How to find your star
Congratulations on naming your star, now it’s time to locate it in the sky. If still, you don’t have your star we advise you to visit our website and to choose one of our beautiful names a star gift packs.
To name a star, there are some steps to go through to ensure that you or the person you are buying the gift for will have your name on the star and no one else will claim it. One thing that everyone should be aware is that science does not accept this concept, so you do not need to consult NASA for buying a star.
So, now you have received your gift certificate. First, check DEC (declination) and RA (right ascension); just like we have on the Earth, they are sky’s longitude and latitude. Any particular star has a unique RA and Dec for all observers on Earth, and that position remains the same, night after night.
What are star co-oridnates?
RA (Right Ascension) is the celestial equivalent of terrestrial longitude. It shows how far a star is from the vernal equinox, celestial “prime meridian” or the spot the Sun arrives at on the first day of spring. The vernal equinox is currently located in the constellation of Pisces. The RA is measured in hours, minutes, and seconds and because the stars circle about the sky every 24 hours, right ascension or RA ranges from 0h to 24h. RA is measured continuously in a full circle from that alignment of Earth and Sun in space, that equinox, the measurement increasing towards the east, in just one direction — east.
Declination is like latitude, up or down. It shows a star’s position between the Celestial Pole and the Celestial Equator. Dec measures North/South directions while RA measures to East/West direction. Dec is measured in degrees, arcminutes and arcseconds it defines how far north (positive Dec) or south (negative Dec) of the celestial equator the object lies, and is directly analogous to the latitude coordinate here on Earth. Stars on the celestial equator have Dec=0o, stars at the south celestial pole have Dec=-90o, and stars at the north celestial pole have Dec=+90o.
How to find your star image on Nasa Website
The starting point will be the star coordinates. Let’s say we have assigned to you the following:
RA: 00H00m4.49s DEC: 03°56m47.25s
You have to convert your coordinate from the characters and letters with colon and also separate your RA and DEC with coma. in our example, you will need to input the following:
00:00:4.49,03:56:47.25
Then Build the link as following:
https://skyview.gsfc.nasa.gov/current/cgi/runquery.pl?Position=00:00:4.49,03:56:47.25&scaling=Linear&survey=DSS2+Red&lut=colortables/blu-grn-red-yel.bin&coordinates=J2000&projection=Tan&pixels=500
To make it simple, you can go to the the star Registry, search for your star using your star ID and click on the button Click here and you will see your star.
How to find your star in Google Sky
This time Google has surpassed itself. After giving us the GoogleEarth software through which admiring the most beautiful landscapes, now it allows us to explore the universe. You can now explore your star using Google sky. The Skymap developed by Google will show you the planets, stars, constellations and much more. You can make use of Android phones, iOS, Windows and many other platforms. Point your device to the sky and enjoy the wonder of having the entire sky in your hands.
The starting point will be the star coordinates. Let’s say we have assigned to you the following:
RA: 00H00m4.49s DEC: 03°56m47.25s
Then go simply to google sky via this link:
In the googleSky search bar, you have to convert your coordinate from the characters and letters with colon and also separate your RA and DEC with coma. in our example, you will need to input the following:
00:00:4.49,03:56:47.25
et voila! you have named your star and successfully found it on google sky.
