So I went out for night of stargazing with the hopes of finding some good markers like Ursa Major, Leo, Draco and Polaris. It was my hopes that by finding them and locating Venus that I would be able to find Saturn. the seeing wasn't very good as the sky was mottled with clouds and it got cold super fast so I couldn't stay out past 21:45 when it really would get dark. Hopefully if I describe what I sketched you might be able to tell me if I was on the right track. I found Venus and it was west about 40 degrees up in the sky and following ones finger towards the left about 30 degrees was a star and then going upward at a slight leftward angle for about 45 degrees was a yellowish non twinkling light. I took a photo of it and it was spheroid like venus but a little bit more oblong but couldn't get much detail because I was only using my 8mp camera on tripod with 150mm lens. It wasn't dark enough to see where it fell in rel to the constellations but do you think it was Saturn?
2007-05-12 15:52:07 · 4 answers · asked by bastian915 6 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
45° 52' N 66° 32' W is my location
2007-05-12 16:25:56 · update #1
Thanks for all the answers I compared with some sky charts vs what I had sketched and it was saturn I was able to place Pollux, Castor and Regulus and Saturn is there.
2007-05-13 07:39:11 · update #2
The first bright star you come to east (left) of Venus should be Saturn. It's about 45° away. Here's a sky chart: http://www.telescope.com/images/05May07StarChart_clr.pdf
2007-05-12 16:09:44 · answer #1 · answered by injanier 7 · 1⤊ 0⤋
No, I think Saturn is still in the East when Venus is out.
Saturn will be in the East to the West about 40-60 degrees up in the Southern part of the sky and it's a bright yellow and it doesn't twinkle.
2007-05-13 00:24:43 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Hi Bastian. I have Starrynight Backyard. To accurately say that you were looking at Saturn, I would need your exact location and the date you were making your observation. However looking at the program,I believe you would have been looking at Saturn as it would have been up and to the left of Venus. The angular separation is 43 degrees.
2007-05-12 23:13:10 · answer #3 · answered by fuck off 5 · 1⤊ 0⤋
I'm thinking that what you've described wasn't Saturn because at that time of night Saturn is in the east, not west.
You might try working with this website for real-time placement of celestial objects from planets to deep-space ==>http://www.fourmilab.ch/yoursky/
2007-05-12 23:09:23 · answer #4 · answered by Chug-a-Lug 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