Sky Guy Stargazes & Presentations
The “Cat’s Paw Nebula” in the constellation of Scorpio All photos this page: Bill the Sky Guy
People Love space
Over the thirty five years I’ve spent as an amateur astronomer I have shown thousands of people all the cool things you can see in the sky if you have a decent telescope and know where to point it. I’ll never get tired of pointing the scope at some bright star cluster or the planet Saturn and hearing people’s excitement as they exclaim, “It really does have rings!”
Yet, other than the occasional enthusiast I’d run into, almost nobody at my stargazes has actually looked through a good telescope at the night sky to see the amazing things you find there. It’s not really all that surprising though because there’s a lot you have to get together in order to do it. You have to get some decent gear together, you have to learn the sky well enough to find your way around, you have to learn what kinds of sky objects you can see well with the equipment you have and do a little bit of studying to try and understand what’s going on with whatever it is you might have in your eyepiece tonight.
People are hungry to see and learn about space and the Cosmos because it makes them feel more connected to a larger ‘something’ but the investment of time and energy is simply too much with people’s busy lifestyles and our penchant for instant gratification these days.
the universe, at your fingertips
I can provide a truly unique experience for your attendees because no matter what time of year it is I can show them some really breathtaking sights and then, using plain English tell them about what that object is, why it looks the way it does, how old it is and how far away it’s thought to be. Then I try and put those distances (sometimes very large) into an understandable context so people start getting an inkling about the 3D nature of our Universe instead of the more common, “everything out in space is just waaaaay out there”.
Galaxy M84 (fuzzball in the top right ) is 66 million light years away.
The end result is something that usually has people saying things such as, “I’ve never in my life seen anything like that before!” It always makes me feel great to hear comments like that because I’ve made an indelible impression on somebody who just ‘showed up to look through a telescope’. When I can point my telescope at elliptical galaxy M84 and tell people, “When the light that hit your retina just now left that galaxy 66 million years ago, there were dinosaurs walking on the Earth!”
That kind of thing makes an impression you can’t get from reading a magazine or news story because it directly demonstrates the vast expanse of the Cosmos in a visceral, personal way. Over the last few years I’ve heard from dozens of people who say that my stargazes are the highlight of their vacation here in the Lowcountry. One mom even told me, “Thank God you’re here this week! This is all my daughter has talked about since we were here last year!”
You can be part of delivering an experience like this by hiring me to give a stargaze at your location.
So What Can I Do For You?
Stargazes
I can bring a telescope (or telescopes) to your event and show people a wide variety of amazing things in the sky. Here are two:
18-inch “Obsession” Model Telescope–Incredibly bright and clear images
Explore Scientific 6-inch refractor-crystal clear views!
To the left is the amazing Obsession 18-inch in diameter telescope. Its large width gives it tremendous light gathering capacity yielding astounding views of the planets, Moon and things nearby us in the Milky Way galaxy and can also do a very good job at seeing distant galaxies up to 100 million light-years away! It’s about 9 feet tall when looking straight up; I provide a sturdy step stool for those ‘way up there’ objects.
On the right is an Explore Scientific 6-inch refracting telescope which gives crystal clear views of the planets, star clusters and really large objects in the sky due to its wide-field design. Both telescopes are on motorized mounts which follow the sky as the Earth turns beneath it.
What Can you See?
So what can you see with equipment like this? Quite a lot actually! The types of things I like to show people are:
The Planet Saturn. This is about what it looks like in the big scope.
Globular Star Cluster “M5” About 24,000 light years away. Click for a larger image.
The Andromeda Galaxy “M31” 2.3 million light-years away. Click for a larger image.
The Planet Jupiter. See that Moon just off the top?
The “Eagle” Nebula (M16). About 6,000 light years away. Click for a larger image.
Open Star Cluster M37 in the constellation of Auriga–4500 light years away.
We also look at double stars with contrasting colors, supernova remnants and a few others but the above types of objects cover the bulk of it.
