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Two great astronomy apps for your holiday stargazing
As you've no doubt noticed, here in North America the skies are very crisp and transparent in the winter -- when the clouds have parted, of course. We also get the brightest star in the sky, Sirius, and some lovely constellations. I've got two really well-done astronomy apps for you that have just received significant updates. One is pro-oriented, while the other is more for casual sky watchers. First up is Sky Guide (US $1.99), an App Store Best of 2013. Sky Guide has wonderful graphics, and almost all navigation is done with gestures, leaving a very uncluttered screen. This latest version features time-lapse controls, so you can speed the sky up by 30,000 times if you want, watching planetary conjunctions and the life and death of comets. Of course, you can hold your iOS device up to the sky, and the screen will mimic your position to make identifying that star, planet or galaxy that much easier. There is also a way to have the screen match how dark your sky is -- use two fingers and swipe up and down. In very dark locations, you will see an excellent rendering of the Milky Way. The app has plenty of built-in background articles so you can learn about the objects you're viewing, and there are some electronic soundscapes to set the mood. If you are not in the mood for music, the sounds can be turned off. Sky Guide is beautiful, filled with worthwhile information and easy to use. At the high end, we have SkySafari 4 from Southern Stars Software. The company has been at the forefront of excellent astronomy software for years, and the latest version of this top-of-the-line app is breathtaking in its features. The app is normally $39.99, but for the holidays, it's only $19.99 through January 20. There is so much here, it is hard to know where to begin. The app is almost 1 GB in size, so that should give you a clue just how powerful it is. SkySafari 4 integrates with Apple Maps; choose your location and you'll see the skies on screen as they look in real life. Meteor showers are animated and look real. Time settings can take you thousands of years into the past and the future. Want to see the the skies on your birthdate, or when the Titanic sank? It just takes a few taps. The database has millions of objects, and if you have a compatible telescope, you can control it from your iPhone or iPad. You can get photorealistic horizons for a few locations, or add your own so your backyard view looks like your actual backyard. Although things are always changing, right now SkySafari 4 is the top astronomy program of dozens of offerings by a wide margin. If your taste and wallet aren't so ambitious, there are scaled-down, but still very powerful and less expensive versions of the app. The basic SkySafari is $0.99, and SkySafari 4 Plus is $7.99. They have smaller databases, but are very capable apps. Sky Guide and SkySafari are designed for different levels of amateur astronomers, but both are top apps for their target markets. I heartily recommend either one for some great nights under the stars. Sky Guide requires iOS 6.0 and is a universal app. It's an 84 MB download. SkySafari 4 requires iOS 7 and is also universal. It's a 940 MB download, so make sure you have the room to tackle this awesome app.
This weekend's Lyrid meteor shower: Four iOS apps that can help you watch it
If you're a meteor maven or stargazer, this is the weekend for one of the year's best meteor showers, the Lyrids. The Lyrids come to maximum strength April 21-22, which for those of us in North America means late Sunday night and early Monday morning. The shower is caused by the Earth passing through the orbit of space debris left by a comet, and usually dazzles viewers with 10-20 meteors per hour from a point in the sky close to the bright star Vega in the constellation of Lyra. How can iOS help? Well, there are a lot of astronomy apps that will point you in the right direction using the compass and elevation sensors, and give you some background on meteors and their origins. Here are some of my personal favorites that should come in handy this weekend: Star Walk (US$2.99) has some info on the Lyrids shower, and best of all it will show you where to look in the early morning sky. You don't have to know a thing about astronomy; Star Walk uses the iPhone sensors to point you in the right direction. Distant Suns ($9.99 for the most advanced version) is another favorite. It doesn't list the meteor shower on its event notifications, but you can easily select the constellation Lyra in the app and the app directs you on where to look for the shower. Like Star Walk, Distant Suns provides a striking display of the night sky. There is a free, lite version available for download as well. Pocket Universe ($1.99) also has a beautiful display, and while the app mentions the Lyrid shower, it doesn't provide any details. You can use the program to orient you towards Lyra. Sky Safari ($2.99) is an excellent astronomy app and star chart, but it's completely silent about the meteor shower. Like the other apps, since you know that the shower is in the constellation of Lyra, it will point you to the proper area of the sky for possible viewing. If you are just getting started in amateur astronomy, Star Walk is your best bet. It seems the most friendly app for events like this meteor shower, and the Lyrids shower is on the events list in that app along with additional information. You're just a tap away from finding that point in the sky where the most meteors appear to be coming from. %Gallery-186223% The moon is always the enemy of those looking for faint objects in the sky. For this year's Lyrid shower, the moon doesn't set until about 4 AM Monday morning, making this a less than perfect event. You should be able to see meteors beginning at about midnight Sunday, with western North America being the best location for viewing. The meteors you see flash through the sky are actually very small pieces of rock igniting when they hit the Earth's atmosphere about 60 to 70 miles up. These rocks are seldom are large enough to make it all the way down to the Earth's surface, but sometimes they do, as evidenced by the large meteorite that hit Russia on February 15. The meteor image on this page is from Wikimedia Commons.
