I have been working on my new book quite a bit and I thought I’d share the table of contents with you to give you an idea of what it covers.
This book is very different from my other book in that it’s not a tutorial, at least not the first half of the book. Instead it is a very information-dense book about astronomy – the history, the constellations, our understanding of how things work and some practical advice.
I designed this book to answer questions you either already have about astronomy or questions you will have as you study astronomy. I answer questions like “what’s a main sequence star?”, “what are the different types of telescopes?”, “how do celestial coordinates work?”, “what are the different types of galaxies and stars?”, and many more.
This book includes lots of diagrams and photos to help explain the concepts. I don’t waste any space getting you information and chances are that you’ll come back to re-read sections as you understanding deepens as you learn about astronomy.
I have included most of the table of contents here:
Introduction
History of Astronomy
__(there are several subsections here)
How The Universe Came Into Being
__(there are several subsections here)
Understanding the Constellations
__(there are several subsections here)
A Tour of Some Constellations Finding Things In The Sky
____Understanding Azimuth and Altitude
____Understanding Latitude and Longitude
____Understanding the Celestial Sphere
____Understanding Reference Points
____Horizon and Zenith
____Meridian
____Ecliptic
____Understanding Right Ascension and Declination
Understanding Telescopes and Cameras
____Understanding Optical Telescopes
____Understanding Light-Gathering Power
____Understanding Resolving Power
____Understanding Atmospheric Blurring
____Understanding The Different Types of Optical Telescopes
____Understanding Cameras
____Understanding Filters
Understanding What’s In Space
__ Understanding The Solar System
__ Understanding Stars
____Understanding Our Sun
____Understanding the Lives of Stars
____Understanding Main Sequence Stars
Understanding Galaxies
____Spiral Galaxies
____Elliptical Galaxies
____Lenticular Galaxies
____Irregular Galaxies
____Active Galaxies and Clusters of Galaxies
____Galaxy Collisions
Understanding Nebulae
__(there are several subsections here)
Observing The Sky
____Introduction
____Getting Started With Imaging
________Using the MicroObservatory
____________Accessing Your and Others’ Images
____________Viewing and Editing Images
________Getting Started Using itelescope.net
________Getting Started Using Slooh.com
____Understanding Image Processing
________Getting Started With Image Processing
____Using Planetarium Software
Despite the extensive table of contents, this book is likely to be around 110-150 pages long with lots of photos and diagrams.
More updates soon!
