2012 Solar Eclipse Maps

The HeyWhatsThat: Eclipses Map uses two synchronised Google Earth maps to show the path of this Sunday's solar eclipse.

One map shows the path of the solar eclipse on a map of the Earth and the other map displays a planisphere showing the path of the moon across the face of the sun. If you press the play button you can watch an animation of the eclipse as it will be seen from anywhere along the path.

If you can't manage to get to a location that gives you a view of the full solar eclipse you can use the application to find out if you can view a partial eclipse from your location. Just drag the purple square on the left hand map to a location to observe what the eclipse will look like from that location.


The NASA 2012 Solar Eclipse Map uses Google Maps to also show the path of the solar eclipse.

You can lick anywhere on the map to mark a position and calculate the eclipse times from that location. For example, in San Francisco you can view a partial eclipse starting at 5.16 pm.

Tweet to the Stars with Google Maps

Earthtwit is a very cool mashup of the Google Earth plugin and Twitter. The application allows you to browse Google Earth and post an update to Twitter with a link to any location in Google Earth. When your followers on Twitter click on the short URL of the view you submitted they will be taken to the view in the Google Earth plugin.

Earthtwit has now added the option to view Google Sky, Google's map of the night sky. This means that you can now Tweet a link to your favourite images of the stars. If you don't use Twitter you can just grab the URL of a view and share that with you friends via e-mail, on Facebook or on your own website.

Star Counts with Google Maps

Sterrentelling is a Dutch star count map. The map shows the result of users' star counts.

Star counts are a good way to measure light pollution at different locations. Sterrentelling provides seven different star maps with different numbers of stars on each map. Users have to choose which map best reflects the night sky at their location.

The results of user star counts are then added to the Sterrentelling Google Map. The color of the star map markers reflects the number of stars visible at that location and it is also possible to click on each marker to view the result of the star count.

The Universe in Motion

Google Sky & Chromeless Videos

We don't nearly see enough maps created with the amazing Google Sky. Here is my latest effort, and it's pretty impressive, even if I do say so myself.

This Sky Map overlays a number of celestial animations on top of Google Sky. I've used the YouTube API to show the videos in a chromeless player. The effect is pretty cool, creating an almost seamless overlay of the video on the map.

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Where Will You Watch the Lunar Eclipse?

Event Map: Where Will You Be?

NASA have created a Google Map so that you can share where you will be watching tonight's total lunar eclipse. NASA hopes to build a community of moon-gazers across the country by everyone sharing their lunar eclipse viewing spots, comments and photos.

You can add yourself to the moon-gazing map by entering your 10-digit cell phone number on the NASA website. NASA will then text you with tips and resources for viewing the eclipse. You can then text NASA your zip code and they will add you to the map.

Remember you can also tune into NASA's live video feed of the eclipse and view a simulation of the eclipse on the Google Earth browser with HeyWhatsThat's Event Map: Where Will You Be?

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The Lunar Eclipse Simulator

HeyWhatsThat: Eclipses

Early in the morning of December the 21st, on the winter solstice, there will be a total lunar eclipse. If you live in North America you should have great views of the eclipse. If you live in Western Europe you should be able to see the beginning of the eclipse.

HeyWhatsThat: Eclipses uses the Google Earth plug-in to simulate solar and lunar eclipses. Using Eclipses you can watch a simulation of the lunar eclipse from your location. Use the timeline beneath the Google Earth plug-in to view the eclipse at different times during the night.

If you live in the southern hemisphere you can enjoy the summer solstice. However you can also tune into NASA's live video feed of the eclipse.

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The Killer App for your Smart Phone

SightSpaceStation

SightSpaceStation, the amazing satellite tracking website that allows anyone to track satellites in Google Street View, is now also available for the iPhone, iPad, iTouch and Android phones.

The app uses augmented reality and Google Maps to show the real-time location of orbiting satellites. The app is also packed full of other interesting features (view the video above).

