at them and they are pretty good despite light pollution. Thinking of a smaller book format than US letter, so the book can live in a shoulder bag or coat pocket, which will help with the dew situation.

[JeremyS]

36 minutes ago, Ags said:

@badhex I have been testing with a ZS66 so I expect the ZS73 will work really well.

@JeremyS I will start work on my next book shortly, probably a Messier/Caldwell spotting guide and log. That's the one I will use most myself. Although I am tempted to also add a bunch of planetaries and globs to the book too, simply because I like looking at them and they are pretty good despite light pollution. Thinking of a smaller book format than US letter, so the book can live in a shoulder bag or coat pocket, which will help with the dew situation.

That’s a great plan, Agnes. And also good to add a few of your favourite extras.

In the log part, do you plan to include a blank circle to allow the user to sketch as well as make notes? I think that would be useful. I’m thinking something along the lines of the BAA Deep Sky section report: https://britastro.org/sites/default/files/BAA Deep Sky Drawing Blank.pdf

[badhex]

6 hours ago, Ags said:

badhex I have been testing with a ZS66 so I expect the ZS73 will work really well

That was my thinking - looking forward to it 😊

[RT65CB-SWL]

Looking good @Ags - I have just downloaded the .PDF to my iPhone - tnx in adv. 

[Ags]

 

On 08/08/2021 at 21:46, JeremyS said:

Just ordered 👍🏻

😀

23 hours ago, Knighty2112 said:

Me too! 👍🏻

😀

22 hours ago, badhex said:

This is fantastic work Ags, ordering a copy now! Thanks so much for your hard work. I will no doubt be using the book in combination with my ZS73 for the most part so I will report back! 

😀

Looking forward to hearing how you like the physical book! 

[Ags]

Been working on doing a cheaper version on Amazon, using perfect binding (i.e. paperback glue binding). It only saves a few pennies though.

[Ags]

33 minutes ago, Philip R said:

Looking good @Ags - I have just downloaded the .PDF to my iPhone - tnx in adv. 

I like the feel of a paper map and a red light torch - but I hope the digital form works for you. Maybe I should produce a night vision pdf with black paper, red text and so on? Or do you just put red cellophane over the screen?

[Ags]

I think a pocket book with color, ring bound, and about 300+ DSOs would cost around EUR 30 ish, with a freely-available PDF. Done in a facing page format, with DSO chart and info on the left page and notes / sketching space on the right. Would people be interested in that?

Another book I want to do for myself is one on periodic variable stars.

Edited August 10, 2021 by Ags

[JeremyS]

37 minutes ago, Ags said:

I think a pocket book with color, ring bound, and about 300+ DSOs would cost around EUR 30 ish, with a freely-available PDF. Done in a facing page format, with DSO chart and info on the left page and notes / sketching space on the right. Would people be interested in that?

Another book I want to do for myself is one on periodic variable stars.

Yes that sounds a good plan, Agnes. I like spiral/ring bound observing books (both guide books and books for recording observations) as I like to be a blessing to open them flat - and if I am drawing, to be able to fold them back on themselves.

What sort of timeframe are you thinking? Eg weeks, months?

[Ags]

Not sure, as a guide Discovering Double Stars took about three months. This one would be bigger but would re-use a lot of the code. I will start a separate thread for that book and start sharing draft PDFs from the outset.

[JeremyS]

20 minutes ago, Ags said:

Not sure, as a guide Discovering Double Stars took about three months. This one would be bigger but would re-use a lot of the code. I will start a separate thread for that book and start sharing draft PDFs from the outset.

Good idea about sharing drafts. If you started with, say, late summer/early autumn then some folks might like to test drive them in the field.

[Ags]

I got my copy of the production version today. I might be biased but I think it looks fabulous!

[Tiny Clanger]

On 10/08/2021 at 08:50, Ags said:

I think a pocket book with color, ring bound, and about 300+ DSOs would cost around EUR 30 ish, with a freely-available PDF. Done in a facing page format, with DSO chart and info on the left page and notes / sketching space on the right. Would people be interested in that?

That is an excellent idea, but I've a suggestion (already!) for something about 10% of the population would find useful ....

I an not left handed myself, but know (from teaching children) that a lot of things are arranged in a way which makes lefties lives awkward, so if it's a relatively easy re-formatting job you could offer an alternative version with left page blank I think those folk would appreciate it 🙂

Heather

[Ags]

It's an idea but I think it might also be confusing. As the book can be folded in half , maybe left/right pages are less relevant? Also, you can think out the box and turn the book upside down 😆

By the way, I am left handed, but use my right hand most of the time. I remember my mother's horror when she found me drawing with the "wrong" hand - hopefully we live in more enlightened times now... 

[Ags]

I am knuckling down on the next book, tentatively titled Discovering the Deep Sky and covering Messier, Caldwell, bright Planetaries, and a few other objects. I'm going with exactly the same format as Discovering Double Stars, as that's the book I want for me. This time round I have some help with sorting out and normalizing the disparate data sources so that is in progress. Separately, I am working on the maps and looking at generating milky way backgrounds using Tycho data.

[JeremyS]

5 minutes ago, Ags said:

I am knuckling down on the next book, tentatively titled Discovering the Deep Sky and covering Messier, Caldwell, bright Planetaries, and a few other objects. I'm going with exactly the same format as Discovering Double Stars, as that's the book I want for me. This time round I have some help with sorting out and normalizing the disparate data sources so that is in progress. Separately, I am working on the maps and looking at generating milky way backgrounds using Tycho data.

Delighted to hear this progress, Agnes 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻

You mentioned releasing sections as you go along. Do let us know when the first tranche is available 

[Ags]

I suppose a week or two. Depends how quickly we can clean up the data.

[badhex]

On 12/08/2021 at 20:53, Ags said:

It's an idea but I think it might also be confusing. As the book can be folded in half , maybe left/right pages are less relevant? Also, you can think out the box and turn the book upside down 😆

By the way, I am left handed, but use my right hand most of the time. I remember my mother's horror when she found me drawing with the "wrong" hand - hopefully we live in more enlightened times now... 

After 30+ years of struggling with right-handed scissors, it only in the last 5 years occurred to me that we could have TWO pairs of kitchen scissors - lefty for me, righty for my partner. 

Occasionally, if my pair are momentarily out of sight or drying on the washing up rack and I attempt to use the rightys it basically triggers sudden onset PTSD 😂

Edited August 24, 2021 by badhex