Welcome to the OVAS Astronomy Links
Our Current Categories:
Other Astronomy Clubs and Societies
- Delaware
Astronomical society's Links page Many Many Links (Thanks Tim!)
- The Hawaiian Astronomical Society
A great page. Search for messier and other deep sky constellations by
constellation. Learn constellation. "Stellar" pages on the planets.
- The American Association of Amateur
Astronomers A nice page. A different layout then Hawaii.
- Amateur Astronomers Association of
Pittsburgh Page These folks hold the
Laurel highlands Star Cruise which
has become the favorite East Coast area summer star party of the members of
OVAS. We've attended in '01 an '02 and this has been a great event. We look
forward to '03!
- The Peoria
Astronomical Society Nice introductions to various topics.
- The Astronomical League
An umbrella organization for local astronomy clubs. They give our the
Observing certificates.
- The Northern Virginia Astronomy Club A
large club based in Northern Virginia. Lots of information, tips, observing
locations, and links/
- DelMarVa Star Gazers
- Southern Cross AS I think they
run the winter star party.
- Orange County Astronomers Another big club with a nice site.
- Miami Valley Astronomical Society
It’s in Dayton, Ohio.
- MIDLANDS
ASTRONOMY CLUB, Inc. " For over 25 years, Midlands Astronomy Club,
Inc. (MAC) has existed to further the general knowledge of Astronomy in the
Columbia, SC area. You could say that we are definitely a group of
enthusiastic amateurs. No matter what degree of experience in Astronomy you
have, I know that the members will welcome you, and be glad to share their
knowledge, and share your knowledge." Sounds like my kind of place.
- The Belmont Society
Dedicated to beginning astronomers. Double star info, glossary,
pronunciation guide. This site has a lot to offer. This site carries the Tim
lester Seal of Approval!
- Association of Lunar &
Planetary Observers Well just what do you want to know about observing
the planets?
- Black River Astronomical
Society established in 1949, serves Lorain County, Ohio, USA and the
surrounding area.
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An Astronomical Glossary
Bill Ferris’s
Glossary of Astronomy Terms
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Astronomical Resources:
- Sky and
Telescope’s "Astrodirectory". Use it to find a club, planetarium, or
observatory near you!
- The Astronomy Mall Many astronomy product producers or retailers maintain a web site here. Many
links.
- The Messier Objects
This SEDS sponsored page has links to pictures of each messier object.
- The latest Hubble
Space Telescope Photos Be the first on your block to see them.
- The
Houston Chronicle It’s like having a box seat at Mission Control. Keep up
with what’s going on with man in space.
- The Galileo Project
Keep up to date on Jupiter from the vantage point of the Galileo Space
probe. At 5 years and 29 orbits into the mission, there’s never been a better
time to drop in. What’s up with volcanoes on Io? This is the place to find
out.
- NASA Today Visit here
and keep up to date you with what NASA is up to.
- NASA QUEST NASA’s site with space
info aimed at kids (grades K-12).
- NASA Pathfinder
Remember the little rover that could? Read about it here. <
- NASA’s home page Oh give me a home
where the space shuttles roam …
- NASA’s Spaceflight Page Want
coverage of man in space? ISS? Shuttle? All in one place? Well here it is!
- Magnetic
variance from true north Ever want to know how far true north is from
magnetic north for your viewing location or any place on the planet? Enter
your zip code, today’s date, and your altitude. When the data pops up look at
the first item, "D" this is the magnetic declination a negative number means
degrees West of North (360-D) a positive number means degrees East of North
(0+D)
- The Digital Sky Survey
Pictures of DSO’s. Use this to verfy that what you saw is what you thought
you saw.
- Heavens Above Use this site to
locate ISS or other satellites
- Mike Boschat’s Astronomy Links
page Many Many Many links.
-
The Nebulae Page Links off this page explain the basis and physics (in
simple terms) of reflection, emission, and planetary nebulae
- The
Scopulator This tool by Pete Enzerink computes all sorts of interesting
information about the behavior of different eyepieces with your telescope.
Input information about your ‘scopes focal ratio and aperture as well as the
apparent FOV and focal length of an Eyepiece anit it will compute the
effective FOV, magnification, exit pupil and more. A great tool. This carries
the Larry Oyster award for excellence in use of arithmatic.
