Weighing in at 6.44 billion pixels in size, the full-color AllSky CCD image mosaic of the entire night sky visible from Earth may be the biggest addition to Starry Night software since its inception. Named AllSky for its uniform coverage from pole to pole, it’s a single picture of the whole sky.

See the entire Milky Way in exquisite detail and then zoom in to explore dust lanes and nebulae. Instead of dots and circles, you will see an actual photo of a star or a deep sky object.

Smoothly and swiftly navigate this full color photograph of the entire night sky, to a limiting magnitude of 14-15. Five years in development, the AllSky CCD mosaic is comprised of about 20,000 individual images, originally imaged at a resolution of 12 arcseconds per pixel with a scientific grade, custom built AP9E CCD camera.

View on your computer screen what you would see if you were looking through a telescope. The overlay of the AllSky CCD image and data has been precisely mapped to Starry Night’s computer generated stars and databases.

Zoom in on any object in the AllSky image and see increasing detail as higher resolution images are loaded in. There’s more to explore in each of the 5 levels of the image resolution.

Create your own Astrophotography

For Windows users, we’ve added a plug-in to MaxIm DL/CCD Advanced Imaging software (sold separately). This innovative integration lets you find your target with Starry Night, capture the image with your telescope and camera, process the image with MaxIm DL and then import the pictures back into Starry Night.

Take advantage of the FOV pane to create customized field-of-view indicators for your CCD chips.

This integration requires Starry Night Pro Plus 5.0 and MaxIm DL version 4.0.7 or higher. For more information about MaxIm DL, click here:

http://www.starrynight.com/promo/maxim/

• Home Scope moves your scope to its home position for easier computer-to-star alignment.Sync Gaze synchronizes the scope’s internal gaze direction with Starry Night.
• Park/Unpark lets you set the position of your scope when you’re not using it. This is ideal for scopes placed in a permanent location or in one position over several days. Simply unpark your scope and start observing immediately without having to perform a star alignment again or recalibrating.
• Slew Limits prevents the telescope from moving outside a user-defined horizon in both altazimuth and equatorial configurations. This helps to protect your valuable equipment that would otherwise hit the mount or tripod of the telescope. Starry Night Pro Plus version 5.0 also allows you to display your slew horizon in the Starry Night sky.
• Quick Center immediately centers Starry Night on the telescope position indicator.

For Macintosh users, we’ve also added a Telescope Handbox Simulator which allows you to push the direction arrows in the Starry Night interface to move your scope.

Compatible with More Telescopes

Starry Night Pro Plus 5.0 is now compatible with the Orion® SkyQuest™ Intelliscope® series (XT6, XT8, X10 and X12) in addition to these scopes:

See ASCOM web site for Windows support with telescopes.

Get Unprecedented Views of Earth and Mars

Zoom in and explore the surface of Mars and Earth in unprecedented detail with new higher resolution surface maps.

Mars

The Mars shaded color map in Starry Night Pro Plus version 5.0 is a 24-bit color map representing the Mars land mass topography above the sea. Map was enhanced by Mario Rossi.

Earth

Hover above Earth and take a quick dive into the atmosphere for a detailed surface map of 1 km (.6 miles) resolution.

Expand Your Knowledge and Experience of the Universe

More databases… more to explore.

Delve into the fascinating science, history and mysteries of the cosmos with the SkyGuide’s interactive, multimedia tours. A whole new way to interact with Starry Night, SkyGuide acts as your guide to the night sky and Starry Night. SkyGuide provides you with an tips on using Starry Night; tours of the night sky for every season; Astronomy Dictonary; Record Holders of celestial phenomena; links to up-to-the-minute astronomy and space news; and much more.

With direct, down-home explanations and impressive visuals of all kinds of night sky phenomena, you’ll never be lost in space again.

Choose from over 30 Photo-realistic Horizon Panoramas

Enjoy Exclusive Constellation Illustrations

88 new high-resolution constellation illustrations exclusive to Starry Night offer new interpretations and details on classical illustrations.

Pilot your own spaceship to explore 800 Million light years of space. Plug in a USB joystick and pilot the old fashioned way. Go There, Center, and Magnify also work in Spaceship Mode.

Never miss a noteworthy celestial event. SkyCalendar displays monthly, weekly, and daily views of upcoming astronomical events and regional star parties. Starry Night now provides the ability to import, view and even create your own calendars (using the standard vCalendar format). Moon phases, your observing logs, star parties or even an observing club calendar can all be viewed and maintained through the Starry Night SkyCalendar pane. Check out the date of the next New Moon and plan your observing schedule around it.

Know exactly where an object is and will be when you observe in the field. The Ephemeris Generator exports positional data for any object over a specific time span or interval. Options include: Rise / Set / Transit times for any object.

Track artificial satellite positions more accurately as predicted by the SGP4 model.

Starry Night now has an updated look and feel. Darker interface elements and larger readouts aid usability and make for a better user experience.

More options in the find panel allow customizable object searching.

Control the brightness of almost every object, indicator line and image in the Starry Night sky with brightness sliders. Toggle items on and off.