A s t r o n o m y - r e l a t e d  w e b s i t e s

A s t r o p h o t o g r a p h y  a n d  a m a t e u r  a s t r o n o m y

Matt BenDaniel specializes in wide field deep sky astrophotography. His pictures have been on the cover of Sky and Telescope and he offers detailed instructions in the use of auto guiders and polar alignment on his extensive website.

Bruce Sayre is a talented ATM who gathers many ingenious ideas on large reflectors.

Warren Keller: A large collection, using film, of some very dim and difficult objects, taken at Chiefland, the Black Forest and other dark sky sites.

David Hanon has an extensive site, mostly taken with a CCD and a 7" refractor. Many excellent deep sky and sharp planetary images.

Phil Harrington He's an accomplished author, and has published and updated the book Star Ware, a thorough look at the equipment available for the amateur astronomer. Don't miss the page of astronomy ads from the 1960s and 1970s.

Thierry LeGault This page by a French amateur has the highest resolution images that I have ever seen on any web page, the only exception being those from the Hubble Space Telescope. He uses a Hi-sys CCD camera and a 9" Schmidt-Cass.

Jerry Lodriguss, a news photographer by trade, has the one of the most comprehensive site I've seen by an amateur astrophotographer. His photos have been featured on the cover of Sky & Telescope and in National Geographic. It contains thoroughly researched material on film hypersensitizing, digital image manipulation and image- stacking.

Kirk Rogers   Another Astrophysics devotee, with a wide variety of nebula, deep sky, and galaxy images.

Joe Schaefer:  Detailed galaxy images with a C-11 and film, and extensive data on each shoot. He also gives a detailed look at the construction of his back yard observatory.

Chuck Vaughan, another widely published astrophotographer, with photos, articles and details on equipment, technique and good observing locations in California.
 
 

S p a c e  f l i g h t  h a r d w a r e

R e a l   t i m e  v i e w s

The clouds . For those who live in the cloud-bedecked Midwest, this is a handy resource. It displays near-real time satellite views of the cloud cover, the same ones used by television meteorologists.

On board the space shuttle. If you can't get the NASA channel on cable TV, you can see an image here of whatever NASA is broadcasting during a space shuttle mission. The image updates every few seconds, or continuously, depending on your modem speed.

V e n d o r s  a n d  e q u i p m e n t

The Astronomy Mall  If you are looking for information on commercial vendors of telescopes and related accessories, go here. This site also links to a bulletin board of equipment for sale and trade.

Reid Tool Supply   Home Depot doesn't understand my latest telescope project, so check out Reid. This company has a LOT of very cool hardware.
 

O t h e r  l i n k s

The Bad Astronomer I hate it when media inaccurately depicts astronomical subjects. So does this guy, who has a Ph.D in astronomy and works at the Goddard Space Flight Center. He's actually a very good astronomer and his site is worth a visit. He has published a book.

Web pages that suck.com This is the site's real name. There are tons of web page web pages out there (this is not a typo). But this one tries to teach good design by showing bad design. It's a hoot. I hope they never find me. But they are right, you can learn good design by understanding bad design. Note: he does not pick on personal web pages, because he considers them personal artistic statements.

Space Views is an online 'zine that covers the aerospace news and issues. They link to what they call the Space Site of the Week.