-
What Televue refractor is right for you? Uncle Al lists these scopes
various strengths in a table format
-
How do I choose a nice set of Eyepieces for my ‘scope? Let Uncle Al tell
you how!
- Astronomy links page You
want more links?
- Astronomy Tools Programs to aid
your observing
- Astronomy
Day How to set one up
- The Basics of Radio
Astronomy by NASA
- Infrared Astronomy
by NASA
- Links for Kids and Educators
A service of OVAS
-
Magnification and FOV Calaculator. Web based applet.
- netastrocatalog - Internet Amateur
Astronomers Catalog This is a web site dedicated to "visual astronomy".
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Newtonian Collimation
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Magazines and Periodicals
- Sky and Telescope’s web page. The
more scientific of the two leading astronomy publications.
- Astronomy Magazine The
number two publication in my mind but some folks like it better then S&T.
- The Astrophysical Journal
Recommended for enthusiasts and insomniacs.
- Amateur Astronomy Magazine Page
Published for 7 years. Black and white photos and text. ATM. Observation.
Equipment. If you want articles written by top amateur’s for serious amateurs
… so why haven’t you subscribed already? What, you’re still waiting? Why?
Published quarterly.
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The butcher, the baker, the telescope maker
- Discovery Telescopes
Maker’s of tube and truss Dobs.
- Obsession Telescopes
Makers of premium large aperture Dobsonians. These are optimized for ease
of use and ease of setup. Smooth as silk. Moves like a knife through soft
butter.
- Celestron One of the two
major players in mass produced telescopes.
- Meade Instruments Company The
largest maker of telescopes and accessories
- Orion
They carry their own line of Dobs. Said by some to be the best of the
non-premium Dobs. They sell Vixen refractors (reasonable quality) and some
lesser scopes.
- Stellarvue
Makers of Refractors from Chinese components. And now sporting a new line of
lenses they make.
- Tele Vue Al Nagler
makes high quality refractors and some of the best eyepieces going.
- Astrophysics When it
comes to refractors – it’s the best a man can get. Bar none. The best amateur
refractors in the world. Think about it.
- Star master The
other big name in making big aperture premium Dobsonian reflectors. Removable
mirror cell. Thinner mirror. Go To in a large Dob.
- Light Box Telescopes
. Imagine a 12.5" telescope in your passenger seat, or an 18" scope in the
back seat of any car, and imagine a design which does not compromise on
shielding or rigidity. Barry Peckham lives in Hawaii and builds Dobsonian
reflectors made to store in the minimum possible space. Not as smooth as the
Obsession, but fits in a much smaller space per size.
- A Russian scope maker State Unitary Enterprise "NOVOSIBIRSK INSTRUMENT-MAKING PLANT" They
are Russian’s making scopes. I know nothing about them.
- INTES They
import Russian telescopes. Supposedly Mak-Newts and Mak-Cass scopes are
excellent for planets. I have no experience with these folks.
- Mag1 Instruments They
make the "Portaball" line of dobs. These have a spherical base and allow you to
rotated the EP to a comfortable location. The UTA stacks in the mirror box.
You can get an equatorial platform for them – but no way to mount digital
setting circles.
- Coranado They mostly
make solar filters but do make a 70mm Helios 1 telescope as a dedicated H
alpha solar scope.
- The Astronomy Mall Links to
many astronomy related vendors, both telescope and accessory makers. One stop
shopping on the web. Check out their classifieds for deals on used equipment.
It’s lower down the page or hit link at top right of page to "scroll" there
fast.
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Telescope review pages
- Ed Ting’s Scope/Equipment Review
Pages Ed begins his page with a statement - This Home Page Has
Been Visited Over One Million Times . It is followed by an unsolicited
page review: "Ed, you are a bum. I stumbled onto your web site and spent the
next four hours reading it instead of working. PS, Can you write some more
please?" Ed has reviewed many telescopes of all different types. His reviews
are informative and often entertaining as well. He talks about telescopes,
eyepieces, and other telescope related accessories. I like this page.
- Ed’s Ranking Matrix
Here Ed holds nothing back as he ranks the scope’s on a 1-5 scale.
What’s the best that you can afford for a given telescope type? What to avoid?
Start here.
- Todd Gross’s Pages Many
reviews of telescopes and eyepieces live here.
- Cloudy Nights another scope
review page.
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Wayne and Garth’s Excellent Amateur Astronomy Pages
- Cosmic Voyage
Bill Ferris was chosen by Sky and Telescope Magazine as having a great page.
