Astronomy & Astrophotography Resources

In an effort to help spread an appreciation for and sense of access to the night sky to more people, I have compiled some of my favorite websites, apps, and other educational resources here for your use and enjoyment.

While there are many planetarium apps you can choose from, I personally love Stellarium. Stellarium is a free, open-source planetarium software that renders a realistic 3D of the night sky in real time. You can download it as an app on your phone or as a software program on your desktop/laptop computer. You can set the time and date and it will show you exactly what the sky will look like at that moment. You can also use it to find a variety of celestial objects (stars, planets, constellations, galaxies, nebulae, comets, satellites, etc.)

Clear skies are a necessity for proper viewing or imaging of the night sky, and there is no better app than Astrospheric for relevant weather forecast information. Unlike regular weather apps, Astrospheric is built with astronomers and astrophotographers in mind, providing location-specific clear sky forecasts, cloud cover, transparency, and atmospheric seeing conditions. Temperatures, wind speeds, dew points, times for sun/moon rise and set are all displayed so you easily know if you have an upcoming evening for going out. You can even set the app to track and show when a specific object will be viewable so that you know the best time to catch it!

*Only works for North America*

Not everyone has the ability to see a great deal when in the night sky from their home. We sadly are swamped with light pollution, but websites/apps like Light Pollution Map do make it possible to find the nearest dark sky location to you. LPM is an interactive tool for displaying the intensity and distribution of artificial light shining into the night sky across different geographic regions. You can see what your region’s bortle scale (night sky brightness measurement) is classified and scaled at. This is especially helpful for astrophotographers looking for the least amount of light pollution to get the cleanest images of the Milky Way or of deep space objects!

Solar System Scope is an interactive 3D model of our solar system. It also displays the night sky in its own planetarium mode. You can download this as a phone app, a desktop/laptop program, or simply use it on a web browser. One cool aspect of this program is that it uses real-time orbital parameters from NASA to show the precise positions of planets, moons, dwarf planets, and comets at any given date or time! I have used this app to figure out alignment patterns of the planets, or to see on which date a comet would be passing nearest to Earth for example. Its incredibly user friendly and has great educational tools for teaching information about all the objects in our solar system.

If you are truly interested in pursuing astrophotography, this app is a MUST to own! PhotoPills is a photography planning app that allows you to plan your photos ahead of time. It was designed to help you plan photo shoots for nightscape, Milky Way, Moon, sunrise, sunset, star trails, meteor showers, solar and lunar eclipses, time lapses, and more! I honestly am blown away by how much this app can help you with and honestly have not even used all it has to offer. Without a doubt, my favorite feature is the Augmented Reality which uses your phones camera to show you the position of the Milky Way, Sun, and Moon wherever you point it (you can also adjust the date/time for this)! I have used this feature to plan out my Milky Way shots ahead of time so that I got the sky and foreground framed just how I wanted them. It is also incredibly useful if you’re shooting an eclipse that will be low to the horizon.

If you ever get the chance to see a total solar eclipse, you MUST have this app at the ready. Solar Eclipse Timer does exactly what it sounds like it does. It is a talking timer that will call out the need-to-know phases and moments of the eclipse as it happens. A major reason this app is a must for a total solar eclipse is for safety reasons. Viewing a total solar eclipse requires that you only look at the sun without eclipse glasses when its light is completely blocked by the Moon. You do not have to worry about making a mistake and looking too early with this timer as it loudly calls out warnings for when to remove your glasses and when to put them back on. I used this app for both the 2017 and 2026 total solar eclipses and it allowed me to enjoy the moment fully without any worries.

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