The sky at night

[Guest Marney1]

Anyone noticed these two bright stars in the sky recently?

Can anyone confirm that what we're seeing is Jupiter and Venus?

[ViceMan 1380]

I did remember hearing that Venus and Jupiter were going to be extremely close together, the closest they've been for a long time.

But yes they are Venus and Jupiter anyway, so they aren't stars. Venus is the brightest thing in the sky, and Jupiter is quite bright which is remarkable given its distance from us, but you have to take into account the size - it's much larger than Venus. You can make out the moons of Jupiter with an average pair of binoculars.

Anything else you wanted to know?

[Massacre 7646]

If they're both in the west, then they're Jupiter and Venus. You should also be able to see Mercury near the horizon, but it can be difficult to spot.

[Guest Marney1]

I did remember hearing that Venus and Jupiter were going to be extremely close together, the closest they've been for a long time.

But yes they are Venus and Jupiter anyway, so they aren't stars. Venus is the brightest thing in the sky, and Jupiter is quite bright which is remarkable given its distance from us, but you have to take into account the size - it's much larger than Venus. You can make out the moons of Jupiter with an average pair of binoculars.

Anything else you wanted to know?

I knew you'd be able to help out with this because you seem to know a bit about the solar system but that's all I wanted to know for now.

I bought a telescope a while back but only used it to look at the moon so far. Haven't been camping for ages and I love sleeping out in the open and staring up at the night sky. I used to be able to figure out all the star signs by looking up but I only seem to notice the Pan handle and The Bear these days. And Orion's Belt.

Edit: @Massacre - And Mercury too? Hmmm.

[TreeFitty 2631]

I noticed these the other night but forgot to look them up. Question answered.

[ViceMan 1380]

Astronomy is one of my interests along with the natural world. It's more of a casual interest with no formal, structured learning though. I can tell you loads of random things about various different topics but don't have one area where I know everything about it. That applies to my knowledge in general mostly... that's what you get for looking up things on Wikipedia when you're bored.

I only know the Plough (and subsequently Ursa Major,) Orion and Taurus.

[Qdeathstar 1763]

Thats clearly Nibiru and mini Nibiru set to crash into earth later this year. Duck.

[DuffMan 266]

I was out about in the countryside the other night and saw Orion has a penis. God knew what the fuck he was doing.

[Guest Marney1]

It's amazing what you see when in the countryside at night without the artificial light pollution you get in built up areas.

[Qdeathstar 1763]

Kinda hard to see a penis without light, though.

[DuPz0r 5361]

I've always been interested in astronomy and the stars at night. I wanted the do some astrophotography at one point, but never really wanted to spend insane amounts of money on a decent DSLR camera and a good quality telescope etc. I guess these day's it'd probably be much cheaper to do.

I've done a couple of time-laps photo-animations of the stars before. They didn't turn out too well,and i got extremely cold doing it. It was kinda fun though.

QD didn't you do a time-lap video outside your house before? You should try that pointed at the sky instead!

[CFO Charles 827]

I hear there's a solar storm tonight... Fucking cloud cover

And copy and paste the generic "I'm interested in astronomy but have no formal training" explanation here V

[Qdeathstar 1763]

I took a time lapse of a ski resort by taking screencaps of its webcam.

.