I agree. This is an excellent site that is packed full of information for the
beginner and experienced astronomer alike. I like his section on Collimation.
Check out his links.
- Starlore Richard
Bartlett was chosen by Sky and Telescope Magazine as having a great page. I
agree. Another S&T "top 7" pick, his site has graphical icons on a bar across
the top of the page. Pick one say galaxies. You see a 4 column display. On the
right click on a month, say January, and the site displays his picks for what is
visible that month – with pictures – with comments of what type of telescope
you’d need to see it – It’s home constellation, etc. You can click on the
pictures for a better look – and it seems as though he’s planning on associating
finder charts with each image (seems to be a work in progress). Oh, I am not
worthy. No clunky 1 or 2 line print outs like in the IC/NCG observing list
generator (which are more useful in the field), this is a graphics rich sit that
takes advantage of all the web has to offer to produce lists that are beautiful
to behold. Highly recommended for the New to intermediate astronomer for object
selection. Highly recommend to all for its glorious interface. (And above all
references to both 2001 A Space Odyssey and Star Wars. If only the site was
constructed from Krell Steel.)
- Adventures in deep
Space Like deep space objects, but the Messiers just aren’t enough. This
is your home page for observing projects and reports.
- Jeff b has a big scope and likes to observe. A good page.
- Mel Bartel’s Page A great
builder and motorizer of telescopes. A legend in his own time. Want to
computerize your Dob – here’s the man to show you how.
- Bert’s visual deep
sky page Dated. But talks about observing with a 6" Dob, which I think
is a great starter scope. Not to big. Not to heavy. Enough light grasp to look
at the deep sky (out side of our solar system). Not too expensive. Forgiving
focal ratio on mirror makes introduction to collimation (aligning your
telescopes two mirrors with the eyepiece) a little easier .
- Jeff Bondono’s Page
A
bit dated. But many, many links.
- Kemer’s page Kemer is an amateur astronomer with a "Tak" refractor and a 18" Obsession. He
reviews various products that he’s used. He post’s observing reports for each.
- Harry’s Astronomy
Page Harry has a nice selection of links: ATM, alignment, collimation.
Check it out!
- Tom Campbell’s
Amateur Astronomer A great site for the beginner. Ex-cell-ent!
- Astrola "A gathering
place/information exchange for the owners of and enthusiasts of the legendary
line of Cave telescopes."
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Wayne and Garth's Excellent Amateur Astronomy Pages - ATM -
dob
- Ultra-Light and
Minimalist Dobs... by Mel Bartels
-
telescope making web ring page, many links to ATM'ers sites are found
here.
- the flying dob an
ailine transportable 16" dob by Jack Gelfand
- travel scope
by Ray Cash He can build a 13" to fit into a single relatively small
box. Very nice work.
-
Innovative ideas about minimalist dobsonians
by Tom Krajci
- the 40 POUNDER
an ultra light weight 16" dob by Gary Wolanski - . He also makes
quality products for other ATMers such as focusers and spiders.
-
Newt Software
Newt is a Newtonian telescope design program. It ray traces
the telescope checking for vignetting, optimizes diagonal size, calculates
baffle size and position, and a lot more. It allows you to easily and quickly
change any of the design parameters of the telescope and to see the results
immediately.
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Observatories, Planetariums and Such
- The Lowell Observatory
- The National Radio Observatory It’s in WV you know.
- The Yerkes Observatory The U. of Chicago.
- The
Palomar Observatory
- The
Educational Observatory Institute The Educational Observatory
(incorporating one or more ATFs), when completed, will provide K-12 students
with an opportunity to do real science (observational astronomy) from their
classrooms via the internet. Wow!
- The United States Naval
Observatory. Attention!
- The Ohio State
University Astronomy Dept.
- Star Date on Line Daily
radio bits from the U. of Texas.
- The Alder Planetarium
- The National Optical Astronomy
Observatory
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Vendors and Purveyors of Astronomical Goodies:
- The
Astronomy Mall Links to many different vendors.
- High
Point Scientific An astronomy products store run by some great guys. We
had the chance to observe with Dave and Larry at the laurel highlands Star
Cruise through their 24". These guys know their stuff. They are becoming our
prefered Astronomy products Vendor
- Sopetronix A small
business that grew. A scope store. The make after market add ons for various
popular scopes. In particular they make/sell producets for eye piece
projection photography with digital cameras.
