Expert: Rocky Alvey & Billy Teets
Bio: Rocky Alvey is the assistant director of the Vanderbilt Dyer Observatory and has been involved in astronomy since 1969.
Filmmaker: Dimitri LaBarge

Duration : 0:4:4

Technorati Tags: Astronomy, nature, science, sky charts, star charts, Telescopes

ESOcast 4: 24 hours in the life of an ESO astronomer.

Have you ever wondered what it must be like to be an astronomer? In this fourth episode of the ESOcast, Dr. J takes us behind the scenes at ESOs Very Large Telescope in Chile to show us what a day in the life of an ESO staff astronomer is like.

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The countdown for an exciting night with an observation run at the world’s most advanced optical telescope, the ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT), has begun …

In this ESOcast episode, were going to follow a day in the life of Dieter Nürnberger. Dieter is a staff astronomer at ESO. His job is to support those scientists that have managed to get observing time on ESOs Very Large Telescope at Paranal Observatory in Chile. Dieter spends most of his working days helping the successful few to make ground-breaking discoveries.

Dieter Nürnberger is on his way to meet the visiting scientists to team up for the night to come. The three have been observing together for several nights, today is their final evening and they are keen to get started. Over dinner they discuss plans for the night ahead.

Well before sunset they leave the Residencia and drive up the desert road to the building housing the VLT control room. At the control building they prepare the observations and check the set up of the telescope. Observing time on these great telescopes is precious and delays must be avoided at all costs.

Like a pilot checking his plane before departure, Dieter goes through a detailed check of his instrument, while the telescope operator does the same for the giant telescope. The astronomers have travelled far for a glorious view of the Universe, and here a glorious view of the sunset is included for free! As usual at Paranal, the conditions are perfect and Dieter and the visiting astronomers return with high expectations.

Read more: http://www.eso.org/public/videos/ESOCAST4/ESOCAST4.pdf

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ESOcast is produced by ESO, the European Southern Observatory. ESO, the European Southern Observatory, is the pre-eminent intergovernmental science and technology organisation in Astronomy designing, constructing and operating the worlds most advanced ground-based Telescopes.

• http://www.eso.org/
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Duration : 0:6:0

Technorati Tags: 04, 24, an, Astronomer, astronomers, Astronomy, chile, discoveries, ESO, ESOcast, european, hours, in, Large, life, Observatory, Of, Paranal, Scientists, southern, telescope, The, universe, Very, VLT

And is Bunshell a quality optic supplier? How good are the optics?

Personally, having used a few different binoculars i find 10×50′s are quite good for astronomy the 16x magnification may sound appealing however shaking will become more of an issue, you may think it will be a subtle difference, but you can tell. For ease of use and portability, I find 10x 50′s are good and anything like 20×70′s aren’t very effective – unless you have a tripod, that’s when those size binoculars outshine 10×50′s in my opinion.

This video showcases the Zenith Telescope, built by Troughton & Simms in London, England circa 1872. Surveyors used this telescope to mark the boundary between Canada and the United States along the 49th parallel in western Canada.

To learn more about Telescopes, visit the Canada Science and Technology Museum.

http://www.sciencetech.technomuses.ca/

Duration : 0:2:25

Technorati Tags: 1609, 2009, 49th, and, Astronomy, Canada, discoveries, Dominion, earth, education, Exploration, Galileo, Guide, instrument, International, IYA, maps, Museum, navigators, Observatory, Of, optical, orbits, Ottawa, parallel, Program, railway, Resources, revealing, science, Simms, stars, sun, Surveyors, teaching, technology, telescope, Troughton, Virtual, Year, Zenith

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spectroscopy and so on for more detailed information.

Duration : 0:9:47

Technorati Tags: Astronomy, spectrograph, spectrometry

Duration : 0:12:49

Technorati Tags: cable, design, generation, hydro, kea, mauna, ntsc, power, product, renewable, sex, shop, shopping, shower, solar, tap, Telescopes, toys, tv, wind

Duration : 0:3:21

Technorati Tags: Exploration, landscapes, mars, NASA, photography, planets, satellite, solar-system

Expert: Jesse Sturgeon
Bio: Jesse Sturgeon has served as a sales and customer service representative for Anacortes Telescope in Anacortes, Wash. for several years. He enjoys introducing people to the science & art of astronomy.
Filmmaker: Curtis Enlow

Duration : 0:2:24

Technorati Tags: Astronomy, binoculars, night sky, science, Telescopes

Duration : 0:1:50

Technorati Tags: elements, space

http://www.opticalvision.co.uk/astronomical_telescopes/sky-watcher/dobsonians

With telescopes, you very much get what you pay for. A £100 telescope will be extremely limited in what it will show you, and you will soon be frustrated and wanting more. Most of the telescopes in this price range are cheaply made toys…the ones on the page above are some of the rare exceptions. Quite frankly I wouldn’t recommend any of the competition. Read some of the recent telescope questions here and you’ll see how frustrating cheap telescopes can be! Anything less than a 150-mm Dobsonian is probably a waste of money, so realistically you’re looking at around £200.

Here are a few web pages with good information on beginner’s telescopes:

http://www.gaherty.ca/tme/TME0702_Buying_a_Telescope.pdf

http://www.scopereviews.com/begin.html

http://observers.org/beginner/j.r.f.beginner.html

For more advanced information, read Phil Harrington’s Star Ware, 4th edition (Wiley).

You’ll get the greatest value for your money with a Newtonian reflector on a Dobsonian mount, such as these:

http://www.telescope.com/control/category/~category_id=dobsonians/~pcategory=telescopes/~VIEW_INDEX=0/~VIEW_SIZE=1000000

http://www.skywatchertelescope.net/swtinc/product.php?class1=1&class2=106

Buy from a store which specializes in telescopes and astronomy, either locally or online; don’t buy from department stores, discount stores or eBay as mostly what they sell is junk. Find your local astronomy club and try out different telescopes at one of their star parties:

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/community/organizations

I strongly recommend that beginners steer clear of astrophotography until they have learned their way around the sky. Astrophotography is by far the most expensive and difficult area of amateur Astronomy.

Many people who buy Telescopes have no idea how to find interesting things to observe. A good introduction to finding things is NightWatch by Terence Dickinson (Firefly). A more advanced book is Star Watch by Phil Harrington (Wiley).