If you get a smart phone for Christmas and you want to show off to your friends then get the SightSpaceStation app. In my opinion it is one of the killer apps for Android and iPhones.

iTunes Link

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View the Lunar Eclipse with Google Maps

HeyWhatsThat Eclipse Simulator
Tonight's partial lunar eclipse is best seen from the Pacific in the middle of the night or in the western U.S. just before dawn. The upcoming July 11th total solar eclipse will be seen to best advantage in the South Pacific.

I only know this because of HeyWhatsThat's latest Eclipse Simulator. Here's a video of the simulator in action showing the July 11th solar eclipse,



The simulation uses two instances of the Google Earth plug-in, one showing the Earth and the other the sky. You set your location by clicking on the Earth, set the time by clicking on the green timeline, and start an animation by clicking on the timeline's arrow. Use the drop-down menu on the bottom right to view other eclipses.

(Note that the timeline shows your computer's local time, not the time at the chosen viewer location.)

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Hubble Telescope's 20th Anniversary

Today is the 20th anniversary of the launch of the Hubble Space Telescope. The telescope has proved a huge success and has returned some of the most incredible images ever taken of space.

Google Sky

One of the best ways of viewing the images taken by the Hubble Telescope is to view them in situ in Google Sky. Google Sky includes a Hubble Showcase (accessible from the menu at the bottom of the page).

The Hubble Showcase lets you view some of the most spectacular images captured by Hubble and view them in context with Google's Sky map.

Star Viewer

One of the most interesting showcases of Hubble over the years has been the European Space Agency's Hubblecast series of videos. The Hubblecast videos have been exploring the images captured by Hubble and explaining what they teach us about the the Universe.

Over the last couple of years I've been geotagging the videos with the Google Maps API so that you can watch the videos embedded in the Google Sky map.

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View the Jan Solar Eclipse on Google Maps

January 15 Annular Solar Eclipse

HeyWhatsThat has produced an amazing Google Earth browser plugin application to view the route and the predicted views of tomorrow's annular solar eclipse.

The eclipse will start in Uganda, pass through Nairobi, and cross the Indian Ocean where the greatest eclipse is taking place. The islands of the Maldives are the best spot for viewing the eclipse from land. The annular Eclipse at Male', the capital city of Maldives starts at 12:20:20 hrs and ends at 12:30:06 hrs Maldives local time.

HeyWhatsThat has positioned two Google Earth maps next to each other, one showing the route of the eclipse across the Earth and the other showing a Google Sky view with the Sun and the Moon.

Both maps can be controlled using the time slider positioned below the maps. As you move the slider you can follow the track of the eclipse and view the moon passing in front of the sun.

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Virtual Tour of the Universe

Star Map

I've fallen in love with NGC 5866 (pictured) and I'm packing my bags in preparation for the invention of inter stellar space travel.

If you can't wait for the development of faster than light speed travel then you will have to make do with the wonderful imagery from the Hubble and Spitzer telescopes. This animated tour of the universe highlights some of the amazing imagery that is available in Google Sky.

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The Best Game in the Universe

La Aventura Del Universo

L'Agrupación Astronómica de Madrid, CosmoCaixa Madrid and the Planetario de Madrid have jointly released an astronomy game using Google Sky. The game has been released as a Google Gadget and uses the Google Earth browser plug-in.

The game itself is in the form of a quiz. Each question is placed in a different part of the universe and after you answer a question you fly through the stars to the next part of the quiz. The questions include YouTube videos and models of the planets (observe Jupiter in the screenshot above).

The game is in Spanish but, if you are interested in astronomy, I think you will enjoy this even if you don't understand the language.

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Make New Constellations On Google Maps

Scribble Maps
Scribble Maps is a great Google Maps mashup that lets you draw directly on a Google Map, save your scribblings and even export a kml or jpg or gpx of your work. Scribble Maps now also lets you draw on a map of the night sky. So yes - now you can create your own constellations.