- Kendrick Astroindustries They make dew heaters and sell solar telescopes. They make/sell the dew
heaters prefered by the members of OVAS
- Lumicon An astronomy store.
Their nebular filters are said to be the best. They make/sell the preferred
UHC and OIII nebula filters.
- Coranado They make H
alpha solar filters and telescopes They are the preferred H-Alpha products
vendor by OVAS members.
- Astrovid aka Adirondack Video
Astronomy - they sell astronomical video and CCD cameras and accessories. You
want the best in Astronomical video cameras and Accys?
- SBIG CCD Camaras for the stars,
and galaxies, " they say that in every industry there is a leader "
- Software Bisque These
guys make planetarium software and software to drive your computer driven
telescope. Supposed to be first class, but I've never seen it.
- INTES The
sell Russian made telescopes. Glasnost at last.
- Astronomics A
telescope/astronomy store. Many product lines.
- Orion
Telescopes and Binoculars They sell their own line of scopes and
eyepieces.
- EZ Telescope They make laser
collimators and other things for Newtonians. Don Kemper has one of their
collimators. Ask him how he likes it.
- Pete's Photoworld A camera
store that sells astronomy stuff.
- Shutan Camera and Video A
camera store that sells astronomy stuff.
- Dark Sky Stuff
He sells light blocking panel systems for home viewing.
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News Groups, Bulletin Boards and the Like:
- The Meade Advanced Products Users GroupGot
a problem with or question about your meade?
- Yahoo Groups Many Astronomy Groups.
I moniter: bigdob · Chinese_Refract · Discovery-Dob-U · Flaming_Optics ·
MeadeETXOwners · obsamat · obsessionusers · SkyCommander · solar-observers ·
spruceknob · StarryNight · starrynights · Stellarvue · telescopes . More
groups are available.
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Deep Sky Links
- Skunk info
I added this as skunks abound in our area and they seem to be attracted to
me.
- Mike and
Carolyn’s Deep Sky Page Amazingly good. Many great links.
-
IAAC
Page Defines Deep Sky Objects. Examples. Links. Good Resource. History
of DSOs. How to find DSOs. Wow!
- SEDS Messier Page Pic’s and info on all objects
- SEDS
Herschel 400 Page More DSO’s. Info. Pics. History.
- NGC/IC Observing List
Generator It’s free.
- Adventures in
Deep Space No wise cracks. This is a great page for the DSO observer
who wants more then Messier’s Objects
- The Planetary Nebula Observer’s
Home page Want to learn about PN’s. This is the place
- John
Small’s Telrad Messier finder Charts a set of 15 printable maps (Adobe
reader) let you find the Messier objects with your telrad! (Thanks to Don
Kemper for this site!)
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Double Star links
- The Spirit of 33 A
double star observers page! This seems to be a set of 33 double stars in
selected constellations. Look for Observing Projects link to the top of the
blue bar at the right edge of the page. Select your constellation. Find your
list of double stars! You want double stars? Here they are!
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Planetary information/naked eye astronomy sites:
-
The Nine Planets
A great site to learn about the planets. A top seven
pick by Sky and telescope Magazine.
- The Star Hustler A page
about visual astronomy. Astronomy with the naked eye. A top seven pick by Sky
and telescope Magazine.
- Earth and Sky’s
"Sky Watch" Daily highlights of naked eye astronomy.
- Sky Map’s downloads Provides whole sky naked eye sky charts like those printed monthly in
Astronomy and Sky & Telescope magazines
- Whole
Sky Panoramic chart This site is way too cool. First you wait for the
image to load (painful without high speed internet access) they you click on
the image and drag the sky around. You can tour the whole milky way. The
entire sky is visible as seen through a camera lens. The entire sky, from any
where on the planet. This gave me my first look at the Large and Small
Magenelenic clouds. It’s like the sun and the earth just aren’t there. Must be
seen to be experienced. Like Wow! Thanks Don!
- The Assn. Of Lunar and
Planetary Observers What to look for. How to look.
- The Hawaiian Astronomical
Society Click the button on the left side of the page that says Views
of the Solar System. They had much info. and many pictures.
- Home
Planet Software for your computer! Free!
