In order to examine in detail the constellations of the starry sky or just admire the stars on a cloudy day, it is not at all necessary to go to a planetarium or buy a telescope. For a long time, an ordinary smartphone has been enough for this. Under the cut, you will find a short overview of five star-themed apps
Star Chart
One of the most popular apps in its category. Despite the relatively small base of celestial bodies (only 120,000 objects), Star Chart can seriously interest even those who are not at all inclined to admire the night sky.
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The main feature of Star Chart is support for the so-called augmented reality. With her, you can see the starry sky even on the most cloudy day. You just need to launch the application and point the smartphone camera up and the whole sky will be as if in the palm of your hand. The most interesting thing is the automatic map scrolling mode (Settings – Mode – AR mode), in which the direction of sight is determined by GPS, but manual research has its advantages.
By today's standards, there seems to be nothing special in this focus, but it still looks very cool. On the one hand, the sky map has ceased to be an abstraction, a boring and incomprehensible projection of the world around us on a sheet of paper. Now you can safely turn your head around as if in a giant interactive planetarium. On the other hand, you will not be able to get lost in unfamiliar constellations and celestial bodies with all the desire. One has only to stop looking at one or another part of the sky, and the application will draw a picture of the constellation and highlight the main stars. Just one tap – and all the information about the star you are interested in is already in front of your eyes. And if you want more, then just one more tapa is enough, and now you have already gone on a virtual tour of the galaxy.
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Star Chart: if the stars are lit … |
Additional paid options include the display of comets, meteor showers and satellites.
Stellarium planetarium
Classic atlas of the starry sky. I must admit that it does not look as impressive as the Star Chart, but it contains more background information. First of all, the application will interest those who have started to get involved in astronomy in earnest. Here you will find a solid base of stars and other celestial bodies (from artificial satellites to planets of the solar system), a list of nebulae and galaxies, drawings of constellations.
At the moment, the application catalog already includes more than 600,000 objects, whose position is calculated and displayed in real time. For many, the support of the Russian language will be a significant plus, which is not found in all atlases of this volume.
SkySafari
But if there are no problems with English, then it makes sense to look towards SkySafari – this is perhaps the most complete map among all currently available for mobile devices.
This application has many different versions, their price starts from 99r and goes up to two and a half thousand. The most complete version of the application contains information on 25 million stars and 740,000 galaxies and 630,000 other celestial bodies, from comets to asteroids.
Solar walk
The stars are great, but you shouldn't forget about your own solar system. There's a lot to see here too, and the Solar Walk app is the best proof of that.
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In fact, the app is a 3D model of the solar system. You can not only get detailed background information about each planet, but also look at it in section, see the available photos, find out its orbit and study the globe.
There are many other interesting options in the application, but almost all of them are paid. For example, you can watch interactive 3D videos about landing on the Moon or satellite flights, download HD textures of planets, watch educational videos about phenomena such as a solar eclipse or the influence of the Moon on ebb and flow, and much more. All this is great, but only the price of the application, taking into account these purchases, increases significantly.
Separately, I note that the developers declare support for 3D glasses with red and blue lenses. Their happy owners will be able to see all the models in a truly voluminous way.
Astronomy Picture of the Day
In conclusion – a very simple application that daily supplies its owners with photos of NASA on space topics.
All shots have a detailed description, unfortunately, it is only in English. If desired, the pictures can be used as wallpaper for the desktop, and the images can be automatically changed daily.
