Planispheres: Guide To The Night Sky

For my observational paper I wanted to do something different, but yet simple, something that would state that you don't need a lot of money, or special equipment to indulge into astronomy and actually enjoy it. I looked into maybe buying a small telescope, but I thought I would get creative. So began my research into what ancient astronomers used for stargazing, and what sailors would use as navigational tools. My research led me to, …

…problem is that the planisphere map is only a few inches across, yet the sky that it represents stretches from horizon to horizon. What looks like a small group of stars on the map can spread over a large area of the sky. The trick is to find an easily recognized group to give you a feel for the scale of the map, and then look for other groups until you are familiar with it.