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Here Comes the Sun
- Exploration of
the Earth's Magnetosphere -- Fantastic history, simple science
- Solar and Heliospheric
Observatory (SOHO) -- The Hubble of solar imagery
- The
Space Weather Center: Living in the Atmosphere of the Sun -- a museum
exhibit co-developed by Mike Carlowicz and colleagues from NASA and the Space
Science Institute
- Space Weather at
Windows to the Universe -- The best background overview of the subject,
teacher tested
- Space Weather Now-- Home of the
official U.S. space weather forecasts
- The Space Weather Bureau -- A
popular news and information site
- Live from the
Sun -- Electronic field trips to your nearest star
- Mission to Geospace
-- Broad library of info and activities for space weather
- Magnetosphere -- "Causing vivid
auroral displays and engrossing rock music"
- The
Northern Lights-- Stunning photographs of the aurora
- Shooting the Aurora
Borealis-- More outstanding aurora imagery
- Eclipse Home
Page -- Best background on this wondrous phenomenon
- In-Flight Radiation
Protection Services -- What to know before you fly
- Satellite News Digest
- Satellite outages and failures
- The Planetary Society Solar
Sail Project -- sailing on sunbeams...really..
- ULYLSSES Satellite -- info r.e. the Heliosphere
- ALPO solar
section main solar links
- ALPO other links other solar links. Much info here
Solar and Deep Space Probes
- Far ultraviolet Spectroscopic Explorer
Exploring Space in Ultra Violet light.
- The Space Telescope Science
Institute The Hubble!
- Space Telescope
imaging Spectrograph One of Hubble's instruments.
- SOHO
explores the sun The sun seen at several different parts of the spectrum.
- Transitional Region and Coronal Explorer A solar observer.
- CICLOPS The imaging page of
the CASSINI Space Probe. Its been to Jupiter. No its on the way to Saturn and
the first images are "in"!
- TRACE
transition region and coronal explorer - its mission:
-
- To follow the evolution of magnetic field
structures from the solar interior to the corona.
- To investigate the mechanisms of the heating
of the outer solar atmosphere.
- To investigate the triggers and onset of
solar flares and mass ejections
- NASA space
weather data page new combined page.
- ACE
Advanced Composition explorer -From a vantage point approximately 1/100
of the distance from the Earth to the Sun ACE performs measurements over a
wide range of energy and nuclear mass, under all solar wind flow conditions
and during both large and small particle events including solar flares. ACE
provides near-real-time solar wind information over short time periods. When
reporting space weather ACE can provide an advance warning (about one hour) of
geomagnetic storms that can overload power grids, disrupt communications on
Earth, and present a hazard to astronauts.
- YOHKOH - the Japanese
solar X-ray probe. This is to their PR page (English). If you have a high
speed connection visit the Yohkoh "movie
theater" on the public outreach page.
- Microwave Anisotropy Probe - Cosmology
explained. This is a follow up to the COBE satellite and this site tells you
what the universe is thought to be like. There are also links to pages that
explain cosmology - the "big picture" view of the universe.
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FREEWARE
-
Cartes du Ciel
Free Astronomy software. A Sky Chart program. Powerful and
free.
-
Astrostack
a freeware program to stack images from BMP or AVI files.
- AVI2BMP This freeware
program lets you convert AVI frames to individual BMP files. Just review frame by frame,
check mark the good ones and batch save them to create a series of BMP files
that are numbered sequentially and can be averaged with Astrostack!
- Virtual Moon this
shows you the current lunar phase and allows you to identify craters on the
moon. A great program! And it is free! A lunar atlas for your computer! The OVAS WEBMASTER rates this one a MUST HAVE!
- Hayden Planetarium 3-D Interactive Software
I have no experiance with
this. It was reviewed in Sky and Telescope in 2002.
- Astro Snap Another
Free French Software Package - take long term astro photos with a web cam. This
link is to the US version of the web site.
- Registax Freware
that lets you stack AVI's, BMPs, (?and JPGs). Has image processing features as
well. Great for video of planets. Its shagadellic baby.
- The GIMP Homepage will tell you about
GIMP which is a freeware that I use to touch up some of my images. Like
Photoshop, kind of.
- Castle Point Astronomy Club's Jupiter
moon locator - ever wonder which moon is which when looking at jupiter.
Well this program tells you! It is downloadable and as a JAVA applet it runs
in your internet browser.
A nice review of some image
processing software is at:
Astrophoto.org this includes Freeware and Costware. This site is not all
inclusive.
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