Here's mine, The Alligator,



Other Google Sky Mashups

Also See

• Star Viewer
• SIMBAD Astronomical Database and Google Sky
• HeyWhat'sThat Cosmic Visibility
• Hertszptung-Russell Diagram

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Awesome Time-Line of July Solar Eclipse

HeyWhatsThat

This Google Earth plug-in application shows a simulation of the July 22 total solar eclipse. The simulation shows the view for the eclipse at its maximum in the South Pacific. The application uses the Google Earth time-line to show the relative position of the sun and moon throughout July 22nd.

If you prefer to see the eclipse in 2D you can also view the eclipse in Google Maps on the HeyWhatsThat Cosmic Visibilty page. This Google Map uses the Google Sky feature of Google Maps to also show the view at the eclipse maximum in the South Pacific.

You can use the time feature at the top left of the page to see the position of the sun and moon at different times of the day.

If you want to know what view of the eclipse you will get at any location on the Earth you can use the HeyWhatsThat Planisphere. This Google Map lets you define your location and download a collection of planispheres for that location, including July's solar eclipse.

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Sky Map for Android

Google Sky Map
Google have today released a new application for Android phones called Google Sky Map. The application allows you to discover and browse the night sky just by pointing your phone to space.

The application is able to determine your current location and show you a star map for your location.

This video explains the application in more detail:



Also See

• SIMBAD Astronomical Database and Google Sky
• Star Viewer
• HeyWhat'sThat Cosmic Visibility
• Hertszptung-Russell Diagram

Via: Google LatLong

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Today's Solar Eclipse on Google Maps

HeyWhatsThat

To coincide with Australia Day and India's Republic Day (Monday) the Moon has decided to do a fly past of the Sun. Western Australia, the south of Africa, southern India, Antarctica and South East Asia will today be able to see an annular solar eclipse.

The only reason I know this is because HeyWhatsThat has updated its Cosmic Visibility and Planisphere sites with this year's solar and lunar eclipses.

The Cosmic Visibility site uses Google Maps with its sky maps to bring the night sky to your web browser. Go to Cosmic Visibility and select an eclipse on the left, and use the "+" and "-" under minutes and hours to see the Moon pass over the Sun or through the Earth's shadow.

The Planisphere site generates KML files which you can view in Google Earth's sky mode. Go to Planisphere to set your location and request a KML file for current conditions or one of the solar eclipses. For the lunar eclipses and other options, use the Advanced Planisphere site.

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Adopt a Star on Google Maps

Pale Blue Dot Project

There are many private companies that will offer to "sell" you a star. Now you can adopt a star for just $10 from a non-profit organization and support scientific research at the same time.

In March 2009, NASA will launch the Kepler satellite on a mission to discover Earth-like planets around distant Sun-like stars. The Pale Blue Dot project is supporting this mission, through the research efforts of the Kepler Asteroseismic Science Consortium (KASC), a large international collaboration of scientists.

You can select any of the stars being targeted by this mission by selecting it from a Google Earth browser map of the night sky. Each of the adoptable stars are shown on the map by a yellow map marker. Just make a note of the star's number and press the 'donate' button.

Via: Google Earth Blog
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Out of this World Google Maps

Astronomy Star Finder

NGC 5866

I love Google Sky and can spend hours looking at the amazing celestial sights on this night time map. That task just got easier with this mashup of Google Sky with a database of 250,000 stars.

It is possible to search the database using a SAO or HD number, or a PGC, NGC or UGC catalog number. The site has also created a number of specialist lists of stars. The lists are, Named Stars, Bright Star List, Messier Objects, Herschel 400, ARP Peculiar Galaxies.

Each of the lists include quick links to the stars in that category.

Via: Ogle Earth

Previous Google Sky Mashups

Hertszptung-Russell Diagram

The Barnabu blog has produced an interactive Hertszprung Russell Diagram map of 3000 nearby stars. The map uses the Goolgle Earth plug-in to portray a scatter plot of stars’ luminosity vs colour.

The map displays 3000 nearby stars from the Hipparcos catalogue. The European Space Agency's Hipparcos satellite operated for four years between November 1989 to March 1993 and was dedicated to the measurement of stellar parallax and the proper motions of stars.

