At Home Planetarium

(Image Info: Courtesy NASA/JPL-Caltech)

A few weeks ago I got to spend time in a Digitalis Portable Planetarium, all by myself, for a couple hours.  It was unbelievably fun.  The Universe at my beck and call!  The ability to zoom in and out of planets, see what phase Mercury and Venus are currently in, where the moons of Jupiter currently sit, what constellations are in our daytime/night sky, etc, etc, etc.

The remote was having some issues, so there was a moment where I was rewinding time, and hitting play wouldn't resume normal speed.  The stars were spinning round and round fast.  So crazy!  When the remote decided to work again I was viewing last Novembers stars.  Totally reminded me of the Psych episode "For Earth to Starbucks" when Shawn hosts a Planetarium show, and then leaves to investigate, leaving the sky spinning.  I know what that feels like!!  Cool and nauseating at the same time.

I found out that the same planetarium program I was using in the Digitalis Dome is available as a free Open Source computer download: Stellarium.  Sure, you're not inside a dome, but you can set the location to where you live, and see what constellations are in the sky no mater the time of day.

It's a really fun program to play around with.

(BTW, the symbol with the sun behind the cloud turns off the atmosphere, which is helpful for daytime viewing.  When you have the planet names turned on, click on the planet and zoom in using the (/) key and out using the (\).  A couple planets have two zooms, if the moons are spread out at a distance.  The Help menu is highly recommended.) 

http://stellarium.org/