Using Binoculars

 | Basic Celestial Phenomena | Constellations | Planetarium |

Get ready...

• Get a reclining lawn chair and lay on your back--do this for a year before buying a telescope. Use our constellation web pages as a guide to the stars.
• Get a planisphere.
• Get a book like Chet Raymo's 365 Starry Nights, and go out under the night sky regularly throughout the year.
• Subscribe to Sky and Telescope.

Get set...

• Any brand or size is fine, even Wal-Mart birding binoculars.
• Try 7x50 if you are buying specifically for sky viewing (available under $100).
• Astronomics in Norman carries a complete line.
• Interested in a telescope?

Go!

• When viewing with binoculars hold them close to your face for extra stability, resting your hands against your cheekbones.
• Watch the terminator or shadow line on the Moon. Get a Moon map from Sky and Telescope.
• Deep sky treasures within reach by binoculars include:
  • Colored stars tinted blue, red, orange, yellow. Colors reflect the temperature of the star: the hottest are blue and the coolest are red.
  • Double stars, perhaps of contrasting colors. The double-sunset scene on Luke's home planet in Star Wars is not fiction! Many stars are actually star systems with multiple stars revolving around a common center of gravity.
  • Star clusters, containing hundreds of stars in close proximity.
  • Globular clusters, containing thousands of closely packed stars (very faint with binoculars).
  • Galaxies or star wheels like our own Milky Way. All the stars you see in the night sky are contained in the Milky Way galaxy, but many cloudy patches of light are distant galaxies.
  • Nebulae (singular: nebula) are clouds of gas and dust.
• Use our constellation web pages as a guide for binocular viewing of the constellations. Click any constellation name below for a star chart and description of that constellation.

  Constellation	Binocular Object
  Andromeda	Andromeda galaxy
  Cygnus the Swan	Albireo, the beak of the Swan, is a beautiful double star (orange and blue)
  Aquila the Eagle	Star cluster
  Lyra the Harp	Double star
  Sagittarius the Archer	Nebula
  Scorpius	Red star Antares, the heart of the Scorpion
  Hercules	Globular cluster
  Ursa Major the Big Bear	Double star Alcor and Mizar in the handle of the Big Dipper
  Coma Berenices, Berenice's Hair	Star cluster
  Cancer the Crab	Star cluster
  Canis Major the Big Dog	Star cluster
  Lepus the Hare	Double star
  Gemini the twin brothers	Star cluster
  Orion the Hunter	Great Orion Nebula
  Orion the Hunter	Bluish star Rigel, his left foot; red star Betelgeuse, his right armpit
  Taurus the Bull	The Pleaides star cluster
  Perseus	Double star cluster

| Top |