(wow… and here i missed a chance to plug my own book! )

It’s not easy to learn and if you don’t have the darkest of skies, it’s even more difficult. I’m always here to help when you have questions!

Wishing you clear skies…

Let’s make the night sing and dance for you and your binoculars.

When looking at a star chart, you have remember you’re looking over your head instead of down at the ground. That means it’s kinda’ inverted in one respect. East is left and west is right. But… when you’re outside the cardinal directions are always the same.

Let’s try this…

Go outside and face due south. Raise your right arm. That’s west. Left arm? East. Behind you? North. Directly above your head is the zenith. The path the Sun, Moon and planets follow is the ecliptic and it varies depending on where you’re at on Earth!

For now? Let’s try it blind. When you stand facing the south just after the sky gets dark, ahead and to your right you should see hourglass shape of Orion. (Don’t wait too late, or it will set!) Latch onto the reddish star in the upper left hand corner – Betelgeuse. Look at Betelgeuse and keep looking up towards the zenith until you see another bright, reddish “star”. That’s Mars! To be sure, you’ll see another bright reddish star, Aldebaran (got it, bunnyman!) to the right of Mars.

Once you find Mars, stay facing south. Start looking to Mars’ left (east) until you see the next really bright star. That’s Saturn! It’s near the bottom of the backwards question mark of Leo. The fainter bright star near Saturn is Regulus. You can tell Saturn in binos because it looks yellowish and elongated.

Be sure to show your nieces the nebula M42 in Orion’s sword (below the 3 belts stars) and the star cluster M41 just below Sirius – the ultra-bright star to Orion’s left when facing south and basically due south just after skydark.

If you have success and what to try something else? Turn around and face north. In the early evening you’ll see the Big Dipper ahead and slightly to the east. Connect the two dots (stars) at the top of the Big Dipper from east to west in your mind and continue the same distance and trajectory west towards a blank looking area of space. Search around a little right there in your binoculars and you’ll see what looks like two very faint “cat’s eyes” fuzzies. They’ll just be little glowing patches – but they’re the M81 and M82 galaxies!

Wishing you clear skies and good luck.

If you don’t mind spending $50, to me the ultimate would be the Celestron Binoculars & Green Laser Kit. You’d get the 10X50 binos, plus a green laser and a red flashlight! Believe me, that’s like getting the laser really cheap and just giving you the binoculars and red flashlight. (Green laser pointers are an absoutely awesome tool when used properly.)

Gosh… Makes me wish I had an extra $50!

The most important thing to remember is to get the porro-prism design if you’re going to use them for astronomy. If you get over 50mm in aperture, they’re going to be too heavy to enjoy. Go more than 12X magnfication and you’ll not only have the image bouncing all over the place, but they’re sometimes hard to focus for certain eyes – especially if you wear glasses. Get binoculars that are too expensive, and you’re less likely to play with them… Get ‘em too cheap and they won’t perform. Sure. You can get a pair of porros from ebay or a department store cheap, but there’s no guarantee they’ll be collimated (properly aligned) or properly coated. Stick with names like Celestron, Meade, Canon, Nikon and Bushnell and you won’t go wrong.

And thank you, Leanna!

For those interested in a great beginner level pair of binoculars, you might want to check out the new Celeston 8X40 Up Close Binoculars. At just a little more than $20, they’re great for determining if binocular astronomy is right for you.

If you think you’d like to step up a little more, I’d recommend the Celestron 12X50 Up Close Binoculars ($22) or the Celestron 10X50 Up Close Wide Angle Binoculars (under $30). Much more than that in size and you’ll find them difficult to steady.

It’s a suprisingly minimal investment to enjoy such a great hobby!

One point about the “incredible red triangle of Antares, Betelguese and Mars.” Did you mean Aldebaran instead of Antares?