Celebrate "One Small Step" + 40 with free Carina astronomy apps
On July 20th, 1969, I was an 11 year-old nerd who loved space. Along with billions of other people in the rest of the developed world, I sat in rapt attention in front of the family TV set watching the ghostly figures of Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin taking the first steps on the moon. Now I'm a nerdy 51 year-old who still loves space. This weekend, my wife and I are celebrating the 40th anniversary of the historic Apollo 11 moon landing by presenting an Apollo retrospective at the Lookout Mountain Nature Center near Denver. If you're in the Denver area, drop by at 7 PM on Saturday, July 18th to learn more about the incredible challenges that were surmounted by the U.S. space program to land men on the moon and return them safely to earth.For the majority of you who aren't in the Denver area, there's another way you can celebrate on Monday, July 20th, 2009. On Monday, Carina Software will offer free download-only versions of their SkyGazer software for Mac OS X on the Carina website. iPhone and iPod touch owners won't be left out of the fun, as Carina's SkyVoyager app will be free on Monday from the App Store.Be sure to pass along the information to your friends and join in the free fun on Monday! [via The Mac Observer]
WiFi-enabled Crestron touchpanel aids in stargazing
We've seen home automation touchpanels used for some -- shall we say, unorthodox -- activities, but this is taking things to another level galaxy. Franklin, NC-based Dan Quigley has whipped up a way for his WiFi-enabled Crestron TMPC8X to actually control a giant telescope. Rather than manually getting the 'scope into the right position, he simply touches a button and watches it automatically check to see "if and when that object is viewable." While he's at it, he can dim the lights around him and check the local weather, and once a celestial body is in view, he can snap a photograph or have the system channel the image to any computer / TV. Suddenly, astronomy has become entirely more attractive.[Thanks, Chuck]
Stargazing with Starmap
Starmap 1.1 (iTunes link) is a pocket-sized map of the sky that packs a great deal into a small package. One thing that strikes you immediately is the challenge of incorporating all the options available into the iPhone's limited UI space. The button panel at the bottom of the screen is a 3D object that you can spin round to reveal more controls. And you need them, because there's a lot Starmap can show you. Not just the stars and constellations, but also planets, expected meteors and "deep sky" objects like galaxies, clusters and nebulae. Features I particularly like include: the night-vision mode (tints everything red to minimise your iPhone's own light pollution); the fact that, by default, only objects you're likely to see are shown in lists of stars and planets (you can toggle this on and off if you'd rather see a list of everything, below the horizon or not); and the general feeling that a great deal of thought has gone into building the app from the outset. The main issue with Starmap, and it's one you'll notice pretty quickly, is speed. Right now, the app does not use any accelerated graphics and subsequently, the frame rate is 3 FPS. Dragging the night sky around beneath your finger is slow and the animation jagged; as a result, it can be a little frustrating to use. Consider this before you buy. This is a known issue, though, and work is under way on a fully optimised 3D version running at 20 FPS. It might be released as soon as October, we're told. That (and one or two crashes) aside, Starmap is a fantastic educational app and very good value for the price ($11.99). Existing users should hold out for future updates -- if they deliver what's promised, Starmap will be an almost irresistible purchase. Oh, and one other thing would be nice: a function that controls the appalling British summer weather, and clears away the almost permanent cloud cover so that we actually have a remote chance of seeing some stars.