As we find each new sky-object in the telescope, I pull up a professionally taken photo of it and point out the things I think people should be able to see, even if they’re not experienced observers to help them notice as much as possible. I also explain what that object is, why it looks the way it does and what’s going on physically with it (dying star, cloud of glowing hydrogen or whatever…)
Presentations
I can also give indoor talks with slides in a “meeting room” type situation on a variety of topics. If my talk precedes a stargaze I’ll talk about the things we’ll be looking at that evening. Otherwise I have a number of topics I can present for a more lengthy, formal presentation if we’re not going to be looking through a telescope that night. The talks are not particularly technical in nature although some of them do deal with ideas concerning physics.
Contactless Stargaze
If desired I can do a ‘contactless stargaze’. The way this works is instead of people stepping up to the scope and looking, I replace the eyepiece with a sensitive astronomical camera which takes a series of exposures that display on a computer monitor or even a projector/screen setup.
Ideas for Events
Dinner or Dessert + a Stargaze. (obviously this is weather dependent). Lots of planets in the sky? “Planetpalooza”!; Springtime could have a galaxy theme. You can also have a theme for a planet when it’s at its closest for the year: “Saturn-day” or “Mars Attacks”. Moonday???
You could also combine an event with a meteor shower. The two big ones are the Perseids (August 11/12 every year) or the Leonids (November 17/18)
Pricing
Single telescope stargaze (2 hours or until we’ve had enough): $300
Two telescope stargaze (larger groups–keeps the wait time down): $400
Add a presentation in front of the stargaze: + $85
Presentation Only: $150
Solar Daytime Stargaze (it’s safe, special scope designed to look only at the Sun)—great for kids and adults. $150.
Weather and moon Issues
Obviously the weather plays a big part in determining if we can see anything through the scopes or not. I advise planning a “cloud date” to have ready for the next “clear enough” night. This is especially important in July and August.
The Moon is also an issue. It’s great to look at but the full Moon is so bright that it washes out, or makes it impossible to see the fainter things we look at in other parts of the sky, so we generally avoid the time around Full Moon.
Potential good moonless ‘windows’ in which to plan an event are as follows through the end of 2024:
January 3rd — Jan 17th (earliest observing start: 6:30 PM)
January 28th — February 16th (earliest observing start: 7:00 PM)
March 1st — March 17th earliest observing start: 8:30 PM)
March 29th — April 14th (earliest observing start: 8:30PM)
April 27th — May 14th (earliest observing start: 9:00 PM)
May 27th — June 14th (earliest observing start: 9:30 PM)
June 26th — July 13th (earliest observing start: 9:30 PM)
July 26th — August 11th (earliest observing start: 9:00 PM)
August 24th — September 11th (earliest observing start: 8:30 PM)
September 28th — October 9th (earliest observing start: 8:30 PM)
October 20th — November 9th (earliest observing start: 6:30 PM)
November 20th — December 8th (earliest observing start: 6:30 PM)
Note: these dates are only suggested “dark sky” times. If you really need a stargaze at an event already scheduled outside these times, we can still do it but you won’t really be able to see as much.
I also suggest trying to find a suitable date early in the window, in case we have to postpone because of weather.
Daylight issues
We all know that it gets darker earlier in the winter and stays light later in the summer. This can have an affect on when your event starts since we obviously can’t look at the night sky until night has actually fallen! So be aware of this when you set start times. For a month on either side of June 21st (Solstice) you can’t really start looking at the sky until 9:30pm. At the end of December you could start as early as 6:15pm if you wanted to! The general rule is it needs to be at least 60-90 minutes after sunset before we can really start viewing.
Contact Me
So give me a call at 513-608-3975 if you’d like to talk to me personally or you can send an email inquiry below by clicking the button.
I really look forward to working with you and giving your guests an experience they won’t soon forget!
Bill Gwynne
aka “Bill the Sky Guy”