Posted on by Fraser Cain

SGU-24 Starts Soon

Our good friends at the Skeptic’s Guide to the Universe are about to punish themselves in a feat of skepticism that will shock and amaze mankind for generations to come. What will be seen, can never be unseen!

To help raise money for the show, the rogues have decided to put on a 24-hour video show, drawing in legends and supporters from across skeptic-kind. At some point you’ll see Adam Savage, Phil Plait, Richard Wiseman, Brian Brushwood, Richard Saunders, George Hrab, and more.

And you’ll also see me and Dr. Pamela Gay, my co-host from Astronomy Cast (I think we’re scheduled for 3pm Eastern time on Saturday).

The show gets started at 8:00pm Eastern Time on Friday, September 23rd, and runs for 24 non-stop hours.

You can find more, and actually watch the show here.

And if you really want to show your support for the SGU, take a moment and donate. Show them how much you appreciate their science news and skepticism.

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Happy Equinox!

We’re now in Autumn (in the Northern Hemisphere), the time when the length of day and night are roughly the same. And from here on out, the nights will be getting longer and the days shorter. It’s often difficult to explain to people how the Earth’s tilt defines how much sunlight we get every day, and how it causes the changing seasons. Here’s the easy thing to do. Show this amazing video to anyone, and they’ll totally get it. It’s a full year’s snapshots of Earth taken by NASA’s Meteosat satellite.

The Bad Astronomer, Phil Plait, has a great explainer on the Equinox, and details what you’re seeing in this video. Check it out.

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Google+ Is Live for Everyone

I’ve handed out hundreds (maybe thousands?) of Google+ invites to Universe Today readers, but now the service is open to everyone. If you’re interested in joining, you can go over to the Google Plus homepage and sign up.

Once you’re there, you can circle Fraser, Nancy, Ray, Adrian, Jon, and Steve.

And while you’re there, circle our space-minded friends: Phil, Pamela, Ian, Brian, Emily, Nicole, Alan… and more!

We record every episode of Astronomy Cast as a live Google+ Hangout, so 8 lucky listeners can watch the fearsome reality of our recording process. Once seen, it can’t be unseen! As soon as Google lets us start using Google Hangouts on Air, we’re planning to widen the audience. Oh, and if there are any Googlers reading, please, give us access… please?

(I know what you’re thinking, but I promise, Google didn’t pay me for this.)

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Question: What’s the Best Beginner Telescope?

The VLT Survey Telescope (VST) is the latest telescope to be added to ESO’s Paranal Observatory in the Atacama Desert of northern Chile. Credit: ESO/G. Lombardi

[/caption]We get this question the time. People want to get into astronomy, and they want to get their first telescope. So, to all you experienced astronomers reading Universe Today, what do you suggest people consider for their first starting telescope? We’ve heard lots of horror stories about bad quality department store telescopes, so where should people go? How much should they expect to spend? Who are some good telescope manufacturers? What should people avoid?

My first answer is always to suggest that people use a planisphere and their own eyes in the beginning, learning the constellations. Then graduating to binoculars if they’re still enjoying the hobby before even considering a telescope purchase. What’s your opinion?

Feel free to respond in the comments below.

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Amazing Timelapse Video from the Space Station

Science educator James Drake built this amazing timelapse video from the perspective of the International Space Station as it flew over North and South America. He created this video by downloading a series of 600 photographs that were available online at the Gateway to Astronomy Photograph of Earth, and then stitching them together into a complete video. You can see more of James work at his blog: infinity imagined.

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Attention Public Relations: Here’s What Internet News Wants From You

This is a summary of a talk I gave recently. There was enough slack-jawed astonishment from public relations folks that I thought it might be helpful for others.

My name is Fraser Cain, and I’m the publisher of Universe Today. A space and astronomy news website read by more than 3 million people a month. We have 65,000 RSS subscribers and email readers. We’ve published about 25,000 articles on Universe Today over the last 12 years, and deeply understand what our readers want.

So, if you’re in public relations, and you want to reach out to publishers and news editors, to get them to publish your news, let me tell you what we want. Although I’ll give you examples for space/astronomy, I’m sure this is exactly the same in every news market on the internet.

We want scoops!
Continue reading “Attention Public Relations: Here’s What Internet News Wants From You”

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Reports of a Bright Meteor over Southwestern US

Just a quick post here, I’m hearing reports that there was a really bright fireball (meteor) across Arizona, Nevada and California.

I would really love to see pictures or video. Did anyone capture it? Email me at [email protected]

  • Eyewitnesses are saying it was brighter than the full Moon, and cast shadows.
  • People have seen it from Phoenix to San Diego

Update: Here’s a picture. Not great.

Update: Another image.

Update: Good coverage from the LA Times.

Update: Here’s an account from UT reader Renee:

I sure wish I had a camera ready. I saw it… It was so bright the light caught my eye and caused me to look up as I was walking my dogs, right about 7:42-45 p.m. AZ / Pacific time.

It was bright blue/turquoise, seemed to brighten now and then (I had the impression it perceptibly lit the dark field and hillside I was near), with an orangish trail, and pieces breaking off, also orangish. WOW. It was very bright and lasted quite a long time.

I have witnessed two other fireballs in my life. One of them I saw (about 25 years ago) also could be heard. I didn’t hear anything with this one, even though it was so very intensely bright. It was so bright I didn’t even know what it could be at first; my immediate thought before I had it straight in my sight was someone set off a firework.

Sure made up for all the nights of sitting outside hoping to see a falling star. 🙂

I reported it here: http://www.amsmeteors.org/fireball2/form2.php I hope you would direct others to report their sightings there too. If you know of other places that collect info, please let me know.

Sure hope someone got a pic. I called my hubby and kids to tell them (wish they’d been with me!); would love to show them what I got to witness!

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Astronaut’s Photography Manual

Astronaut's Photography Manual - Hasselblad
Astronaut's Photography Manual - Hasselblad

[/caption]
I can’t believe I never saw this before. This is the astronaut’s photography manual provided by Hasselblad for NASA astronauts. For those of you who didn’t grow up with a professional photographer for a father, Hasselblad cameras are really high quality, square-format film cameras that were used by astronauts throughout the NASA program – even on the Moon. (The astronauts use digital cameras now.)

Click here to access the guide (warning, it’s a PDF document).

So this is a guide written by Hasselblad giving astronauts special instructions on how to take the best photographs from space!

It’s actually a really solid photography guide, with great information on lenses, exposure settings, and camera technique. Any photographer could get some use out of it. But if you happen to be up in space, you’ll have everything you need to get that perfect shot.

Posted on by Fraser Cain

Exposing PseudoAstronomy Podcast Tackles Elenin Nonsense

A big thanks to Stuart Robbins for recording a special episode of his Exposing PseudoAstronomy podcast on the Comet Elenin scaremongering. Somebody needed to do it. Stuart explains Elenin, the crazy conspiracy theories about it, and the rational, science-based reality – it’s just a regular comet, that won’t get any closer to Earth than Venus, and might very well be breaking up. Not very scary.

Anyway, check out this episode and then dig into the Exposing PseudoAstronomy back catalog.

Thanks to @2012hoax for the link.