| Human Vision and the Night Sky: How to Improve Your Observing Skills 2006 Edition Contributor(s): Borgia, Michael (Author) |
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ISBN: 0387307761 ISBN-13: 9780387307763 Publisher: Springer OUR PRICE: $31.49 Product Type: Paperback - Other Formats Published: September 2006 Annotation: This book is intended for amateur astronomers who are readers of Sky & Telescope magazine or similar astronomy periodicals or are at least at the same level of knowledge and enthusiasm. In particular, those of us who have reached a point where enjoyment is fading because the challenges have run out will appreciate it, because it takes such people to the "next level" in observational astronomy. It begins with teaching astronomers to use their most important astronomy tool, their eyes. Then it discusses how to select the right telescope taking into account that everyone is unique and shows readers how to set up and care for their instruments. Subsequent chapters take the readers on a tour of the solar system as they have never viewed it before] through their own eyes. We start close to home with the hidden treasures of the Moon, on to investigate the power of the Sun, incredibly hot Mercury, the subtleties of Venus, the changing surface of Mars, the outer solar system and then on into deep space. Each chapter includes a series of observing challenges that will entertain and push the reader to continually higher levels of achievement. Amateur astronomers will learn, through this book, many of the same lessons that professionals learned as they conducted similar observations. |
| Additional Information |
| BISAC Categories: - Nature | Star Observation - Science | Astronomy - Science | Physics - Astrophysics |
| Dewey: 005.74 |
| Series: Patrick Moore's Practical Astronomy (Paperback) |
| Physical Information: 0.54" H x 6.14" W x 9.2" (1.15 lbs) 292 pages |
| Descriptions, Reviews, Etc. |
| Publisher Description: For years, the images have blazed through your imagination. They are the magni?cent full-color photographs returned by the Hubble Space Telescope and 1 its sister Great Observatories of the grand depths of the cosmos.From the "pillars of creation,"considered to be Hubble's signature image, to the incomprehensible depths of the Hubble Deep Fields to the intricate details imaged in the surface and cloud tops of Mars or Jupiter, the power of the Hubble Telescope to turn on the public to science is unparalled in the history of modern culture. They also have spurred new telescope sales to unimagined highs.And after years of watching the heavens through the eyes of NASA, you've decided it's time to see it for yourself. You make the trip to the department store and pick up that shiny new "500 "te- scope, set it up and soon you're in business. Unfortunately, the high initial expectations usually give way to disappointment. Instead of seeing the magni?cent swirling clouds of gas in the Orion Nebula, you see a pale green-gray cloud with a couple of nondescript stars lurking nearby.The swirling red, yellow and brown storms of Jupiter are nowhere to be seen; only varying shades of gray in the planet's cloud bands, assuming you can see bands at all And Mars? After waiting all night for the red planet to rise up over the morning horizon, you are greeted by nothing more than a featureless reddish-orange dot. |