HeyWhat'sThat Cosmic Visibility

HeyWhat'sThat is a website that generates a horizon view for any given location. The site includes the option to open a 'Sky' view that overlays the celestial sphere with the horizon, visible summits and an azimuth-altitude grid for that location at the current time.

HeyWhat'sThat also uses the Google Earth browser plug-in to portray the night sky.

Star Viewer

This is my own mash-up of Google Sky and videos of celestial animations from the European Space Agency and YouTube.

A number of celestial objects are presented in a right hand menu. If you click on one of the menu items the celestial object is shown on a map of the night sky. If you click on the tagged object a video animation is then displayed on top of the map.

SIMBAD Astronomical Database and Google Sky

In design and interaction this mash-up resembles Google's own web based Sky. However it is so much more than Google Sky. When you search for a celestial object in Google Sky you are shown the resulting map tiles in your browser. If you undertake the same search in the SIMBAD Astronomical Database and Google Sky you not only get to view the stunning imagery of Google Sky but you receive all the data available from the SIMBAD database as well.

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Google Maps Drop NavTeq

Google Maps are now only using TeleAtlas map data. Google Maps, the Google API and Google Maps for Mobile now all use the same underlying map data.

The only exception is Israel where Google still use GISrael in Google Maps and Leaddog in the Google Maps API.

Via: Mapperz & Blumenthals

GRB 080913 - A Blast from the Past

On September 13 the Swift Satellite recorded the electromagnetic radiation of a high-energy explosion that took place 12.8 billion years ago. This is the oldest and furthest gamma ray burst ever recorded, from when the universe was only 7% of its present age.

Ogle Earth has created a Google Earth KML file containing an image overlay of the burst. You can view the file in Google Earth or you can view it in the browser based Google Sky. To view the overlay in the browser version of Google Sky right click on the kml link, copy the link location and then paste the kml link into the search box of Google Sky.

Via: Ogle Earth

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Google Sky Maps

SIMBAD Astronomical Database and Google Sky

Google Maps mash-ups of Google Sky come along very rarely so I was very excited to discover this mash-up of Google Sky with the SIMBAD Astronomical database today. What makes it even more exciting is that it is an awesome accomplishment.

In design and interaction this mash-up resembles Google's own web based Sky. However it is so much more than Google Sky. When you search for a celestial object in Google Sky you are shown the resulting map tiles in your browser. If you undertake the same search in the SIMBAD Astronomical Database and Google Sky you not only get to view the stunning imagery of Google Sky but you receive all the data available from the SIMBAD database as well.

Truly awesome!

Update
Mapperz has contacted me with some other interesting Google Sky news.

First off, Google Sky is now localised so non-English speakers can browse Google Sky in their own language. For example, here is the Turkish language Google Sky.

Secondly, there are two examples of Google Sky mash-ups in the Google Maps API Demo gallery. One, by Pamela Fox, is a demonstration of all the different planetary types available in the Google Maps API. The second, by Mapperz, is an example of an image overlay on Google Sky.

Previously Featured Google Sky Mash-ups

Hertszptung-Russell Diagram

The Barnabu blog has produced an interactive Hertszprung Russell Diagram map of 3000 nearby stars. The map uses the Goolgle Earth plug-in to portray a scatter plot of stars’ luminosity vs colour.

The map displays 3000 nearby stars from the Hipparcos catalogue. The European Space Agency's Hipparcos satellite operated for four years between November 1989 to March 1993 and was dedicated to the measurement of stellar parallax and the proper motions of stars.

HeyWhat'sThat Cosmic Visibility

HeyWhat'sThat is a website that generates a horizon view for any given location. The site includes the option to open a 'Sky' view that overlays the celestial sphere with the horizon, visible summits and an azimuth-altitude grid for that location at the current time.

HeyWhat'sThat also uses the Google Earth browser plug-in to portray the night sky.

Star Viewer

This is my own mash-up of Google Sky and videos of celestial animations from the European Space Agency and YouTube.

A number of celestial objects are presented in a right hand menu. If you click on one of the menu items the celestial object is shown on a map of the night sky. If you click on the tagged object a video animation is then displayed on top of the map.

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