Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas

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For Father's day, I got the field edition of the Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas.  In the past, I always used the first edition of Uranometria 2000.0 by Will Tirion, which was published in 1987!  I was always very happy with the Uranometria and I always preferred the first edition over the second edition.  I never took the book outside, but I made a copy of every page which I put in a sheet protector.  I took the pages in a big folder outside to starhop through the skies.   

The Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas comes in a nice sturdy slipcase.

The last years, I mostly observed from home (Bortle 5), so I mostly observe bright objects.  Since last year, I added a SkyFI 3 to my Argo Navis / ServoCat so I can use SkySafari to always have a map on my phone or my tablet.  However, a real star atlas has a nicer overview, which is very useful when observing.  Under dark skies, a good star atlas is really needed to find the faintest objects.

A nice card with the legend of the atlas

The nice thing about the Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas is that only objects that are visible for an observer are drawn in the atlas.  The non-existent objects from the NGC / IC or objects from other catalogues that are too faint to be observed are not drawn in the atlas.  
The Interstellarum shows a brighter symbol for easy (or bright) deep-sky objects and a fainter symbol for more difficult deep-sky objects.  This makes it very easy to spot directly which objects are easy to see and which objects are difficult to see.  
The atlas is also made for use under the stars.  The pages are printed on a special material that looks and feels like paper, but is a waterproof foil.  According to the website of the atlas, the pages can be even put in a bucket of water without being damaged.  The colors are also selected so that the visibility stays high even when looking at the atlas using a red flashlight.  
The faintest stars are very similar to the faintest stars in Uranometria 2000.0 and also the scale is very similar, so I'm certain that I will like the new atlas a lot!

An example page of the Interstellarum Deep Sky Atlas

The last weeks the weather was actually very nice in Belgium.  But I really suffer from hay fever, so I did not observe (mainly because my eyes are watering all the time).  I hope to be able to do some observing during our holidays in July and August.


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