Dont Build it for the Background

I see it all the time at the cellphone store where I work, the moment a new device is purchased, we must accessorize! We must download a dozen new apps .. before we even know how to turn the device on. How many features on how many products have we never heard of, never read the instructions for (instructions? they went out with the box and receipt)... the 'thing' we bought quickly recedes into the background .. the cake disappears under the icing. Now maybe Im just an icing man but

The same seems true of building/restoring/acquiring a planetarium projector and dome. Im fighting it right now with my biggest ever star projector hand made - that 'ok its done, the stars are there.. now what' feeling. I need special effects! I need software to go with the hardware!. the Stars are Never Enough it seems. Im having to reel myself in and think .. I didnt build it for the background. Isnt that whats happened to most planetariums?

Why arent the stars good enough? Why isnt Rigel and Antares just as important as .. (insert 20 special effects and videos here). Is it because our imaginations have been replaced?

So I say, dont build it for the background. Keep the stars in the foreground. Effects, other subjects .. icing ... can be done of course in other ways. But enjoy what you so painstakingly have produced - the night sky.. first. It may be enough.

Its Bigger and Fainter Than You Think!

Finally drilling a big star projector is a revelation all its own, revealing for instance Ive never really LOOKED at the constellations in relation to one another. By that I mean, yes, Geminii is bigger than Orion, just fainter. The three Orion belt stars arent as bright as I thought, they just are hard to miss where they ARE.. and no, they are NOT in a straight line, they bend a little .. Sometimes I think I've looked at too many starmaps and books and not enough of the real thing. Orion has an upraised club right? I see it in every atlas. Have I ever seen it in the real sky? That would be .. umm no. I dont know where it goes ... its just .. up there over his head someplace .. and his shield .. the shield is problematic .. its very faint and keeps appearing brighter in my newly organizing sky .. I guess stars together or in a special place seem brighter, just like some brighter constellations seem bigger when they arent! Creating the sky maybe means understanding the skys true appearance. Like the stars themselves, its a very humbling experience. Ive spent a week on Orion and Geminii. And they still arent quite THERE yet ....

Just Work Down, Thats Whats Up

As builders of our own sky, sometimes ironically, the sky IS the limit .. in less cryptic words, we cant go up any further. Zeniths might be higher than our ceilings, our shed roofs, or in my case, how high my original-yet-inept carpentry could take me (limiting factor, my ladders and my sense of equilibrium, neither which are too good)... So what to do .. when you cant work up anymore, try working down!

Lower the horizon .. the projector .. the chairs .. I havent dug into the ground yet but the thought has crossed my mind .. seen in the accompanying picture, I needed more sky due to my not high enough roof in my remodeled main theater .. so I napoleanized it (a new verb, you heard it hear first!) - I shortend everything. it should look good in the dark, and now Ive got more sky for the same price!

So keep looking up, but dont forget to look down too. For as they say, space really has no direction. Just ask the guys standing upside down in China !

Black Vinyl, YOURE FIRED!

Ive had it up to HERE (well maybe, here... ) with black vinyl. I have bought my FINAL VINYL. Ive finally gone spasstic over plastic, excuse me if thats a politically incorrect term nowadays. I have bought enough black vinyl plastic to cover Delaware . over my home planetarium years for all manner of purposes... and in two massive trips to the Sumner Landfill today, I swore off black vinyl! I used it to make rooms dark ... but it doesnt really unless you buy the 4 MIL .. the lower versions let light right through! And with my carpentry, the wind ALWAYS brings down the corners .. there arent enough staples in Staples to hold it .. I'll have star shows when it gets dark if I have to .. go back to nature! but BUT then my biggest folly - use it to fight roof leaks!! But what happens over and over is .. it merely amplifies and funnels leaks into a torrent of rainwater in some corner .. while HIDING the sources .. then it sits around outside and collects rainwater, which hidden in the folds grows rancid .. the wind blows it all over the yard .. its goes everywhere, disposing of it means taking a shower in said water .. and so

black vinyl .. YOURE FIRED!!!!

i feel better now

'Making' Planetariums

If I were to sum up what I've learned, 'making planetariums' means alot of different things to alot of different people. What IS a planetarium anyway? To some its a projector of the stars. To others, its a domed theater. To even more, its a model, functioning or static, which depicts the heavens or some aspect of them. Its childhood memories, and its teaching children of all ages. Its expressing that love in related art, reading related books, and writing related articles. Its maintaining and restoring the old, its inventing and reimagining the new in technology. Its combining scientific laws of optics, mechanics, geometry in ways that can be enjoyed from private lazyboys to public forums. Its bringing physics and romance into a garage or spare bedroom. 'Making' planetariums is finding new uses for old 'junk' or commonplace items. Its learning mythology and biography, and meeting people both deceased and very much alive today.

If I were asked, what do you mean, 'making planetariums', I'd actually be more hard pressed to say what it isn't.

Astro Enhanced Art

I was frustrated, I couldn't find astro art that satisfied that odd mixture of science and emotion. Sure there was Starry Starry Night by Van Gogh .. stars dripping through the Paris(?) sky but where were my own mental images? Where was the secluded cove at Lake of the Ozarks watching the Cross slip into the darkened hills, time for Dad to fire up the 5 horse outboard and take us in. Where was Crux over south seas unimaginable as I stood for a few brief days on Maui and realized just how much larger the world was than my TV screen .. no art captured these emotions .. I found some pictures in old dusty shelf astronomy books and this brought the idea ..

I'd create my own .. enhance pictures I found that were ALMOST there in my mind .. the sunset, the sky .. the lake, the ocean . the scene .. how hard would it be to dab in some impressionistic yet realistic stars? Stars dont have to be pinpoints always .. we see them in our minds eye more a watercolor sometimes .. So I tried it .. I may make a collection .. just small additions

But is adding the cosmos to a scene small in any way? Or is it dreaming big?

I Might See my Future, and it Might Not be a Dome!

Ive got dome-fatigue you know, Ive built them out of sheets, posters, panels, displayboards .. and they arent ever tall enough, or smooth enough, or domey enough .. or big enough, or white enough, or light tighted enough!

So I mused as I lay in bed and gazed up in the dark at my square victorian bedchamber, 12 foot ceiling lost in dim haze and I thought .. I want kids to build star projectors darnit! Or buy my little one, my cakebox, if you will .. and use it where? where gare? Why in their bedroom of course .. nobody but my beloved geeky friends (i fly my geek flag high) are going to ever build a dome, or buy one ... I need stars on the ceiling ... And other folks are already selling these (see picture)

So I might see my future, and it might not be a dome..

I might need to build a bedroom out behind the barn to give shows in .. it might ought to be square not round ... pie r squared.. isnt that math?

Stars on the ceiling. As I lie there in bed ..